According to Google’s research, the average query on it’s Mobile Search is 15 characters long, but takes roughly 30 key presses and approximately 40 seconds to enter. This means that search engines don’t have a lot to work with when tasked with providing the user with an experience that roughly equates to the quality of desktop search.
One way in which Google and others are compensating for this lack of keyword action is by providing what’s known as ‘predictive search’ (or ‘predictive phrase/query suggestions’) in order to help users complete their queries more easily and to help them deliver more relevant search results. You may have already seen this in action: when you key in a search for ‘pizza restaurant, San Francisco’ on your phone, a little drop down – much like your phone’s predictive text writing function – attempts to ‘fill out’ your search query for you by providing a variety of options such as: ‘pizza restaurant’, ‘pizza take out’ and so on. It’s a neat way of helping users to conduct a faster search and guaranteeing the provision of relevant results.
But from a technical point of view, this new functionality presents a new web marketing opportunity. Just as you might try to identify a set of keyword categories to align yourself with in the desktop web, it’s now extremely important to place yourself in the most common ‘predictive search phrases’ that are related to your business and location.
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