ecommerce at its best: 4 year old needed 6 words to order sweets for christmas (and no instructions at all).
Christmas morning was a surprise to us all.
The door bell rang and a package was delivered. I am ordering a lot online but couldn’t remember having ordered something that hasn’t been delivered yet. Much to my suprise the package contained a dispenser containing 200 (!) Chupa Chups lollypops (the full sugar ones). My first thought was that one of my colleagues at Sitewards GmbH somehow thought this would be a nice idea (you never know what ideas they come up with…), but there was no note or card from anyone attached. It took some seconds for me to realize that maybe maybe my son Henry (4 years old) could have something to do with it.
So I hid the box so that my son couldn’t see it and turned to him: “Henry, did you ask Alexa to order something?”. He smiled and said “Nooooooo.” Somehow I’ve heard these type of “Nooooo” before and I tried again and he smiled and confirmed: “I ordered lollypops”.
The amazing part here is: I did not order anything via Alexa before as I use these devices mostly to control lights and listen to music. Henry is using these devices for the same purpose. Noone has ever shown him that you can actually order something via voice. So how did he do that (with no instructions at all)? Well…he just asked for it.
6 words.
Via the Alexa app i found the history of recent happenings and voice commands. I found the dialog between Henry and Alexa from two days ago.
His exact request was: “Alexa, hast du einen Lolli?” (Alexa, do you have a lollypop?”). Alexa offered him a special deal of 200 Chupa Chups and asked wheter he wants them. He answered with “Ja” (Yes). It took him 6 words from his idea (!) to a succesfull order.
He didn’t have to activate a skill first, he did not have to login somewhere and for sure he did not have to start a computer or grab an iPad. He did not even have to change the room or his position (ok, I have echo devices across our apartment..). All he needed to do was to say what he wanted. With out any instructions, manuals or having to learn to control a user interface.
And this is actually the game changer here. Once you have a voice assistant, the user interface becomes obsolete (“ZeroUI”) or, put in different words, the user interface is just voice and you use it the same way you use it when talking to people — so you already KNOW how to use it. Removing an artifical user interface (= abstraction layer) and thus moving from indirect interaction (user -> user interface -> device) to direct interaction (user -> device) removes all barriers. Why should you need to enter your request into an artifical user interface (grab your phone/pad/computer, type in a URL or search for a site, decide where to buy, open a website, log in, find the search box, filter results, chose result, add to cart, confirm order) when you can just say what you need and everything else (like authentication via voice for example) happens in the background? In 2018, there is no reason to do this anymore. Classical user interfaces were introduced in the past because the capabilities and resources (computing power, artificial intelligence) for proper voice recognition and proper dialogs did not exist.
However, I know that the example of ordering some lollypops is a rather easy one, but there are a lot of examples in B2B or B2C commerce that are comparable and that can quite easily be implemented for any existing ecommerce solution or digital platform by creating a custom skill for Alexa for example by our team of DAVE42 (advertising! These guys are awesome!).
Think of the following: “Alexa, order the printer paper that I am always ordering”. “Alexa, I need more screws of this type.” (and then show the screw to the inbuilt camera that some echo devices come with. Today, picture recognition algorithms exist that can identify products properly).
There are a lot of scenarios where a combination of a voice interface with screen output or touchscreen interaction is a better approach for the user in case complex data, filtering or interaction is required.
I am shareholder and CEO of ecommerce agency Sitewards GmbH since 13+ years and jointly with our team we have implemented hundreds of B2C and B2B ecommerce systems and digital platforms always striving to make it as easy, intuitive and fast as possible for the users of those systems. But 6 words? Not bad, Amazon, not bad (And not bad, Henry, not bad!).
As we are not a big fan of sugar sweets, we (we is my wife and me, not so much Henry) wanted to return the package to Amazon. Now here is the catch: It’s considered being a food product, means: no return possible. I quickly opened up a chat with Amazon, within seconds someone replied and refunded all costs (because a 4 year old is technically not allowed to order..). This took me 3 minutes to clarify this issue with Amazon and the chat ended with “We are trying to become the most customer-friendly company of the world. Thank you for your business”. This experience again impressed me. How is you company handling issues, returns, requests ;-)? How do you impress you clients?
Still, Amazon did not allow me to send the stuff back, so if anyone is in need for 200 Chupa Chups lollypops, please leave a comment and a good reason why I should send them to you and they’re yours.
Exec Summary / TLDR
Can your clients order your products through your digital platform / ecommerce system by saying 6 words? If not, let’s talk! It’s possible and affordable and will position you to win the digital race.
