Yext Knowledge Network to Help Alexa Get Better at Local Search

Loup Ventures annually measures what it calls voice assistant IQ. The test is designed to compare leading voice assistants by their ability to answer a common set of 800 questions. One area where Apple Siri performed particularly well in the test was local search. Google Assistant edged Siri out by the narrow margin of 88% to 87%. Amazon Alexa trailed with only 63% correct answers. One thing both Google and Apple have in common when it comes to local search is the Yext Knowledge Network.

All of the search engines have multiple sources of data. Yext is one of those sources for local information that enables companies to proactively keep data about them up to date. Jeffrey Rohrs, Chief Marketing Officer of Yext, told Voicebot in a recent interview:

“We believe that companies should be in control of the objective facts about their business across the digital universe, because they are the best source of authority…Those entities understand where they are located, what their hours of operation are, what their accreditations are; if they are food service, what their menu is and how it changes on a monthly basis. All of those are things consumers are searching for. Our whole philosophy is to put companies in control of those facts across the digital universe.”

Multiple sources ranging from web pages to mobile apps may include information about local businesses. However, these sources vary significantly in their data fidelity and frequency of updates. How does a search engine know which source has the most current information? Yext’s solution is to get search engines to default to its knowledge network that companies proactively update and assure accuracy.

Yext Local Data Comes to Alexa

Yext announced in July at Voice Summit that the Yext Knowledge Network would be integrated with, “Amazon to give businesses control over the answers Alexa provides to them.” This is good for Yext customers that want the service to be available anywhere consumers may ask about their businesses. However, the key measure to look for is whether Alexa gets better at answering queries about local businesses. One way we may be able to gauge the impact is if Alexa narrows the gap with Google Assistant Siri in the next Loup Ventures voice assistant IQ test.

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