Voice Interfaces: a new way to connect with your customers

Google launched its Voice Assistant service in Dutch in 2018, offering consumers in the Netherlands a new way to experience brands and interact with products and services. Similar to the smartphone revolution of 10 years ago – which created entirely new products, services, revenue models and businesses – this coming revolution is likely to change the way you interact with customers.

In the US, the adoption rate of voice interfaces is expected to totally outpace that of smartphones: over 50 million people in the US now use smart speakers like Amazon Echo and Google Home (Voicebot.ai) and ComScore predicts that 50% of all internet searches will be carried out by voice by 2020.

Creating added value for your customers using voice technology

Offering benefits like improved service experience and new insights that enhance customer relations and efficiency, conversational interfaces are clearly on the rise. It is crucial that companies now start investigating how this new technology can enrich their customer journey.

Mirabeau began experimenting with conversational interfaces four years ago to investigate the opportunities to create business value for our customers. Using insights and data, we create new services that fit seamlessly into customers' lives. We develop intelligent virtual assistants that integrate with social channels such as Facebook and voice assistants like Microsoft Cortana and Google Assistant, and build skills for Amazon and Google smart speakers.

Our dialogue engineers tie together services using your business data and AI-powered cognitive services, shaping those resources into natural, smart and effective dialogue. In addition, dialogue designers create the best conversations, using smart ways to interact and learn, and, of course, define the brand personality of dialogue-based services.

So how do they work?

Regardless of the complexity of the service any voice assistant provides, they all follow a similar process. The typical process flow of a voice assistant contains a number of elementary steps which are explained here.

Our human-centered design approach

How to be customer-centric? We start with focused research that unlocks user insights in order to determine your customers' needs. This enables us to identify opportunities for using conversational interfaces for your business. These insights in turn drive our dialogue design, resulting in a natural and flexible conversation focused on delivering value to your customers.

Our approach covers copywriting, determining actions, fallbacks and overall flow architecture. Each conversational experience is powered by data. Identifying existing or creating new data sources that feed the AI-powered cognitive services enables us to enhance the conversational concept. We use a setup based on analytics, training and optimization to improve the experience and deliver the best possible value for your investment.

Cognizant’s global reach allows us to execute global multilanguage conversational projects that seamlessly integrate with your IT backend.

Partners

Mirabeau supports all leading cognitive platforms, collaborating closely with Google, Microsoft and Amazon as well as NLP platforms such as Artificial Solutions. This gives us direct access to the latest developments in voice technology, natural language processing and dedicated technical support.

Transavia Voice Assistant

Leading airlines like Transavia know that they need to be where their customers are in order to remain competitive. We are constantly looking for the latest technology to enrich their customer journey and voice interfaces are the next big thing. Together with Transavia, we created the Transavia Voice Assistant, which enables passengers to easily explore travel destinations and book their tickets by talking to Google Home or Amazon Alexa.

Read the case >>

Watch the case video >>

Radio station Qmusic and Mirabeau create digital sidekick on Google Assistant

Mirabeau and Qmusic, a leading radio station in the Netherlands, together created a proof of concept for the Google Assistant. On 26 July, the official launch date of the Dutch version of Google Assistant, radio DJ Joost Swinkels had a conversation with his digital sidekick – asking questions about the weather, the on-air music and suggestions on what to eat.

Check out the news article here >>

Watch the video >>

Open Voice: meetups to explore the voice channel

To explore the voice channel, Mirabeau teamed up with digital guru Maarten Lens-FitzGerald and Sam Warnaars (aFrogleap) to organize Open Voice, a series of interactive meetups. During the first two editions, thought leaders from Dutch and international companies like Amazon, Talpa and NOS and independent voice strategist Ben Sauer shared their lessons learned, insights and vision on voice interfaces.

Curious about how to brand with voice, how conversations fit into your customer journey and how to kick-start your projects? Register here for Open Voice >>

Let's start the conversation!

What would your clients ask your brand? We offer all the skills required to build seamless voice experiences and would be pleased to support your voice journey.

Read our latest article on the six steps to ensure your organization is voice-ready.

Like to know more? Get in touch with Edgard Beckand.