Tag: amazon

Hyundai Develops Alexa Skill For Remote Car Control

Posted on by Lab Team

What Happened
Hyundai has become the first auto brand to bring Alexa integration into cars as it launches a new Alexa skill to remotely control a variety of car functions on its Genesis models. Available on the Genesis G80 now and soon on the G90 models, the integration allows car owners to speak their commands to Alexa-enabled devices at home to perform tasks such as lock and unlock the car, set the AC temperature, or even honk the horn.

In related news, the automaker is partnering with Amazon for an on-demand test drive program. During this weekend and next, Prime members in Los Angeles and Orange County can request a 2017 Hyundai Elantra be delivered to their door for a test drive.

Why Brands Should Care
With this Alexa integration, Hyundai has found a way to plug their connected cars into the smart home space and open up new possibilities for them to connect with customers at home. Similarly, Volkswagen struck a partnership with LG earlier this summer to connect its vehicles to smart home devices and other gadgets. As automakers experiment with smart home device connectivity to expand the reach of their services, other brands should take note and start exploring this space to reach customers at home as well.

The Lab has extensive experience with building Alexa skills and helping brands navigate the new realities that conversational interfaces are set to bring. If you’re interested in learning more, please reach out and schedule a visit to the Lab. For additional information on how brands can effectively reach consumers on conversational interfaces, please check out the first section of our Outlook 2016.

 

Source: AdAge

Amazon Pushing Alexa Into Connected Home And Car

Posted on by Lab Team

What Happened
Amazon has big plans for its voice-activated digital assistant Alexa. The company is seeking partnerships with smart home device makers such as Nucleus to build Alexa Voice Service into their products. This initiative is aimed at positioning Alexa as the central command hub for devices around the smart home space, even the hardware that isn’t made by Amazon. Beyond the home space, Amazon is also actively seeking to integrate Alexa into the connected car. The company has so far established partnerships with BMW and Ford to explore how Alexa can bring voice commands into cars and, in Ford’s case, bridge the gap between smart home and connected car.

What Brands Need To Do
Amazon’s vision of an intelligent assistant is set to push conversational interfaces into new spaces and further infiltrate consumers’ daily lives. In turn, it will give rise to more marketing opportunities for brands to reach customers in cars or at home with branded Alexa skills. As Amazon continues to push Alexa into the smart home and connected car, it is time that brands start working with developers to build branded Alexa skills.

The Lab has extensive experience with building Alexa skills and helping brands navigate the new realities that conversational interfaces are set to bring. If you’re interested in learning more, please reach out and schedule a visit to the Lab. For additional information on how brands can effectively reach consumers on conversational interfaces, please check out the first section of our Outlook 2016.

 

Source: New York Times & The Verge

 

Amazon Launches New Alexa Developer Tool For Audio Games

Posted on by Lab Team

What Happened
Amazon is adding a new developer tool for building with Alexa Skills Kit that aims to make it easier for developers to create “choose-your-own-adventure” audio games. The tool includes a graphic interface for crafting and visualizing decision-tree flowcharts that will guide players through games with audio clues. Developers have already been making audio games for Alexa with the most high-profile one so far being The Wayne Investigation, a Batman-themed mystery game that Warner Bros. launched in March to promote the release of its Batman Vs. Superman movie.

What Brands Need To Do
While Alexa-enabled Echo and Fire TV devices may not seem like an obvious choice for gaming, the conversational interface they employ opens up interesting possibilities for brands to engage with Alexa users via voice-based interactions. With this developer tool, Amazon is encouraging developers to explore Alexa’s gaming capacity. Brands interested in developing branded Alexa skills should consider leveraging this handy tool to create a fun, gamified experience.

 

Source: CNET

Amazon Had A Great Prime Day With Voice-Ordering Via Alexa Popular Among Shoppers

Posted on by Lab Team

What Happened
Amazon reported record sales for its second annual Prime Day event it held on Tuesday. The Seattle-based ecommerce leader enjoyed an increase of over 60% in global sales volume and more than 50% in the U.S. compared to last year’s Prime Day.  Compared to the mixed reaction Amazon received last year, the consumer feedbacks regarding Prime Day improved significantly this year, according to two social analytics services.

An important tidbit emerged from Amazon’s press release on Prime Day was how much the sales event pushed sales for Amazon’s Echo smart speaker. Tuesday counted as the largest sales day for Amazon Echo devices, with sales up over 2.5 times compared to the previous daily sales record. Interestingly, many Echo users also tried out the Alexa-enabled voice ordering, purchasing one Alexa-exclusive deal per second on average during Prime Day using their voice.

