Third-party Alexa skills. A qualitative analysis for a successful B2C voice interaction in Germany

Abstract

Voice is the most natural way of communication. Technological milestones, especially in the areas of speech recognition and natural language processing have led to the emergence of Intelligent Personal Assistants (IPAs). The integration of IPAs into consumers’ daily lives will lead to a major change in consumer behavior. It is estimated that the number of worldwide consumers of IPAs will increase from 390 million to 1.8 billion in the period 2015 to 2021. These numbers are meaningful and speak for themselves. Companies will face new structural changes as it is predicted that voice will become the most relevant interface of future communications between companies and customers. The growing popularity and usage of IPAs raises the question of how German companies and especially innovation departments can successfully participate in this development, gain sustainable competitive advantages and position themselves in this market. Since the launch of Amazon’s IPA Alexa in September 2016 in Germany, companies can enter the voice market with an own third-party Alexa Skill. Therefore, this scientific work seeks to find out how Alexa Skills in the framework of a Service Engineer-ing approach need to be elaborated, which factors influence an individual’s adoption of an Alexa Skill and which strategic deliberations companies need to consider. Based on Haller’s (2017) process model, from a development success point of view, the following steps must systematically be passed: (1) Idea generation, (2) analysis, (3) design, (4) development, (5) tests, (6) launch, and (7) optimization. Applying Da-vis’ (1989) Technology Acceptance Model, from a usability success point of view, perceived usefulness is characterized by the variables rapidness, simplicity and naturalness, whereas perceived ease of use is influenced by Skill discovery, Skill description, Skill invocation, guidance and quality of dialogue. Regarding several strategic implications, companies can benefit the most from this billion-dollar market, if they enter the voice market as a pioneer.