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Voice Search for B2B: 3 SEO Tips to Get You Ahead of the Competition

Since the invention of “digital personal assistants” like Siri, Alexa and Google, voice search has been on the rise. Early adopters found that these tools were somewhat helpful, but knew they had a long way to go before they would implant themselves into our everyday lives. Today, these digital personal assistants are a lot smarter and more accurate. As a result, they’re integrating them into nearly any newly developed electronic device.

Users leverage digital personal assistants to play music, add tasks to lists, and search for information. While voice search has been seen as something crucial for B2C marketers, that is no longer the case. Today’s savvy B2B SEOs are optimizing their businesses and clients to take advantage of B2B voice search. Check out the video below to learn more.

Articles I reference in this video:

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Like I said in the intro, we’re going to be talking about voice search and more specifically we’re going to be talking about how voice search is impacting B2B companies. Voice search has come a long way. Voice commands are being used in a new number of different ways. And the other thing about it is technology like Alexa and Siri and Google and you name it has a lot more data and though they’re getting smarter and they’re getting better at delivering the right queries when people are asking them. Yes there are ways to use voice search in maybe some funny ways, Siri and Google will tell you jokes and all that, but people are also using it in very serious ways to help them with everyday business problems.

There’s been some research done over the last couple of years, used to be done by Stone Temple Consulting and now they’ve merged with Perficient Digital that’s kind of tracked the trends of voice search and how voice search is being used. And if we look at this data, we can see that voice search is being used obviously in a lot of personal applications or areas that would be more individual or life oriented spaces. But we also see them being used in the office and we also see them being used with coworkers in the office.

Voice search is being used cooperatively in the office. But the interesting thing is voice search with coworkers is on the rise. We saw a rise in that in 2019. Now this is typically your younger age group, those twenties to thirties and then that range who are really taking the lead on using voice search. But I don’t think it’s just for play.

I think they’re also using it to find answers to the problems that they’re trying to solve because we look further in the data, more you make, so the people in the 50,000 to about a 100,000 mark and then $100,000 and over, those are the ones who are using voice search the most, even in these office locations and these office settings. We can also see that the higher your college degree, the more likely you are to actually be using voice search. So voice search is making its way into the workplace. It’s also making its way up the C-level and to the people who are more likely in a decision making position inside of a business. So, what do we do to optimize it and how is voice search different?

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Well, voice search is a lot different than typical search where you would get on a computer. It’s a little bit more keyword driven. Yes. People use phrases and Google has really shifted. We’ve talked about this a number of times, shifted their algorithm to be more semantic so they understand how all of these themes fit together, but one of the ways that voice search is different is it tends to be a lot more conversational and it also tends to produce very long or much longer queries where people like find me the best business book on finances and that’s a very long question. If you were searching in search from a desktop, you might just do best business book or best finance book, but if you’re doing a voice search, you would say find me the best.

It’s a lot more like, “”Hey would you find me this? You’re talking to like an assistant, really, what these are called. More assistance, right? So that’s one way that search is different. It’s a lot more conversational voice search. The second way is it tends to be a lot more localized.

22% of voice searches in a study done showed that they were looking for local information specifically. Find me the best CPA in my area. Things of that nature. Find me the best business coach, find me the best co-working space, things like that in my area or close to me or near me. People are using voice search very much for local information. And the third way that it’s different is it’s very action-oriented. People are looking to take action, right then. Typically if you’re using voice search you’re in the car or maybe you’re in the office working on something with coworkers and you need to find something now.

You can’t wait for it. That’s what you’re doing. Typically the longer sales cycle, the informational searches, is most of search that is done behind a desktop still and people are reading and looking for information and taking their time. But voice commands and voice search tends to be very action oriented and action driven.