What Retailers Need To Do
Given the positive results, it seems very likely that Amazon will bring back Prime Day next year. The success of Alexa-enabled voice ordering shows the potential for integrating ecommerce capabilities into voice-based conversational interfaces. As more and more Amazon shoppers get Alexa-enabled devices, voice ordering is something that retail and CPG brands need to look out for.

The Lab has extensive experience with building Alexa skills and helping brands navigate the new realities that conversational interfaces are set to bring. If you’re interested in learning more about our take on this topic, please reach out and schedule a visit to the Lab.

 

Source: Amazon’s Press Release

News Roundup: Amazon Prime Day Is Here Again

Posted on by Lab Team

What Happened
Today marks Amazon’s second Prime Day sales event, the ecommerce giant’s answer to Black Friday and Cyber Monday. Before you run to Amazon.com and try to get yourself some heavily discounted goods, check out all the related news about the second Prime Day:

• Amazon says this year it is increasing the number of items on sale to 100,000 across all departments and product categories, as well as upping the frequency of flash sales from every ten minutes last year to every five minutes.

• Leading up to Prime Day, Amazon started offering exclusive deals via Echo, prompting users to try voice ordering via Alexa.

• Walmart is taking on Amazon Prime Day with a week-long free shipping deal for all shoppers who order on Walmart’s website, with no minimum purchase required.

• Some major retailers such as Target, Sears, and Banana Republic are offering one-day-only deals today in response to Prime Day.

• Menswear e-retailer Mack Weldon is opting to sit out on Prime Day for it wants to ensure “ full control over customer experience.”

• According to a new CIRP report, Amazon Prime now has 63 million members in the U.S., who are estimated to spend $75 billion on Amazon this year.

Why Brands Should Care
The first Amazon Prime Day sales event last year was met with tepid response, with many customers voicing their dissatisfaction with the sale selections and comparing it to a “garage sale.” Nevertheless, it significantly boosted the sales volume on Amazon, with U.S. sales almost doubling itself year over year according to online retail tracker ChannelAdvisor, and attracted “hundreds of thousands” of new members to sign up for Amazon Prime. By all measures, it was a solid start for Amazon to develop an online shopping holiday a la China’s Singles’ Day sales event spearheaded by Alibaba. For participating brands, Prime Day provides a good opportunity to increase brand exposure and stay relevant in the ecommerce space. The ones that choose to opt out of Prime Day can still ride its coattails and capture interested online shoppers with their own sales.  

Sources: various publishers as linked in article.

Header image courtesy of Amazon.com

Amazon Expands Alexa’s Shopping Capability

Posted on by Lab Team

What Happened
Alexa lovers rejoice! Amazon has expanded the shopping capability of its digital voice assistant service. Previously, Amazon Echo users could ask Alexa to make basic purchases such as reorders of existing products as well as order a handful of select items from Amazon. On Friday, Amazon announced that Alexa can now search and purchase millions of products that are eligible for Prime shipping. Now when users ask Alexa to buy a product, Alexa will suggest a Prime eligible product and tell the cost, and users can simply place the order by responding “yes.” Certain product categories, including apparel, shoes, jewelry, and watches, are currently not eligible for purchase through Alexa, but Amazon says it is adding new items to Alexa’s shopping list daily.

What Brands Need To Do
This expansion marks an important step in Amazon’s integration of its industry-leading ecommerce business with its growing line of Alexa-enabled products. As we explained in our Outlook 2016, conversational interfaces will drastically change the rules of search discovery for brands and this serves as a good example to that point. When shoppers search for items via Alexa, they won’t see a list of options as they would on Amazon.com, but are instead served with a few top choices determined by Amazon. As Alexa-enabled devices continue to proliferate, especially among Prime members, it can significantly alter how shoppers discover and order products, and brands relying on Amazon as a sales channel will need to take proactive measures to respond.

The Lab has extensive experience with building Alexa skills and helping brands navigate the new realities that conversational interfaces are set to bring. If you’re interested in learning more about our take on this topic, please reach out and schedule a visit to the Lab.

 

Source: CNET

Amazon Makes It Easier To Discover Alexa Skills

Posted on by Lab Team

What Happened
Amazon’s virtual assistant Alexa is getting new skills every day, but it hasn’t been very easy for users to find and activate the skills they want for their Echo devices. This pain point was largely alleviated as Amazon revamped the skills section of the Alexa mobile app, putting all skills into 20 browsable categories – including Connected Car, Smart Home, Shopping, and Travel & Transportation – and adding new search tools to make Alexa skills more discoverable. In addition, Amazon is allowing users to activate new Alexa skills by voice command. Users can now access their previously enabled skills via a new “Your Skills” section.

Since its low-key launch in November 2014, Amazon Echo has turned out to be a sleeper hit, ushering voice-based conversational interfaces into smart home devices. Early adopting brands such as Capital One, Domino’s, Kayak, and StubHub have already created branded Alexa skills to better serve customers at home. In fact, Amazon says now there are more than 1,400 skills available for Alexa users to explore.

