Voice is the new normal, not just a threat or an opportunity: Virat Tandon

'As per Google data, voice search has grown by 270% in the past one year', said Virat Tandon

Voice is the primary input mechanism for a significant majority of searches in India already, Virat Tandon tells Alokananda Chakraborty

Let's start with VoiceX. What was the need for an agency to specifically cater to the voice needs of advertisers?

Voice is the new normal when it comes to a significant segment of users today — broadly the “type-challenged” and the “type-averse”. In the coming years, both these segments will grow as new users get onto the digital ecosystem with voice as the primary input mechanism. As an agency model focused around hyper-bundling, we are today building a strong technology and data ecosystem that our clients can tap into for disruptive growth. 

Why must voice search SEO matter to business owners? Does voice search really improve the search process? Is there enough data to prove that?

As per Google data, voice search has grown by 270 per cent in the past one year. So voice is not really a threat or an opportunity, it is the new normal. Here and now searches are today the norm on voice, and by early next year, ComScore predicts 50 per cent of all searches will be voice searches. It’s no wonder that the voice recognition market is already a $601 million industry.

How do consumers use voice search? Are corporations in India voice search ready? Where does VoiceX fit in in the new scheme of things?

It is early days for voice and so is the overall conversational commerce in India and that’s where we start by helping brands and businesses become voice-ready. This means starting with auditing their current digital assets, understanding current consumer experience journeys to create a voice and conversation readiness report which highlights possible interventions that could be voice-enabled experiences. 
 

VoiceX is starting with readiness reports, and then partner the business all the way through developing solutions and monitoring and maintaining the voice assets. 

Do we make queries in the same way via voice as we do through keyboard inputs?

The key to voice as an input starts with the word count: We speak roughly at 150 words per minute compared to typing at an average of 40 words per minute. This is what is disrupting voice search, more long-tail, no auto-fills etc.

How will voice search impact digital marketing in 2020? How does one optimise one’s website for spoken queries? What are some of the key trends in voice search marketing? 

By 2020, as predicted 50 per cent of all searches will be voice searches. But more importantly, it’s not like one can ignore their text- or image-based websites too. Once a brand/business builds out its NLP (natural language processing)-based purpose-led BoTs (internet robots), the same can be deployed across touchpoints —screenless devices, screen-based devices, WhatsApp, social channels and so on to power user conversations.