Ask any SEO or PPC practitioner which search engine they’re most focused on, and the vast majority will say Google. It’s understandable, too; with the majority of market share going to Google, Microsoft still has a huge mountain to climb if it wants to becomes the engine of choice in the future.
In a recent interview with digital marketing agency Impression, James Murray, EMEA Product Marketing Manager at Bing, explained how Bing Ads will be adapting to the rising popularity of voice search, and where he sees voice playing an important role in ad targeting. You can watch the video of his interview here:
Voice “An Inevitable Bid Modifier” from Impression
What does voice modification look like for advertisers?
One point Murray was very clear on was that the current volumes of voice search don’t yet warrant the ability to be able to break out voice as a specific bid
modifier. But it’s certainly something that’s likely to appear on Bing’s roadmap – and no doubt Google’s, too.
Essentially, what we’re saying here is that voice search could be something on which we base budget adjustments, for starters. Knowing that a searcher is using their voice to search will give us insights into where that user might be in the sales funnel and, depending on the query, their propensity to buy. For example, if a user is using voice to search for a coffee shop, chances are they’re currently out an about and looking for coffee, so their propensity to buy is higher and therefore our bids may also be higher as a result.
What it will also likely mean is that voice-appropriate content will become a factor in quality assessments. If your website isn’t setup to deliver information to a voice searcher, or your brand isn’t one that currently services a voice need, it may be a consideration in how – and if – your content is served when the request is made.
What should we be doing to prepare?
In much the way the SEO industry is preparing for voice search by investing into higher quality content, long tail keywords and the acquisition of featured snippets, PPC managers too will be considering how best to broaden their reach to a voice-driven audience.
Google’s changes to “exact” match earlier this year is one example of how AdWords is attempting to adapt to natural language queries, changing the level of control we theoretically have over our campaigns, but equally providing opportunities for us as advertisers to adapt our messaging and our content to serve users beyond the search bar.
What’s more, the technical excellence of our websites, particularly when it comes to mobile, will continue to be an essential factor and should play a huge role in our marketing strategies in the months to come.
You can watch the full Bing interview at https://www.impression.co.uk/bing-interview/
