Beginner’s guide to Actions on Google

Srishti Maurya
Nov 8 · 5 min read

Actions on Google is an interactive developer platform for the Google Assistant. We can build Actions (voice applications for Google Assistant) for Google Assistant which are available on various surfaces, like phone, speakers and smart displays. For developing a voice application for Google Assistant, you’ll need the Actions on Google platform.

What do Actions do?

Actions help extend the functionality of the Google Assistant.

Actions are nothing but voice applications for the Google Assitant platform. They enable the users to get the task fulfilled with just a simple voice command at the other end of the “Ok Google” query. For example —

  1. Ok Google, tell me about today’s weather
  2. Ok Google, turn off the bedroom lights
  3. Ok Google, start my run with Nike Run Club

These Actions range from short queries (“Call mom”) to long conversational experiences (Trivia Games and other voice apps). Actions are nothing but an aid to the user’s request (referred to as an Intent) and an equivalent fulfillment that can accomplish the request. We can build Actions to fulfil requests with web content, android apps or even using smart home devices. We can even build our own custom conversational experiences from scratch.

Short Queries v/s Long Conversations

Approaches for building Actions

There are multiple ways to build Actions. This includes the following —

You can add your web content, data, to the Google Assistant in a structured format, fitting the predefined schemas to enhance discoverability and enhance the search experience for the user. Structured data is nothing but addressing details to Google about the content with the help of predefined schemas. Google then presents the content in an interactive format. Users get intense conversational exposure generated from the content. You can learn more about adding structured data to your website by following Google’s codelab.

Having structured data helps Google index and better present your content

Actions on Google provides predefined schemas that lets you automatically generate the Action at the cost of properly markup content.

  • FAQ
    A Frequently Answered Questions (FAQs) is a list of questions and answers related to a particular topic, for example, product or services etc. If you own an FAQ page, you can align it according to the FAQPage schema to present your content to the user who searches Google for it. By using the FAQPage structured data, your questions and answers will be displayed directly in Google search results and the Assistant.
FAQ search enhanced with Google Action
  • How-to
    How-to guides are a type of step by step instruction manuals, which walks the reader through accomplishing a specific task. If you have a How-to guide, for example, something like Wiki-how, you can easily mark it up using the How-to schema and exhibit your content as a rich result on Google search. A properly marked-up content automatically generates a How-to Action for your content. So when a user asks the Assistant for guidance with something, your content is served to the user.
A how-to guide for tying a tie-knot
  • News
    To make your show up your news content in the Assistant’s directory, you need to make it platform ready. First of all, associate your content with Google News. Then, mark up your content with AMP (Accelerated Mobile Pages) and finally, align your news content according to the structured Article schema.
News over Assistant
  • Podcasts
    Podcasts refer to the episodic series of audio or visual files available on the internet which can be listened and downloaded by the user. You can mark up your content according to Google’s guidelines or RSS feed guidelines and build a podcast action for your content.
Podcast on Assistant
  • Recipes
    You can add your structured recipe data for preparing the content of your Action. In order to serve the preparing instructions for your recipe for guidance with Google Assistant on Google Home and smart displays, make sure to add recipeIngredient and recipeInstructions. These properties are necessary to make your recipe eligible for guidance. You can find a more detailed overview of the properties on the Recipe page.
Recipe over Google Assistant

With the help of App Actions, one can increase the discoverability and extend the functionality of their Android application by including the support for built-in intents to include the express tasks or quick information calls such as book a ride, hotel room cost, restaurant menu etc. It is one of the more powerful offerings from the Google Assistant platform. For example, when a user wants to start his run with the Nike Running app, instead of opening the app, navigating to the desired screen, the user can just ask Google Assistant to start the run. This is possible because Nike implemented App Actions for its Android app. This saves the user time and removes friction from the process.

And finally, you can create Actions specifically for Google Assistant by designing and developing your own conversational experience. From designing a fun trivia game using templates to building voice-first solutions for the health sector, the possibilities are endless. And with the introduction of Interactive Canvas, one can build more engaging experiences for devices having a screen. Make sure to check out the conversation design guidelines in order to build better voice applications.

Custom Conversational Action

Hey Google, let’s build an Action

Head over to the Action Console and get started with your very first Action project. Do not forget to share the invocation names of your Action in the comment section. We are excited to see what you build! 🤓 (or have already built)


Voiceano is a voice interaction design and development studio that builds conversations for Alexa and Assistant. If you feel that your brand needs a voice, then you should definitely grab a drink with us! 🍻😄

Voiceano

Voiceano is a voice interaction design and development studio that builds Actions for Google Assistant

Srishti Maurya

Written by

An undergraduate student, currently studying computer applications. Passionate to be a Data Scientist. Currently a Business Intelligence fanatic.

Voiceano

Voiceano

Voiceano is a voice interaction design and development studio that builds Actions for Google Assistant

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