APPLE TAKES A BITE OF LOCAL SEARCH

APPLE TAKES A BITE OF LOCAL SEARCH

iOS is Becoming the Primary Local Search Platform for Millions

 

This year, Google announced that mobile search volume would surpass desktop search volume. Concurrently smartphone users have been migrating from mobile browser-based web platforms to apps. According to an Interactive Advertising Bureau study, consumers spend 88% of mobile internet time in apps. According to Comscore, as of April 2015 Apple Maps is now the 11th most popular mobile app in the U.S. If the next iPhone performs as well as the the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus, it is likely to continue to cement iOS as the primary local search platform for millions.

 

Is iOS Search Taking on Google?

 

Whether iOS is a deliberate shot across Google’s bow, or more likely in Google’s face, or just Apple trying to continually improve its customers’ experience, there’s little doubt that iOS Search will start to chip away at people’s reliance on Google Search. In fact, it already has. Consider the following use cases that already exist: A Siri voice query for local information (e.g. “bars”) brings up local results from Apple Maps A Spotlight search for local information brings up local results from Apple Maps, links to relevant installed apps and suggestions for new apps A local query in Safari, on both iOS and Yosemite, suggests an Apple Maps listing in the address bar before ever launching Google Search. Of course there are plenty of non-Local use cases as well. Apple is building a search engine baked into its operating systems. It is focusing on the content that its customers have shown to value most—content within apps— and leaving Google and Bing to duke it out over which wants to pay for the privilege of being backfill.

 

This means that all of your website and app content can be available to iOS users via search. For example, for retailers, this could mean a store’s location and other pertinent info could be presented to mobile searchers—whether or not a user has even downloaded the app onto their iPhone.

 

While the service is still in beta and will likely evolve considerably, Apple provides the following recommendations for having your content appear in iOS Search:

 

1. Drive interactions with your search result to improve ranking. Having rich search results is the best way to foster engagement. Include images, reviews, ratings and actions whenever possible. In other words, make sure your content is great.
2. When responding to search result engagement, go straight to the content in your app, avoid any mid-steps, splash-screens or interstitial views.
3. Speed matters. Time from tapping a search result to the content in your app is measured and used in ranking.
4. Always index your user-generated content.
5. Use the same identifier when indexing the same item with multiple APIs in order to avoid duplicates and help your app rank higher. See Search for Developers for more detail on the iOS Search APIs.
6. Markup your website with schema. iOS supports Open Graph and AggregateRating, Offers, PriceRange. InteractionCount, Organization, Recipe, SearchAction and ImageObject from schema.org. Two actions are currently supported: calling a phone number and getting directions to an address. In order to enable these actions you must implement either the telephone item from the Organization schema or the Postal Address schema from schema.org. Only items indexed using web markup are eligible to show in Safari.
7. Providing rich results to drive engagement is the best way to improve your ranking. Always include a relevant thumbnail, title and a unique description. When possible, add metadata for ratings and actions such as dialing a phone number, or getting directions to an address. Since your engagement-to-shown ratio will be an important factor, only showing results when your app has a compelling answer is crucial. When using keywords, only include terms related to the items such as synonyms or abbreviations. Providing users with a great experience, minimizing time from result to content and avoiding any interstitials or multi-steps are very important. When handling results in your app, get the user to the relevant content as quickly as possible.

Initial Local Optimization Strategies Based on the above and tests with the iOS 9 beta, recommend the following initial strategies for targeting local search queries on iOS:

 

1. Either include a full store locator feature within your iOS app or use Universal Linking to your website to insure your locations appear in results. It’s unclear whether or not these will trump Apple Maps results. More than likely the order of these results will be based on each user’s interactions.
2. Make sure your location data is visible to Applebot and up to date. Apple appears to be biased towards treating as many search results as local queries as possible. Having consistent, visible location data will be critical to your brand’s visibility.
3. Focus on indexing only your best content to improve your “engagement-to-shown” ratio. For local businesses this appears to come down to avoiding indexing content that could be duplicative from a keyword-basis with your main views. For example, if you are a financial advisor company, you’ll want to make sure your “Financial Advisors in Pleasanton, CA” page is indexed but perhaps avoid indexing a legalese page on your website that uses the term “Financial Advisors” in its title.
4. Use <description>tags on web pages to target popular keyword variations of the page’s main target keyword. You will need to be careful to balance this with best practices for Google, but at least in the early days, my bet is that Applebot will be much easier to game with keyword stuffing. In fact I wouldn’t be surprised to see people set up sites solely to game Applebot while blocking Googlebot.
5. Invest in acquiring local user-generated content both within your app and on your website. If a user adds a review via your app or site, your content is more likely to show up in these results.

 

Final Thoughts…For Now

 

The direction is clear: search is making a leap from the public web and into the private space occupied by mobile apps which, increasingly, are capturing consumers’ attention, and dominating all other forms of media engagement. As iOS 9 Search rolls out, businesses will need to continually test and iterate in order to stay in front of its ever-increasing mobile customer base. The iPhone’s enormous penetration means that iOS Search will be used by millions from day one. Whenever new technologies emerge at scale like this, there will always be opportunities for early adopters to learn the system and reap the rewards. In many ways, optimizing for iOS Search is no different than optimizing for Google Search: • Make sure your content is accessible to the bots • Understand and use keywords your target customers are searching for the more relevant and engaging the content, the more likely it is to show up This last point is perhaps the key differentiator between iOS Search and Google Search. Instead of using backlinks as its major ranking factor, Apple appears to be focused on user engagement—both Public and Private. Writen by Yext

Written by

Kevin Scrimgeour