Life is unimaginable without robust search engines that deliver relevant results to the queries fed into them. Whether it is on your smartphone device or your laptop, the fact remains that each one of us searches for multiple things on the internet every single day! Organizations understand that, and this is how they drive more customers towards them.
For example, if you need to purchase some home décor, then there is bound to be various businesses that you can find online that will be selling the same products that you want to purchase. This is beneficial and requires almost no effort if you are the customer. But what if you are managing a business? How can you make sure that your business can successfully compete with other businesses and come out as the winner?
The answer to this question lies in understanding and employing the various techniques for vertical search optimization. Vertical search engines are different from general search engines like Google, in the respect that these search engines are more focused on a specific type of online content. Vertical search engines are also known as topical or specialty search engines. And in this article, we’ll basically be covering everything that you need to know about how you can profit from vertical search optimization.
What is a Vertical Search Engine?
As we mentioned above, vertical search engines go a step beyond than general search engines. What we mean by this is that when an individual searches for something on a universal or general search engine like Google, then he or she can have a lot of varying data on his or her fingertips within a matter of just a few seconds. But when somebody searches on a vertical search engine, then he or she will only get results related to a specific domain. For example, if somebody searches something on PicSearch.com, then he or she will only get results in terms of pictures.
This is why put simply; a vertical search engine would focus only on one specific industry or type of content. Common examples of vertical search engines, include Skyscanner.net, Hipmunk, Momondo.com for the domain of travel and flights, IceRocket.com, BlogPulse.com, and eBuzzing Labs for searching for blogs, TinEye.com for images, 123people.com and Pipl.com for searching virtual profiles of people, BoardReader.com for forums, Blinkx.com and PodScope.com for searching audio and video files, and AudioGalaxy.com, MixTurtle.com, Music-Map.com, and SongBoxx.com for searching music.
It is important for readers to note that the term ‘vertical’ does not just refer to the indexation but also to the serving of the content in a neatly organized or ‘vertical’ manner. These slimmer indexes of content provide an individual with the benefit of having a pure focus on a particular activity, business, or domain of area. This provides that individual with faster, better, and more accurate results. Apart from that, vertical search engines provide users with the ability to leverage domain knowledge, including ontologies and taxonomies. One can also find support for specific unique user tasks on vertical search engines.
And according to various sources, a large number of users are moving towards vertical search engines. In this fast-paced world, a user does not want to waste his or her time looking at various websites and sources before he or she can find what he or she has been looking for. Instead, users now want quick and better results that lead them to high-quality products and services.
This is why it is vital for businesses to not just focus on optimizing search at the level of Google or other general search engines, but businesses now need to take things forward and work efficiently at optimizing search at the level of vertical search engines. By doing this, one can come across as a true expert amongst all competitors.
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Why is Vertical Search Engine Optimization Valuable for My Business?
If you are still convinced from our discussion above that vertical search engine optimization can be a true game-changer for your business, then we have prepared a list of all the reason why vertical search engine optimization can be valuable for your business. And that list is mentioned below.
- The Significance of High Intent
Once consumers have a set mind frame regarding what they need to buy, then the chances increase dramatically of those consumers of using a vertical search engine to purchase what they want to. Because of this, complete bypassing of the universal search engine the task of domain-specific businesses become simpler as all they have to do now is to show up for their customers.
Further, it is a well-known fact that the vertical search engine is full of people who are ready to purchase various services and products. This means that when it comes to vertical search engine optimization, the task of an organization is not to coerce customers into making the final purchase, but they need to show their customers that their product or service is of the best quality and is worth the price.
- The Data-Driven Factor
As a business or marketer, you know that the main goal of a business is to get maximum return out of any investment. Also, a key part of marketing involves accurately identifying and engaging with the right target audience. And customers on vertical search engines provide all of that and more.
Customers who engage in vertical search engines provide highly structured data to various businesses. And if your business falls under that category, then you can use that extremely structured data to come up with a highly specific and targeted marketing plan.
A good example for illustrating this point is Amazon. If you have ever searched something on Amazon, then you must have noticed that Amazon sends back a highly tailored list of associated or similar products. This is not a coincidence. That is Amazon’s data-driven advertising at work.
- The Built-In Relevance
A big struggle for advertising is the fact that they always have to stay relevant to their target audience. This means that a television advertisement can reach a million people and it still won’t have any effect if it does not appeal to the audience.
Thankfully, with the help of vertical search engine optimization, you can stay updated regarding the exact context under which the consumer is looking for a particular product or service. This information can, in turn, be used by the organization to come up with an advertisement schedule or strategy that is highly appealing to the target audience.
Techniques of Vertical Search Engine Optimization (VSO) and How Can I Employ those Techniques?
Now that we all understand why vertical search engine optimization or VSO is important, the next question that you might have would probably be along the lines of how your business can employ vertical search engine optimization. If that is the case, then you don’t have to worry because we have prepared a list of some of the best practices that you can employ for your vertical search engine optimization campaign. And the list is mentioned below.
- Research the Behavior of Your Audience across Different Search Engines
It isn’t rocket science to understand the fact that customers visit different websites for different reasons. This means that the expectations of customers regarding what they want will vary from one website to another.
This is why the first thing that your organization needs to do is to understand what your customers expect from you. One excellent strategy for doing this is to analyze the data that is available on different platforms that fall under your domain and have a similar target audience. In this manner, your organization would be able to come up with a plan for responding appropriately.
- Maintaining a Cohesive Brand Presence across all Major Social Network Platforms
One of your major goals as an organization is to come across as a leading expert in your industry or domain. And to achieve that you have to make sure that there is a sense of cohesiveness amongst all the information that is present on all your social networking platforms.
- Understanding the Ranking Framework
It is vital to understand the ranking factors that can affect your website. And to do that you should analyze the websites of your competitors. You should focus on what factors your competitors are stressing on. After that, it is advised that you should focus your strategy on that.
- Creating Unique Content for all Your Platforms
Ask anybody in the social industry, and they will always tell you about the perils of duplicate content. And the fact is that this also applies to vertical search engines. If you do not wish to miss out on search traffic, then it is paramount for you to steer clear from duplicate content.
- Continue to Adapt and Change
It is a well-known fact that the market is always changing. And this is why our final advice to you is to always stay up-to-date regarding that change and adapt your marketing and search engine optimization strategies according to that.
Check out – Inbound Marketing Agency
The Conclusion
Before ending the blog, one final note that we would want to leave our customers with is that if you wish to stay ahead of your competition, then you always have to keep up with the trends and do everything in your power to maintain your edge. These days the best way to maintain that edge is through vertical search engine optimization.
