As Digital Assistants become more popular, marketers must learn how to reach people on a new platform. Digital assistant brands are scrambling to beat out the competition and get to the top. Brands are now pondering how they can bring their products to a conversational voice interface. And Digital Home Assistant companies are now frantically trying to have the device with the most “skills”. Alexa and Google combined have sold approximately 12 million devices according to data from Consumer Intelligence Research Partners.
Alexa: “It’s only been a year since Alexa go introduced to the market, and I have not seen the pace of acceleration so fast in terms of the adoption and people getting accustomed to it.” Amazon is on a quest for Alexa to be everywhere. Laptop manufacturers like Acer, Asus, HP, and Lenovo are beginning to incorporate Alexa on their Windows PCs. – users will be able to control their computers from large distances across rooms. Panasonic is working on bringing Alexa to cars.
Google: Working on implementing a line of smart displays like voice-activated speakers with screens on them. The competition between Google and Amazon is hot. The Google Home offers more options when it comes to screen sizes and privacy features and full access to YouTube and other Google services. Google recently banned Amazon from using its services. Google’s enormous data load gives them a tiny edge as well; however, they still have some growing to do to surpass Amazon. Owning the biggest ad network in the world doesn’t hurt either – Google will be able to monetize their services rather easily.
Cortana: Currently in an uncomfortable position up against Google and Alexa. “Microsoft is getting out-Microsofted by Google and Amazon.” Microsoft and Amazon were at one point interested in combining their platforms into one at some point in 2017 but that never happened. Since Alexa is now being implemented on Microsoft computers this bodes bad things for Cortana. Maybe it’s goodbye? Cortana has never supported as many devices as Alexa.
Siri: Apple’s Siri is probably a little head of Cortana. Both Amazon, Google, and Apple have made sure to integrate their assistant with smartphones and therefore will stay ahead of Cortana. You can access Siri on any Apple device; however, not available on any third party speakers and users have texted Google versus Siri and say that Google provides more accurate answers – not a surprise. Siri is most likely not going to be the winner of the assistant face-off.
What does this mean? We are going to see a huge push for smart devices that can connect to your home assistant. Things like Fridges, mirrors, alarm clocks and more will become more widely adopted once the prices drop and the products have been available for longer. The goal for brands is to offer both voice and AI learning algorithms that can automate key tasks into devices throughout a home to ultimately, make people’s lives easier.
The confusions: None of the devices can talk to each other. Say you had an echo dot and a google home mini – they could both do the same things but they wouldn’t be able to connect and sync together to control your home. This means there may be some initial confusion for buyers – what do we do? Well, it seems to pledge allegiance to one company for all your smart devices is the way to go to sync everything with no glitches. Digital assistants will become the next web browser.
Who will you let into your home?
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