What can you as a business owner do about it? There are a couple of things. One of the things is structured data. This is something we’ve talked about on this channel quite a bit and understanding how do we take our content and the story that we’re telling and the creative stuff that we’ve done in the website and then make it easier for the search engines to process. And this is where structured data comes in. We have a number of videos on that and we’re going to continue to do some teaching on structured data, but this is something if you haven’t implemented it yet, you should start doing. Things like structuring your organization, your blogs, the way your images are on there and how things show up because this is going to impact those rich features that you’re seeing in search now where there might be that information on the sidebar or people also ask for questions or the FAQ model or the video models carousels, we’ve had a lot of those different options now in search.

Most of that is being informed by the structured data that really helps the search engines understand what your site is about. The second thing you need to do is claim your Google Business listing.

Google My Business typically was seen as more of a local tool, but it has implications nationally, internationally as well. You need to claim your profile. You need to make sure that it’s optimized proficiently, that you’re in the right categories. You have the right information on there because Google is going to be checking Google My Business and your website and making those connections together. It all has to make sense and it has to be seen as one entity online. Google is putting a lot behind Google My Business and they’re investing a lot. There’s a lot of cool new features in there as well that you can use to reach people and when they’re on their mobile devices, they search your business, usually that’s the card that comes up first and you need to make sure you have the right information and really that you’re in control of that information.

And the third thing you need to do is focus on mobile. If you don’t have a mobile strategy, I know a lot of businesses that we work with in the B2B space, they tend to get most of their traffic from desktop, but there is quite a bit, and I do see growth in mobile traffic even in the B2B side. So you need to have a site that obviously functions mobily that is targeted mobily, and optimized for a mobile experience because a lot of people doing voice search are doing so on a mobile device. So those are the things you really need to pay attention to. Your structured data, make sure that you have your Google My Business listing together, and make sure that you have a mobile optimization plan in place.

These are things we’re going to continue to talk about on this channel and show you and give you tips on how to do these things and achieve these things. This is an overview of how B2B is now being impacted by voice search. And it’s something that we can’t just say, well that’s for the B2C clients or that’s for things that don’t apply to us. It’s starting to apply to everybody and now’s the time to take it seriously if you want to get ahead of the competition.

So, thanks for checking out this video. If you have any questions or thoughts on this topic, please comment below. We would love to continue that conversation with you. Don’t forget to subscribe to our channel, and until next time, Happy Marketing.

Author: Ryan Shelley

Ryan's pretty much your average guy, except for the average part. He is the owner and founder of Shelley Media Arts LLC. He is passionate about helping companies make a more personal connection online with their customers and prospects. Ryan is active in influencing and promoting human driven SEO, personalized marketing and empathic… View full profile ›

What to do in the first 90 days as a marketer

“Ergh, urm I - er, I’m not sure”.

That was me back in 2008 when I started my career in marketing and was introduced - unexpectedly - to my MD. I wasn’t expecting to bump into them, and at that moment when I was asked who I was and what I planned to do in my new role - a simple question - I lost the ability to speak.

Why hadn’t I prepared an elevator pitch for this very reason?

What a great first impression from the marketer who’d said in the interview she had the ability to communicate effectively and, as such, would be the right candidate to help craft the voice of the business.

After this, I swore I’d always prepare for whatever role I had. Of course, every role I went on to hold, within the first 90 days, I would find myself facing new ‘first experiences’.

The first time I had to:

Manage a meeting, but was faced with a really loud person who dominated the meeting.

Create buy-in for a new campaign and share that SEO wasn’t a ‘dark art’.

Manage expectations when we missed lead targets.

I dread to think about how much time I spent worrying about if I’d done a good job or if I was delivering what my new boss required of me.

In fact, it’s a focus we have at Careercake, the video careers platform I work for, that creates content to help people overcome the firsts. If new hires can understand it’s okay to make mistakes, they could spend more time delivering.

Why it’s important to take on the first challenges as a new marketer

The problem is, a lot of time can be spent focusing on the ‘wrong’ parts of a new job and by doing so, can really affect the impact you have.

