Voice assistants and smart speakers are part of the everyday life of a growing number of households in the U.S. and in other key markets. It should come as no surprise that many marketers and advertisers are developing a Voice Marketing Strategy to connect with their community and reach new audiences.
You’ve probably already heard about Amazon Alexa, Google Assistant and Apple Siri. But do you know how to use them to boost your brand or business strategy? Let’s start from the basics and see what voice marketing is.
The definition of Voice Marketing
Voice marketing is the set of strategies and tactics used to reach your target audience through voice-enabled devices powered by AI assistants, like the well-known Alexa.
Basically, it’s a way to add a new and dynamic touchpoint to your consumer journey and interact with your busiest customers, who rely on a smart device to research, browse and - even - shop on the go.
Smart marketers and strategists have realized how effective speaking directly to their audience via interactive voice technologies can be. According to Voicebot.ai:
Voice marketing is recognised as relevant by 91.8% of marketers, with an increasing number of experts considering it an extremely important marketing channel in 2021.
So where should I start?
There are a lot of ways to start implementing a voice marketing strategy.
As with all trends in the marketing space, the first step is always a question. Ask yourself: “What makes sense for me to do?”. Not all brands are the same, so it is essential to evaluate your present customer journey and think about how voice assistants can support it in a coherent way.
Voice has a lot of potential and there’s lots of ways it can help you be more effective in your marketing activities. Here are some ways brands are already implementing voice strategies:
- Creating an Amazon Skill, Google Action or a custom assistant
- Creative voice-fueled marketing campaigns
- Voice Search Optimization (VSO), the equivalent of SEO for voice-enabled searches
Examples of Voice Marketing
Looking for some inspiration to start you off on your voice marketing journey? Nutella and Coca Cola are two examples of brands successfully implementing two different types of voice strategy.
In February 2020, for National Pancake Day, Ferrero USA launched Nutella Creations. This Alexa Skill delivers users Nutella recipes, while also enabling users to take part in a fun memory game once the recipe has been recreated, keeping the family involved and engaged the whole morning.
But you don’t always need to create your own skill or action to be “on” Alexa or Google Assistant.
Coca Cola, among other brands like Baileys and John Frieda, was able to leverage the power of voice, by basing a marketing campaign on an existing voice-based customer acquisition platform called Send Me A Sample. Coca Cola encouraged consumers to simply “ask Send me a Sample for a Coke”, to receive a free product sample.
Working on voice strategy should mean asking users to enact a very simple and intuitive behaviour. When that is the case, the efforts can have huge pay-offs. Another opportunity for connecting to customers many brands are taking is that of conversational marketing, as the cases of German retail platform Snocks and global cybersecurity and compliance solution leader Proofpoint prove.
Inspired to explore a voice-forward strategy for your company? We can help.
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