Three Ways Voice Tech Can Help Your Business
The Amazon Alexa has three skills can be integrated with ease for any business. Each Skill will provide tremendous value to your company. They are the Business Q&A Skill, Onboard Guide Skill, and my personal favorite, the Flash Briefing Skill. It provides so much value that I don’t want you to miss out on.
I hope you enjoy!
1. Business Q&A Skill
A business Question and Answer skill for Alexa can be enabled on any Alexa device that will have the answers to your companies most asked questions. The user asks Alexa any of your companies most asked questions and Alexa provides them with the answer. No phone call, email, or text is required. This functionality can be used in your company twofold, both internally and externally.
Internally it can be used for your employees most asked questions and as time goes on, questions and answers can be added to the skill to keep it up to date. The benefit of enabling this skill for your company is it saves time for you and your employees. It saves time for you since your most asked questions will now be asked to Alexa.
It saves your employees time because of how much quicker it is to ask Alexa a question than it is to reach out and wait for a response. Across the board saving time is huge, but providing such a tool for your employees to make their lives easier is definitely a win.
Externally it provides massive value to your customers. Imagine them being able to just ask Alexa what your phone number is, address, the time you close or any of the other most commonly asked questions you get in your specific business, instead of calling or emailing your business to ask.
This provides value to the consumer when they do not have to spend time searching your website, calling your business, or emailing someone. This again saves you time internally for obvious reasons. It also lessens the friction between you and your consumer by providing them another way to be in touch with your company.
2. Onboard Guide Skill
The onboarding guide allows you, the business owner, to create your own guide for new employees in your company. Alexa does all the talking so you don’t have too. This again saves a ton of time and provides a positive alternative to the onboarding systems many companies have.
Not everyone enjoys reading those huge documents, or 40-page slide shows. Now, Alexa can read it to them and walk them through the process. If some things, as they often are, tend to be a bit complex in the onboarding process a separate Business Q&A can be made for this process. This provides pure value for your employees and again it saves time.
3. Flash Briefing
Flash briefing is a skill that is massively underutilized. This skill provides a quick overview of whatever you would like. It can be of your company, your week, or even your day. You simply upload audio or input text into the flash briefing then say, “Alexa, what is my flash briefing?” Next, Alexa proceeds to either play the recorded audio or read the inputted text.
For instance, USA TODAY flash briefing plays a recording of a news anchor reading the top five news stories of the day for you every morning.
The massive opportunity with a flash briefing for your company is the ability to upload recordings into it which can be updated as often as every fifteen minutes. So, for those long company-wide emails you can simply record yourself, upload the audio and everyone who has the skill enabled on their Alexa device or app can listen to your announcement.
This allows your employees the opportunity to listen to what you have to say rather than skim through that email and get back to work.
Ultimately it helps you to employ empathy for your employees who do not like to read, feel bogged down by long emails, or just appreciate another form of simpler communication.
This skill is filled with opportunity for ways to use it. It is a phenomenal way to just send out a quick message to your employees. Whether it is an emergency or an encouragement. Also, you no longer have to deal with your tone of voice being lost, as is with the written word.
“Also, you no longer have to deal with your tone of voice being lost, as is with the written word.”
This is especially useful for those of you who have employees who work remotely. The team I currently lead is completely made up of remote workers so I use the flash briefing for my weekly team emails, or rather, weekly flash briefings. I compile my thought into a note pad, hit record, and then I send it. I even manage to throw in an encouragement or two.
Plus they do not need an Amazon virtual assistant for this. They can access it through the Amazon Alexa app on their phone.
It only takes a moment for you to talk into the mic and send the message to whoever you would like. You can send it to your entire business or only those on your specific team.
Feel inspired and want to send out a message to your entire client base, or all of the world instead? You can create flash briefings for each community of people and send out private links or publish it to the Amazon Skill store for the world to use.
Once it is up all they have to do is say, “Alexa, what is my flash briefing?”. It is that simple to be engaging with your employees, your clients, or the millions upon millions of Amazon Alexa users across the globe.
You do not want to miss the opportunity this technology is providing for businesses like yours. Allow your imagination to grow with the many ways this technology can be used in your company. It is ample opportunity to provide value for your employees and your customers and save everyone time — including yourself. Time saved here is more time available to be spent there.
If you have any questions or comments, feel free to reach out to me on social! I would love to keep the conversation going!