This article is the culmination of answers to the questions new marketers are asking us during the onboarding phase as well as the tips I wish I’d been told as that first time marketer who was longing to make a great impression.

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So, here are eight steps for new marketers to make a great impression:

1. Understand what’s required of you (and what authority you have)

The first thing you need is to get real clarity with what your objectives are. Far too many people don’t get this from the start, which makes it difficult to understand after month one, month two and month three whether or not you’re doing what’s expected of you.

Of course, this will be determined by the level you are working at. However, you need to know where the opportunities lie as well as any restrictions there may be. It’s your job to push for this, after all, it’s your career, not your manager’s.

What are you responsible for? Are you tasked with:

Growth marketing? (acquiring new users)

Partner marketing? (developing relationships and opening new channels)

Product marketing? (hits to specific product pages or sign-ups)

It is all too common for a marketer’s objectives to shift over time - more so in an SME where you’re the first marketer and the business is pivoting whilst it tries to find product-market fit. But the needle can’t keep moving: for both your sanity and the business’ success.

Agree with your manager what your focus will be within the first 90 days and set some objectives to work towards.

Avoid just looking at hard numbers, your objectives need to also address the professional development aspects. Developing and nurturing relationships, understanding the culture and learning who is who are also really important to your long term success. You’re not there just to hit marketing KPIs, after all.

2. You’re going to feel like you have to work twice as hard as everyone else

I really feel for marketers. In some businesses, we are incredibly misunderstood and can often be the discipline that works extra hard to justify a project or change in tactics. We tend to be the first out or our budgets are slashed when things get tough because a stakeholder doesn’t understand the value of our work.

Understandably, this can impact your confidence levels and feed that inner dialogue that is telling you “you’re not good enough” or “they’re going to find you’re not as good as you said you were in the interview”. It’s no wonder many marketers experience imposter syndrome.

It’s tough to remove this feeling completely but what I would suggest is set expectations from the start and understand who you can talk with if you’re feeling a little low or in need of a confidence boost.

3. Get ready to challenge your boss (professionally)

If you are the first marketer appointed in the business, there’s going to be the occasion that you have to push back on your boss because, quite simply, what they are suggesting isn’t possible.

“I want 100 leads from top FTSE companies, in the next six months, with no budget.

“Let’s sign up to this annual contract because I was told it’ll get me sales.”

“We don’t need to see what the competitors are doing."

Sound familiar?

The expectations of some bosses who may not have marketing training mean that when you come in, you’re expected to perform all sorts of miracles.

It’s not their fault, marketing may not be their bag, but if you don’t manage expectations from the outset the rest of your 90 days - and in fact tenure there - is going to be tricky.

If you find yourself in this type of situation I suggest explaining in a way that they respond best to why their suggestion may not be feasible, but always follow it up with an action plan on how to overcome it. Present them with solutions, not just problems and that’ll help alleviate some of the pain.

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4. Get to grips with your positioning - and fast

The business you join may or may not already have its positioning nailed. Either way, it’s your job as a marketer to test it and see if it’s resonating.

You need to define what your business is and why this is important to a particular segment of customers.

Talk with a range of stakeholders to see if they recite back to you the positioning you see on the website or within presentations. If they are struggling to convey what it is the business does and what problems it is solving, you may have your work cut out for you. Importantly does this match with what customers are saying and see you?

Don’t accept poor positioning it’ll make your job so much harder.

An amazing person to follow on this is April Dunford. I’ve seen her talk many times and her no-nonsense approach to this actually makes it easier to approach.

In her words, she says: "Marketing can polish a turd. Positioning can turn a turd into fertilizer". Check out her tips on how to conduct positioning work on GrowthGenius.

5. Overcome phobias: The first time you have to make a phone call in an open plan office

We use our smartphones for everything, apart from talking to one another. We’ll order pizza, we’ll check in on social media. The frightening thing is, some of us scroll more in one day that we walk. But when it comes to talking with someone for some reason this really scares people - but it shouldn’t.

