Is your blog the answer? People are asking questions. There was a time when people just typed in a word for search and found what they wanted but now we searchers have evolved. We expect more. The humans, they expect more from us bloggers.
When was the last time that you were sitting around with a group of people and someone asked a question and you said “hold on a moment, I will look it up?” That was just five minutes ago right? Perhaps you even found this blog post this way. Our smart phones are now our calculators, our social device and of course, our second brain.
Now that Siri and Google Now has entered the picture we do not even have to type out our question. We just have to hold down a button on our phone and speak. It turns out that since we can speak instead of trying to type on a small keyboard that we speak in full sentences or complete questions.
There was a time when it was so difficult to type out a quesiton that we would just type something like “bbq’ and hope that Google would give us the closest place to eat lunch to our current location. That type of search is so last month and today we hold down a button and we ask “where is the best Bar B Que place to eat in Bedford?” When we ask this quesiton that is frankly far more complex than we could ever imagine we expect an immediate answer. Not only do we expect an immediate answer but we want to to be as thourough as our question was.
What amazes me about this is that search engines did not say “oh well” they have stepped up. Google has created a whole new algorithm to answer these questions.
Check out this great FAQ article by Search Engine Land. As always they do a great job of breaking down some of the most common questions about this change. If you are curious about why this matters just keep in mind that your potential clients and your potiental readers are asking questions. Let your blog be the answer to your next potiential client’s question.
FAQ: All About The New Google “Hummingbird” Algorithm
http://searchengineland.com
Google has a new search algorithm, the system it uses to sort through all the information it has when you search and come back with answers. It’s called “Hummingbird”.
I hope that you have gathered in this post that I have been purely referencing search on a phone and not on a desktop or a laptop. Mobile search is not just on the rise it is becoming everything, ok maybe not EVERYTHING but just about everything. To give you some perspective here are some stats from Econsutlancy that you will want to pay close attention to.
- As of February, Google’s click-to-call ad formats in mobile search were generating 30 million calls every month.
- According to Google’s Mobile Search Moments Study, 40% of mobile searchs have local intent. Similarly, 77% of mobile searches occur at home or at work, while 17% take place on the go.
- Mobile search is more common in the evenings, with 22% of searches taking place between 8pm and midnight.
To read more go to this article:
30+ compelling mobile search statistics | Econsultancy
http://econsultancy.com
Mobile search is an unavoidable part of digital marketing as if brands don’t adapt to consumer behaviour then they risk becoming sidelined if their competitors are faster to react.
Just as a final note, there is another important part of the hummingbird update that goes hand in hand with this point. Your blog and your website must look good on mobile. Make your blog easy for people on a mobile device to navigate and make it easy for people on a mobile device to read. People do not like to pinch and zoom and they sure do not want to see their screen filled with nothing but a bunch of words. Break up your words with short paragraphs, images and bullet points.
The most important thing to remember is to be the answer. Use your blog to answer questions for your potential human visitor. Is your blog the answer?