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I am a strong supporter of conversation interfaces, especially voice. Conversation is the natural way humans communicate, and that's the future of human-machine interaction. If you remember two-year-old children's videos sliding on an iPhone or iPad, something similar happens with devices like Alexa and Google Home: kids already know how to interact with them .
Last year, my team conducted a survey of Alexa and Google Home users to better understand their behavior and satisfaction with devices. This showed that the interest in voice applications was starting to really take off, with all types of companies and brands coming into the space: media, CPG, retail, food delivery , bank, etc.
This year, we redid the survey to see if, or how, the users' behaviors and feelings towards the devices had changed. We also looked at some of the interests based on demographics. The survey, conducted by Dashbot using Survata, involved 1,019 owners of Alexa and Google Home in the United States.
The points to remember this year:
- Voice assistants change their behavior
- Basic features tend to be the most frequently used
- The discovery of third-party voice applications remains a problem
- Users are likely to use the devices to make purchases
- The owners are satisfied with their appliances and highly recommend them.
Voice assistants continue to change their behavior
As we saw last year, voice assistants change their behavior. People use them all day for a variety of use cases.
Almost 75% of respondents use their voice devices at least once a day and 57% use it several times a day. These numbers are very similar to last year's results.
If we look more closely at the use of men compared to women, about 64% of men and 53% of women use their devices several times a day. Among those who use their device the least (less than once a month), women tend to predominate at 7%, compared to only 1.4% of men.
More than 65% of respondents indicated that the devices changed their behavior or daily routine. About a quarter felt the device had changed their behavior a lot, while 40.5% thought it had at least a little. Only 19% said that the device had not changed their behavior.
A number of interviewees described in their own words how much they depended on the device, how it was integrated into their lives and how surprised they were to see how well they were doing it. using.
As voice assistants become more ubiquitous and technology is integrated with even more types of devices, I expect to see more behavioral changes. If you are a big user of Alexa or Google Home, how often are you about to talk to the device when you are away from home – at work or in a room? hotel during a trip? Amazon and Google are working well through their commercial initiatives to provide peripherals in hotels and other locations.
Men tend to report more behavioral changes than women. Nearly 33% of men answered "yes, there are many", compared to 20% of women. As we have seen with the frequency of use, women favoring more infrequent uses, we also find that a higher percentage of women finding that the device has not changed behavior: 23.3% of women answered "no" to 13.7% of men.
It is interesting to note that even the 19% of respondents who indicated that their device had not changed their behavior still used it regularly enough. Of those who answered "no", about 33% still use the device several times a day, and 17% use the device at least once a day.
The basic features are the most frequently used
Respondents were asked what features they use most often.
In the end, listening to music, checking the weather and asking for information are the most common use cases. These are also the essential features of the devices. The use of specific third-party skills is less common (more on this in a moment).
About 75% of respondents use the device to listen to music, 66% view the weather and 63% ask for information.
About 58% of those who listen to music do so several times a day, while only 34% of those who watch the weather do so several times a day.
On the low level of use, only 23% of respondents use their devices to control home automation. However, those who do it do it quite often. Almost 63% of respondents who use the home automation device do so several times a day, and 22% do so at least once a day.
If we look at the use based on sex, interesting differences appear.
Although the three main use cases are the same for both men and women, women tend to have slightly higher use for each – about 5-6% higher. For example, almost 77% of women listen to music and 71% of men.
Some characteristics are more likely to be used by men than women. For example, nearly 42% of men surveyed use the devices for sports scores, compared to 18% of women. Among the other functionalities are information (49% of men against 40% of women), purchases (36% of men against 26% of women), games (33% of men against 22% of women) and home automation. (29%). percentage of men to 18% of women).
Speaking of shopping, let's take a closer look at this use case.
Users are willing to make purchases through their devices
Alexa and Google allow users to make purchases via their own ecommerce services and, with the addition of account links, to other retailers and services. Developers and brands can also monetize their voice applications through subscriptions and in-app purchases.
We asked respondents if they had already made a purchase via their voice assistant. It turns out that 43% of respondents, including 58% men and 32% women.
In terms of what respondents buy, the products of their provider's e-commerce providers (Amazon or Google Shopping) are the most common, at almost 83%.
Interestingly, the distribution of food is also quite common, with 53%. The "rearrange" case, that is, the ability to rearrange the same items as the previous command, works quite well with these interfaces, because it can be done in shorter and more concise instructions than in an order of complex menu. Many food delivery services also said that replenishment was quite common – consumers tend to order the same thing every time.
We also asked respondents how likely they were to make a purchase in the future. About 41% said they were "very likely" to make a purchase in the future, and an additional 20% said they were "likely" to do so.
