According to the Accenture Technology Vision Study, 79% of more than 5,400 IT managers and business people agree that the introduction of artificial intelligence also accelerates the implementation of modern technologies in companies.
Voice control is a technology that should not be underestimated and offers new opportunities, especially for the e-commerce sector.
The accuracy of voice recognition technology is constantly improving and more services are being added all the time, so that more and more consumers are using voice services and the number of voice-first devices is also increasing.
A voice-first device, or digital voice assistant device , is an active, intelligent piece of hardware where the primary interface for both input and output is acoustic. Amazon Alexa is an example of this. The devices are already powered by artificial intelligence and offer a range of smart consumer services, such as playing music, controlling heating and lighting and calling up news, weather and sports scores.
In the following, I present some survey results that show that it is worthwhile for companies to start looking into voice control now. Companies in the e-commerce sector in particular should think about how they can also reach their target groups via digital voice assistants and support them with purchases. (Some of the figures are from the USA, but will also be relevant for Switzerland in the future).
According to Canalys, the number of smart speakers in use will have risen to around 100 by the end of 2018. million. This makes it almost 2.5 times as large as at the end of 2017. And these figures will continue to grow, more than doubling by 2020.
The following illustration shows the cases for which Voice First devices are already being used. It is important to note that voice bots can be integrated into other services and data delivery channels. They then act as personal assistants and can perform simple tasks such as making phone calls, reading messages or setting alarms and reminders. In retail, bots are primarily used to improve the user experience.
(Source: brn.ai – The Report 2018: Voicebots Ahead)
If you ask users why they use voice bots, the answers are very clear: voice assistants are faster than other methods, they are simpler and the output usually provides the user with a satisfactory solution.
Voice assistants are being used more and more frequently by users, especially in e-commerce. A popular feature here is the product search (51%), but it even happens that users pay directly via voice bot (22%).
Voice bots are already very popular, especially among teenagers.
Forecasts show that the figures for Google Assistant in particular will increase and that it will dominate the market.
One thing is clear: the spread of voicebots will certainly continue to increase and companies should definitely be represented here too. We’ll see whether Google Assistant or Amazon’s Alexa really makes it.
