34 Percent of Marketers Expect to Have a Voice App by 2020, Alexa with Big Lead Over Google Assistant as Enthusiasm Runs High in New Report
A survey of North American marketers by Vociebot.ai and Voices.com found that 24% of marketers have already launched a voice app such as an Alexa skill or Google Action. Another 6% of marketers expect to introduce a voice app this year, followed by 4% more next year bringing the total to 34% by the end of 2020. Those results suggest over one-third of marketers will have a voice app for conversational engagement within four years of the launch of Google Assistant and six years after Amazon Echo first arrived.
However, about 50% of marketers report no firm plans to launch a voice app. With nearly 50% of marketers on the sidelines, but 34% engaged is that good news for the voice assistant ecosystem as a budding marketing channel or a negative? When taken in conjunction with other data from marketers it is likely a net positive. These are some of the findings of the State of Voice Assistants as a Marketing Channel report published this morning. The report includes 20 charts embedded in 30 pages of analysis. Report sections include:
- Overview of Marketer Voice App Adoption Related to Consumer Usage
- How Marketers View Voice Assistants Today
- How Marketers View the Leading Consumer Voice Assistant Channels
- What Approach Marketers are Taking for Voice App Investment
- What Voice UX Choices Marketers are Making Today
Voicebot will be hosting a webinar to discuss the findings at 1:00 pm EDT on July 31st along with Voices.com CEO David Ciccarelli as the featured guest.
Register for WebinarMarketers Favor Alexa Today Over Google Assistant
Another interesting finding from the report was the big lead that Alexa has over Google Assistant among marketers. Two charts brought this difference into particular focus. First, about 83% of marketers with a voice app have launched an Alexa skill compared to around 47% with a Google Action. Microsoft Cortana, Samsung Bixby, and Apple Siri were far behind for a variety of reasons.
Second, when marketers were asked which consumer voice assistant had the most potential today, 61% chose Alexa while 24% said Google Assistant. Apple’s Siri was another 11 points further behind. This sentiment was reinforced by another data point about the long-term potential of the consumer voice assistants for marketing.
Enthusiasm for Voice Assistants as a Channel Runs High
Going beyond the horse race, the overall sentiment toward voice assistants as a marketing channel was very positive. Nearly 90% of marketers believe voice assistants with be an important marketing channel with 25% expecting it to be extremely important. This was not limited to promotion activities as 69% are enthusiastic about the potential for voice apps to support product discovery and 62% expect them to drive voice commerce transactions.
It is fair to say that enthusiasm among marketers is exceeding activity by a significant margin. However, the number of voice apps launched by marketers is closely matching consumer adoption of smart speakers and the percentage of marketers that expect the channel to be extremely important. This delay likely represents a lag between the idea and the actual execution of that idea. The next question is then how marketers will act to take advantage of this new channel.
“With voice app development taking off, the one aspect that marketers can’t lose sight of is the voice that will represent their brand or campaign,” says Voices.
Download the full 30-page report here.
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