Why we’re bullish on voice, & the little detail that presents a big opportunity for cities!
Are Google Assistant & Amazon Alexa the next big thing?
Late 2019, my co-founder Mitch & I were discussing the emergence of voice platforms & their prevalence in the digital landscape, particularly in the context of how they could help our clients.
Are they the next big thing? Are they already a big thing? Should we be offering voice integration as part of our product offering?
We discussed on & off (usually over a morning coffee), flicking between voice-related statistics, such as:
- More than 1 billion people worldwide now have access to voice assistants (Voicebots.ai)
- 55% of US households are predicted to have a smart speaker by 2022 (OC&C Strategy Consultants)
- 72% of those who have smart speakers use them every day (Google)
Etc. etc. etc…
As a company that offers integrations with chatbots, voice seemed like a natural progression. And the statistics on voice adoption were (& still are!) convincing. This was an area worth exploring for Hopstay.
So we went out & bought an ‘office’ Google Assistant, which is sort of like having an ‘office pet’, but much more obedient. Although less cute.
We had the City of Adelaide working with us on this initial foray into voice & began scoping out the project. We would start with a basic voicebot that told people living in the City of Adelaide area when their bins were being collected. This seemed like a good starting point as we could replicate the conversational flow & API integration that already existed in the chatbot.
After the initial development, it was time to discuss the name of the voice skill. The technical term for this is the invocation name. Basically, whatever trigger word you have to say to your smart speaker to launch the voicebot.
It functions as follows:
- Hey Google, can I speak to *invocation name*; or
- Google, can you please ask *invocation name* when my bins are being collected?
It’s an important part of the story & one that sparked much discussion.
Should it be The City of Adelaide? Should we characterise it & build a personality that a user can invoke & then speak to?
Ideally, the invocation would just be Adelaide. Not The City of Adelaide. Adelaide is far more natural to say in such a sentence.
But we were under the impression that place names were not allowed. That was, until we sifted through Google’s invocation naming rules & found the following, deep in the fine print:
Wow. No other organisation is allowed to register a place as it’s invocation name, except the government agency of that location.
The only organisation who can register New York is The City of New York. And the only organisation who can register Adelaide is The City of Adelaide.
After successfully applying for this ruling, we had our invocation name. Welcome to Google, Adelaide!
Whilst this project is still relatively young, we’re excited by how it’s developing. After integrating the bin day checker, we’re now working on more integrations & use cases for the voicebot.
Voicebots as a tool for cities & councils
Google’s invocation ruling presents a fascinating opportunity for cities, councils, local governments & municipalities. Here are a few reasons why:
As far as invoking a voicebot goes, invoking the city in which you live is relatively frictionless
Asking Google to speak to Adelaide in order to access urban services is not difficult for a consumer to remember. Brand names, personified characters (that rely on heavy marketing) or colloquial phrases could, at times, be challenging to invoke purely on a memory basis.
Accessibility
Voicebots can unlock new frontiers in accessibility. Cities & councils generally have a social responsibility to provide services to all citizens, regardless of their accessibility requirements. They are mandated to do so.
For the elderly & the disabled who may struggle to navigate a complex website or visit a customer service centre, voicebots can provide unprecedented access. All they need is the power of their own voice.
Of course, education is key, but the nature of voice as a frictionless platform could ultimately make services & information easier to navigate.
Collating urban services & providing local content
A ‘city-wide’ voice skill managed by the urban authority has the capacity to operate as a ‘city-specific’ platform to access many urban services.
It’s important that we understand the difference between the following two phrases:
- Hey Google, can you tell me what event parking restrictions are in place this weekend in Adelaide?
- Hey Google, can you ask Adelaide which event parking restrictions are in place this weekend?
Question 1 is relying on Google to answer the question, because the user has not invoked the voice skill. Google doesn’t have this information, so the user won’t receive an answer.
Question 2 is invoking the City of Adelaide voice skill (by saying ‘can you ask Adelaide’ upfront). The City of Adelaide does have this information. Note: this if for example purposes & is currently not integrated into the live voicebot, but will be down the track.
The potential for this is enormous. If urban authorities take charge of their own voice skill & can successfully connect it to a growing city-specific knowledge base, this could unlock a new frontier in city-citizen interaction.
In fact, a platform that supports this is exactly what Hopstay is working on right now. I better get back to work, but I’ll be writing more about this soon!
Feel free to contact me at lucas@hopstay.co if you’re interested in what Hopstay is up to or would like to chat further. Thanks!