I mention this because I hear of all sorts of stories where new hires are so worried about others hearing their call they’ll go and conduct the call somewhere they ‘feel safe’. Using this example, I would suggest booking a room where you can spread yourself out and write a script.

But don’t write it word for word, I want you to colour-code different areas to help guide you where the conversation may go. Write up that first sentence where you introduce yourself or that paragraph that helps you to deal with the call if that person isn’t in. You’ll need to do this a few times but once you’ve got your flow and understand your style, it’ll be easier.

6. Talk to at least 15 customers/prospects

I love it when I see a new hire take the initiative and talk with customers to get a feel for how the brand is seen. Do this as soon as you can and follow the next few steps:

Arrange conversations with around 15 customers or prospects.

Arrange face to face meetings or video calls, to pick up on social cues.

Get them talking about what problems your product solves.

Example questions to start with, based tools including the Jobs to be done framework, include:

Tell me what was going on in your day that made you realize you needed (product).

What would you be using if you weren’t using (product)?

Tell me how your role would change internally if using (product) was a success.

What is it you like about (brand)’s customer service or speed of delivery etc?

The info you collect will be important and can be used in a range of ways, from landing pages to sales scripts and more.

7. Create a customer journey map to identify quick wins

Walkthrough your customers’ journey by mapping out every step and interaction they have with your business. Start with what you know from a marketing perspective, and then go to each department and ask them for their input.

It works wonders for building those first relationships, and what’s more, this process will help you to highlight success gaps that any MD would be interested to see and act on.

Check out Hubspot’s article on creating customer journey maps.

Here’s a framework I use:

8. Create a mini action plan that will set the scene for your overall marketing plan

This should be a culmination of all of those customer interviews you’ve conducted, all those opportunities you’ve highlighted, as well as key research you’ve picked up that will meet that initial objective you’ve been tasked with owning.

I tend to work with marketers to create a mini-plan over the first three months to see how we work together, what their strengths are and to create small realistic targets. It also helps complement the testing phase of a marketing campaign and can be a great foundation for things to come.

This mini action plan pulls through elements of PR Smith’s SOSTAC® framework but seeks to set a basis of working and will be used to show your boss how you work and what support you have access to.

Stage 1:

What does the business do? What is its positioning? Who are its competitors? Is it on track to meet the targets set by the company? What are the customers saying?

Aim: You want to audit the business to understand its current situation (internal and external factors) to determine what strategy you’re going to propose.

Stage 2:

What objective are you looking to achieve (relate back to point 1)? When will you revisit and revise?

Aim: Think about the business level objective you are looking to help work towards. If you’re looking to help increase new business think about what segments you are going to market to and which metrics you’ll need to look at that will help you build momentum.

Stage 3:

What is your strategy? Is it to go after a particular market? How will you position the company? What potential activity will you drive?

Aim: Here you will use the information you collected about the customer - why they buy, how they buy and how they search for solutions like yours to pull together to create a campaign.

Stage 4.

What will you measure and control? What milestones will you look to work towards every week and month? Use this to manage expectations with your boss and ensure communication channels are open.

Summary

The first 90 days as a marketer can be tough but it’s also a great opportunity to develop both your personal brand and your ability to develop awesome work. These tips are there to help accelerate your learning and help you make an impact sooner, giving you shortcuts to some of the answers you may find you may need to thrive.

With a background in the learning, tech and recruitment industries, Lucy Heskins, Marketing Director at Careercake, has a track record in building marketing functions and driving marketing strategy to scale businesses.She was a finalist in the Best New Talent category in the ESTNet Wales Technology Awards 2019 and a finalist in the Wales Online Awards both for the work she's done with Careercake.

