News and Analysis
The Pitfalls and Opportunities of Screen-Free Customer Service
One vertical that has been able to integrate voice into customer service in a meaningful way is retail. National retailers like Best Buy, Walmart, and REI Co-op have created skills or teamed up with technology providers to connect with customers through voice-controlled assistants. Some retailers are accepting orders via voice, and others are doling out product information and reviews. What the most successful of these companies have in common is a defined strategy and plans to measure ROI.
Leveraging Voice: A Path for Brand Marketers
It’s important that companies can see who their customers are and what transactions are associated with each customer via voice assistants. This sort of knowledge is necessary for brands to make the channel a valuable part of an overarching loyalty strategy.
Given that voice is currently owned by just a few select companies, it’s important for brands to figure out how they will leverage voice differently from company to company or device to device. Will retail brands keep the same strategy with Amazon’s Alexa and Apple’s Siri, or will they find unique ways to take advantage of these platforms across differences?
What Does Customer Experience Mean in a Voice-First World?
The trend of moving customer experience beyond the screen has been dubbed “conversational customer care.” It’s still unclear just how many channels are included under this umbrella or how the future of conversational customer care will look. Brands that are dealing with demanding customers can’t afford to sit back and wait for this to play out. Screen-free customer experiences could be the future. They could be just a single touchpoint in the broader context of customer experience strategy. Or, they could just be a passing fad.
But the chances that voice-first customer experiences are a fad seem to be shrinking.
Commentary
How the End of Network Neutrality Could Affect SMBs and the Public Interest
For many years, the government’s assessment of the public interest was to encourage Web access to all. The current FCC, however, contends that this position is better met by eliminating the net neutrality rules — that SMBs will be able to have a variety of ISP options based on their actual needs with the end of the net neutrality rules.
Latest Posts
Street Fight Daily: Salesforce Brings AI to the CRM Masses, Yelp Courts Developers with New Program
A roundup of today’s big stories in hyperlocal publishing, marketing, commerce, and technology… Salesforce Brings AI to the CRM Masses with New System, Einstein… Marketers Are Getting the Snapchat Targeting Data They Want. Will It Scare Off Users?… Google Trips App Helps Plan Personalized Travel…
Street Culture: Trans-Atlantic Travel Helps Unacast’s Team Build Trust
Every month, one half of the company’s employees travel to visit the other half of the employees — the engineering team is located in Oslo, Norway and the commercial team is in New York City — as a culture-building activity, giving employees a chance to connect while in the same time zone.
LBMA Podcast: Everyware, Shake Shack, and Carling’s Beer Button
This Week in Location Based Marketing is a weekly video podcast from the Location Based Marketing Association with Asif Khan and Aubriana Lopez. On the show: Delta Airlines + Snapchat, Revel Systems & Punchh, OfferUp gets $119M, Hilton Hotels, IKEA’s Dining Club, Trackr + Alexa, and Neiman Marcus.
Street Fight’s Big 3
Street Fight Columns
Street Fight Categories
Authentic Storytelling: Real-Life Scenarios Showcase Brand Values and Build Trust