Why Brands Should Care
As the list of Alexa skills grows longer, it was getting increasingly difficult for branded skills to cut through the clutter and stand out, and this revamp brings some much-needed structure and search capabilities for Alexa skills. Therefore, it is important for brands to properly name and tag their Alexa skills, make sure their skills are filed under the right category, and keep a close eye on this development to ensure the discoverability of their Alexa skills.

For more information on how brands can develop authentic brand voices and navigate the new interface, check out the Conversational Interfaces section in our Outlook 2016.

 

Source: Amazon Developers

Header image courtesy of  Amazon Developers

 

NBC Develops An Alexa Skill To Catch Up Viewers On Its Shows

Posted on by Lab Team

What Happened
NBC has become the first broadcast network to develop a skill for Amazon’s virtual assistant service Alexa. According to an exclusive report by GeekWire, NBC’s Alexa skill aims to provide an alternative way for people to catch up on some popular NBC programs, such as Saturday Night Live, The Voice, and Jimmy Fallon’s late night show. There is not much detail on exactly what types of content Alexa will dispense or how this skill works, but the network does share that a pre-recorded “flash briefing” segment was recorded during live episodes of The Voice for this Alexa skill. Previously, NBC News also created an Alexa skill to enable Echo users to ask Alexa for poll results and other news related to the election.

What Brands Need To Do
At first glance, Alexa may seem to be a mismatch for visual media content given its voice-based conversational interface. But NBC’s example, along with the audio adventure game that Warner Bros. created for Alexa in March to promote Batman vs. Superman, shows that it is possible for entertainment brands to insert their content into Alexa and turn it into a voice-enabled promotional channel. For other brands looking for new channels to distribute branded content, developing an Alexa skill is certainly an option worth exploring.

For more information on how brands can develop authentic brand voices and navigate the new interface, check out the Conversational Interfaces section in our Outlook 2016.

 

Source: GeekWire

Walmart Partners With Uber And Lyft For On-Demand Grocery Delivery

Posted on by Lab Team

What Happened
Walmart is partnering with Uber and Lyft to test an on-demand grocery delivery service  beginning within the next two weeks in Denver and Phoenix. Walmart will charge a $7 to $10 delivery fee when online orders are placed so customers don’t need to pay the Uber or Lyft drivers when their orders arrive. This new services puts Walmart in direct competition with Amazon, which offers similar services via Prime Now and AmazonFresh.

What Retailers Need To Do
Walmart has been taking measures to modernize its online retail experience in order to effectively compete with Amazon, including launching a mobile payment app in December and testing an online order pickup program. This new move marks a significant step in Walmart’s ecommerce expansion as the partnership with two leading ride-hailing services gives it a huge logistical boost to fight against Amazon. Retailers need to take a cue from the two retail giants and start testing similar on-demand programs to meet the growing consumer demand for convenience and instant gratification.

To learn more on what retailers can do to reach today’s connected shoppers across sales channels, check out the Boundless Retail section in our Outlook 2016.

 

Source: The Verge

Boston Children’s Hospital To Further Integrate Amazon’s Virtual Assistant Alexa

Posted on by Lab Team

What Happened
After releasing an Alexa skill called KidsMD last month that dispenses healthcare advice for parents with sick kids, Boston Children’s Hospital is planning to further integrate the voice-activated virtual assistant into its daily operations. The hospital and its sibling facilities are working to “bring Alexa into patient rooms, help doctors take notes, read back charts, and more,” according to a spokesperson.

During a recent demo at its simulation center, the hospital staff set up three mocked-up rooms — an operating room, an intensive care unit, and a child’s bedroom — to demonstrate how Alexa may assist in medical and healthcare domains. While the demo session revealed some potential drawbacks of Alexa, as it occasionally misunderstood commands and frustrated doctors, it nevertheless offers a hopeful glimpse into the future of healthcare aided by voice-activated tools.

What Healthcare Brands Need To Do
Hands-free interactions enabled by voice interfaces are a natural fit for hospitals, as doctors and healthcare practitioners would be relieved from some manual tasks in order to focus on their patients. For brands, however, this kind of interface presents new challenges in discovery as they only present limited options upon requests. Therefore, healthcare brands should be proactive in experimenting with voice-activated devices via deep integrations or partnerships.

The Lab currently has extensive experience working with brands to develop Alexa skills and incorporating them into brand strategies. So get in touch or schedule a visit to the Lab if you’d like to learn more about how to reach your audience via conversational interfaces. For more information on this topic, check out the Conversational Interfaces section in our Outlook 2016.

 

Source: Stat News