AdExchanger Talks is a podcast focused on data-driven marketing. Subscribe here. This episode of AdExchanger Talks is supported by Exponential.
The rise of voice interfaces has the potential to be a highly disruptive trend in consumer technology. About a quarter of US broadband households own at least one smart home device, and 50% will accommodate smart speakers alone by 2021, according to Parks Associates.
Resolution Media President George Manas joins us in the podcast studio to discuss voice interactivity and it is affecting brands. Resolution is helping marketers leverage voice interfaces. It’s early days but not too early to have a strategy, Manas says. The fundamentals are similar to any channel: insights, activation and measurement.
But understanding consumer voice adoption is hard.
“One of the challenges in the market is the difficulty of understanding what’s happening in the ecosystem,” he says. “Predominantly because voice activity lives behind a bunch of different walled gardens – Amazon, Google and Microsoft being the big three.” Apple is a dark horse, he adds.
Amazon Alexa features centrally in this episode as the most successful voice platform, now integrated with more than 50 devices. In addition to smart speakers, Amazon is accessible via thermostats, light systems, dashcams, smartphones and some new Ford trucks. Given its growing pervasiveness, Amazon has a big opportunity to integrate advertising and trade marketing deals with the Alexa platform.
But with any new technology, platforms shun advertising while making their land grabs.
“Advertising within the voice ecosystem today runs the risk of being an annoyance,” Manas says. “If you look at any new technology, they all started ads-free. Facebook started ad-free, Google started ad-free.”
Also in this episode: How voice search differs from traditional search, where voice meets commerce and what marketers can do today.