Interestingly, one of the key indicators to determine if a person has already made a purchase or is likely to do so in the future is to know if he has both an Alexa and a Google Home. More than 56% of respondents who own both devices have already made a purchase, compared to 43% who only have Alexa and 39% who only have Google Home. Regarding future purchases, likewise, 57% of respondents who own both are "very likely" to make a purchase in the future, compared to 41% of those who have only Alexa and 35% who only have Google Home. Consumers who own both devices may tend to be the first to adopt and try to buy through the device.
The discovery of third-party voice applications remains a problem
Voice interfaces are still a relatively new space. Between Alexa and Google Home, there are about 50 million devices in the United States. There are about 40,000 third-party skills for Alexa. In our last survey, we found that many respondents did not even know that the term third-party voice app was a "skill" on Alexa and an "action" on Google Home.
The good news is that consumers use third-party skills, but they do not use a lot of them. According to the survey, 48% of respondents use between one and three voice applications and 26% use between four and six. Only about 15% of respondents said they did not use it.
Respondents were asked what their favorite voice application was. The most common answers were native features – listening to music, checking the weather and getting information. Pandora, Spotify, Uber and Jeopardy are among the most popular third-party applications.
For third-party application manufacturers, discovering and acquiring users are challenges.
The most common ways to discover the skills and actions of users are social media, friends, and appliance apps stores.
Brands and developers often tell us that social media, whether paid or organic, is one of the best user acquisition channels for voice applications. According to the survey, more than 43% of those surveyed discovered skills via social media. Viral video influence campaigns are also recommended because they serve two purposes: reaching through the influencer and learning to interact with the voice application. As this is a new space and a new user interface, users may not know what they can say or do with the voice application in question.
With Alexa, users can ask the device for the latest skills or recommendations, even within categories. The device will review a set of skills, listing them by name and asking if the user wants to install or continue.
In addition, Alexa supports an "opportunity to realize" that developers and brands can implement to help users discover their voice applications. For example, if an Alexa skill can support the order of a pizza, the developer can indicate it as a "fillable" intent and possibly be recommended by the device when a user requests a order a pizza.
Google Home still does not seem to have a searchable directory by voice. Asking the device for the most recent actions, or the recommended actions, results in either the "I do not understand" fallback response type, or the attempt to provide a form of definition depending on the request – for example. describing a "sports action" by asking for the latest "sports actions".
User satisfaction is high
Users tend to be fairly satisfied with their voice devices and strongly recommend them.
Respondents were asked how satisfied they were with the device's ability to understand, the device's response, and the overall experience. The results are quite positive.
Regarding the ability to understand the device, nearly 44% of respondents were very satisfied and 34% were somewhat satisfied. Only about 13% were either very or very dissatisfied.
Similarly, with regard to responses to the scheme, 44% of respondents were very satisfied and 35% were somewhat satisfied. Only about 12% were either very or very dissatisfied.
According to the overall experience, 53% of respondents were very satisfied and an additional 29% were at least somewhat satisfied. Only 10% were either little or very dissatisfied.
In addition, we asked respondents whether he was surprised by anything on the device. The results also indicate a high level of satisfaction. The owners were surprised at how good the appliances can do and how competent they are. A fairly common comment was the speed with which the device is updated: "every day, something new" and "like Christmas every day".
The owners are quite satisfied with their appliances and would recommend them with pleasure. When asked how they rated the overall device on a scale of one to five stars, the average rating of respondents was 4.4 stars.
When asked to rate their likelihood of recommending the device to other users on a scale of one to five, respondents also rated 4.4.
If we take a closer look at ratings based on the impact of the device on behavior, we see overall positive results. Respondents who reported that the device had changed significantly rated it 4.9 stars and are very likely to recommend it, with a rating of 4.9. Even users who said that the device had not changed their behavior attributed to their device almost 4 stars and are still likely to recommend devices with a rating of 3.8.
We asked respondents if anything had surprised them about the devices. The most common answers were:
- How much can the device do
- How intelligent is the device and the ability to answer a variety of questions
- Ease of use
- The ability to understand the demand of the user
- The user's dependence on the device and how his life changes dramatically
- The speed of answers
- The quality of the answers
Although most comments were generally positive, there were a small number of complaints. The most important complaint (still rarely compared to all positive responses) was the frustration with the device's ability to understand the user's request.
conclusions
Overall, Alexa and Google Home device owners are very satisfied with their devices. They are pleasantly surprised by all that the devices can do, their intelligence and their dependence on them.
Although the space of the voice assistant is still relatively new, brands have the opportunity to monetize because there is a strong indication of their willingness to make purchases with the devices. As more and more brands develop voice applications, it will be interesting to see which use cases they support – how they take advantage of the voice interface and whether they are implementing opportunities. monetization.
As many respondents have mentioned, the devices are constantly improving – not only in terms of improving understanding, but of all the features provided.
I continue to be optimistic about this space and look forward to seeing what the future holds.
Arte Merritt is the CEO and co-founder of Dashbot, a chatbot analysis platform for Alexa, Google Home, Facebook, Slack, Twitter, SMS and other chat interfaces.
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