Busy Entrepreneurs Can’t Live Without These 10 Essential Productivity Tools

We’ve all got our own favorite productivity tools, tips, and tricks that help us organize our task lists, assign projects, and manage deliverables. Today, there are more project management and productivity apps and software programs geared toward business owners than ever.

Here, 10 entrepreneurs share the productivity tools they use to stay on top of everything.

We asked real business owners their favorite productivity tools they use to stay on top of ... [+] everything.

Aalap Shah, founder of 1o8, an e-comm-focused digital agency based in Chicago, loves Monday.com for project management.

“My business has clients, vendors, independent contractors, and full-time folks all trying to communicate, and it has streamlined our Slack, email, and file management tools into one centralized (and colorful) dashboard that allows us to glance at a project and know where it's at,” he says. “I love the integrations it has—be it invoicing, other communications tools, Google Drive—along with the extensive training and documentation that it has for a novice to be able to take this tool and harness it to its fullest potential.”

Shah recommends diving into a few of the webinars or training videos on the site and reading a few case studies. “What’s cool about the tool is that it’s flexible for almost any business, and then within your business, you can set up boards for all sorts of different activities and tactics,” he says. “The best part (and tip I can offer) is getting into a daily habit of using it—I load up all the tasks right after a meeting, for example, so it stays fresh and gets assigned to the right team to execute against.”

2. Focus To-Do: Break down tasks into bite-sized chunks

For managing time and tasks, Brandon Ackroyd, founder of U.K.-based Tiger Mobiles, prefers Focus To-Do.

“I primarily use it for the Pomodoro function,” he says. “The night before work, I make a to-do list of things that need to be accomplished. Then on the day, the app has a timer to break down work into intervals. I set it to 25 minutes in length and tick off tasks when they are complete. After every 25 minutes passes, I take a five-minute break. After four of these cycles, I take a 15-minute break.”

3. Trello: Color-coded organization

Chloe Brittain, owner of Opal Transcription Services in Calgary, Alberta, Canada, uses Trello, a Kanban-style app, to organize new projects—from a long-term to-do list to an editorial calendar to an SEO campaign. She also uses it for simple things like keeping track of articles she wants to read later.

“"I prefer Trello to other organizational tools because it's versatile but also simple,” she explains. “I can easily rearrange items on a board or card, color code things, add checklists and deadlines, etc., and even with all these layers of complexity, it’s easy to understand visually where I'm at and what still needs to get done.”

Brittain says if you need functionality beyond basic projects, you can use extensions (called Power-Ups) to help you customize the tool to your needs. “For instance, you could add custom fields to your cards or integrate your Trello boards with Dropbox,” she says.

4. Teamwork: Track milestones and due dates

Shane Griffiths, partner at Clarity Online, an SEO marketing agency in Seattle, loves using Teamwork to stay organized.

He says, “It allows us to stay organized with recurring work, due dates, and important milestones. For large projects like website redesigns, we can add the client to our project so they can always see the status and get updates. We can even assign them tasks like reviewing design mockups or delivering copy,” Griffiths said.

Griffith’s favorite tip for Teamwork is to utilize recurring tasks.“That can save you a ton of time when managing a project or simply organizing your week,” he explains. “It’s a very useful platform that can be used both internally and externally to organize a company.”

5. Google Tasks: Assign actions from your calendar

Taiisha Bradley, publicist and founder of Modernoire, a minority business alliance in Murfreesboro, Tenn., uses Google Tasks to help with her productivity.

“Like many small business owners, I am constantly in my inbox,” she says. “It’s so easy to list my tasks and to-dos right there in my email screen as I read through my emails. My Tasks even adds dates and times to my Gmail calendar so I don't have to take another action to update my calendar or to create a deadline. The ability to add subtasks to main tasks is even more helpful when a task has many parts to completion.”

Bradley suggests watching YouTube videos of how to use Tasks. “I always learn something new from watching the most recent shortcuts and hacks from ‘techies’ on YouTube,” she says.

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