“Welcome to XYZ, How may I help you?”, a human voice pipes up on a shopping platform and brings you relevant details. What is it about Voice Assistants that makes them such a key part of customer experience? It is the human factor. While the world has begun to accept artificial intelligence and function alongside it, a human factor will always add to credible.
A prerecorded human voice used by AI allows consumers to perceive it as a normal human being attending to their needs. Walmart owned Flipkart has introduced a voice assistant on its “Supermart” platform to give the users a more personal experience.
The company’s in-house team worked on developing this Voice Assistant that will answer customer queries, find products, understand product details, checkout, and more. Moreover, the assistant will be able to detect vernacular languages spoken by the user, translate it, and offer what the user has enquired about. Voice commands will begin with accepting English and Hindi and later update to more languages.
After a detailed study across the country, Flipkart found that people want to be able to access multiple services while giving voice commands. It is believed to improve the user experience. Flipkart already saw a successful adoption of its video and vernacular offerings and with voice assistants, they want to take it a step ahead.
Why are Voice Assistants so relevant today?
From a business perspective, voice assistants will be dealing with customer support and guidance much quicker than a regular salesperson. For online businesses, it is the only way they can have someone constantly present to solve customer problems despite not being physically present. This allows the employees of the organisation to work on more strategies, mergers, and expansions of the business.
For the consumer, voice commands are much easier and time-saving as compared to typing out everything you need. By saving time and having an assistant quickly guide you through the website, it is a faster and seamless process. It is also a great tool for those with disabilities to perform functions through voice commands. A conversational way of shopping will feel more natural and convincing to the consumer.
On the contrary, there have been arguments that voice assistants don’t talk exactly like a human. They speak whatever is programmed into them. With more advancement in technology, this issue might just be resolved.
Another concern that is raised with regard to voice is assistants is privacy. On ethical grounds, a voice assistant that is always listening would be disastrous for the privacy rights of an individual. A company must disclose the privacy features of the assistant that is deployed and what kind of data is it saving.
On a personal level, a voice assistant will be great to remind me you of all deadlines, meetings, appointments, etc like a personal assistant. All you have to do is ask your assistant to note!
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