Voice Marketing

What is voice marketing?

Voice marketing, which arose with the advent of smart speakers such as Amazon’s Alexa and virtual assistants like Apple’s Siri, uses artificial intelligence to help brands to engage with users, e.g., responding to queries like “Will I need an umbrella today?” with a weather forecast. Voice marketing is becoming more and more popular with modern mobile apps.

What is next for voice marketing?

In 2016, research analysts Forrester noted the increase of artificial intelligence and voice-based personal assistants, pointing to examples such as Amazon Echo and Microsoft Cortana. The technology was touted as capable of predicting humans’ needs, offering a human-to-machine interface, and even adopting a conversational communication style.

Still in its infancy, voice marketing is predicted to make a big impact across the mobile app landscape as developers incorporate it into their products. “In 2018, we’ll see more B2B mobile apps integrate voice interfaces/features into their core products,” said Jonathan Cue, CEO at App Cues. “And as teams focus on designing for conversation, we’ll see an increase in personalization across the board — both in voice and visual UI.”

Where does voice marketing feature in a mobile marketing strategy?

This newfound conversational tone for mobile apps pairs perfectly with personalization, a staple of mobile marketing. For example, a food and exercise tracker app might employ AI and voice marketing to improve customer relationships. After answering a voice search question like, “How many calories does one hour of running burn?” an app might follow up later with a timely, “Today is a good day for a run.”

Like many mobile marketing strategies, personalization can be automated, based on leveraging voice search data and segmenting and targeting specific customers, e.g., males 20 to 35 who enjoy running. Of course, it is still difficult to precisely associate customer preferences with their voice searches, but consider how marketers are already using predictive auto-correct in text search. By automating their messaging, marketers save time and deliver more relevant content.