Voice presents a unique opportunity for brands to become a seamless component of their customers’ day-to-day lives. Nearly every industry is dipping its toes into the voice pool, but few brands have been able to develop experiences with true lasting power. In fact, only 6% of voice experiences are retained by users after the first week of use, according to VoiceLabs. While still a hit-or-miss venture, many companies and industries are realizing increased revenue, differentiation, and engagement by investing in voice as a first-class citizen alongside their traditional digital assets. Emerson Sklar provides an overview of the companies and industries leading the way, the steps they have taken to make them successful, and how you should approach your voice-first strategy.

1. The Good, The Bad,
& The Ugly of Voice
The Intricacies ofVoice in the
Everyday Lives of Users
Emerson Sklar
Technical Evangelist

2. 2
Applause harnesses the power of the world's largest community of vetted, digital professionals to
create custom teams that provide you with a full suite of testing and feedback solutions. Our white-
glove approach enables leading brands to get closer to their customers, increase development velocity
and deliver high-quality digital experiences to their customers.
Powering Today’s Digital Leaders

3. Testing from the End-User Perspective with Applause
3
Proven Experience and Results:
Trusted by market leaders, with established methodologies for voice testing built from
Amazon’s best practices.
Secure Real-WorldTesting:
Secure and directed testing by in-market vetted testers under real world conditions– in
home, in the office, or embedded in other devices like vehicles.
RealVoices:
Test with native language speakers to validate utterances and dialogs, accounting for
different languages, dialects, genders, and age groups – areas that are virtually impossible
to automate
Unlimited Device Coverage:
Test on any connected device around the globe at scale.

4. MARKET OVERVIEW

5. The Rise of Smart Speakers is Meteoric
5
Smart Speaker Penetration (U.S.)
Source: Activate Forecast

6. Alexa Dominates in the U.S. Market
6
U.S. Smart Speaker Market Share

7. But That’s Not True Everywhere
7
U.S. Smart Speaker Market Share Canadian Smart Speaker Market Share

8. It’s Not Just Smart Speakers
Alexa Skills Still Dominate Google Assistant Actions Are Catching Up Multimodal Use is Increasing as Well
8

9. Enterprises Have Joined the Voice Bandwagon
9
Source: Adobe and Advanis
How important are voice enabled experiences to your organization’s consumers? (U.S. March 2019)

10. Enterprise Prioritization Doesn’t Align with Customer Expectation
10
What new voice enabled interactions are organizations prioritizing (U.S. March 2019)
Source: Adobe and Advanis

11. Many Voice Experiences Still Miss the Mark
11
Alexa Skill RatingsTotal Breakdown
Source: Dashbot

12. Where Do Companies Go Wrong?
12
Assuming One
Size Fits All
Not Listening to
Customer Feedback
TreatingVoice as
an Experiment

13. REAL EXAMPLES

14. • Strong in-car integration on their own platform
• Supports both Alexa and Google
• Localized for each international market
• Complete top-down support, from executives to product to
marketing
• Took time to get it right
• Iterated on customer feedback
Mercedes – Voice First Strategy
14

15. • No officialAlexa Skill or GoogleAssistant Action
• Third-party skills do not reflect the brand identity and
innovation
• In-car voice currently supports basic navigation, calling, and
music, BUT…
• No published list of supported voice commands
• Struggles with acoustic interference from the road and
nearby cars
• Certain features (e.g. wipers, climate, etc.) can only be
accessed via touchscreen
Tesla – Voice as a Future Opportunity
15

16. • Delivers simple skills that solve unique challenges perfectly
suited to voice
• Tested with real people in real conditions
• Ensured that critical functionality truly works
• Promoted the skills extensively, including guidance on how to
enable them
• Currently only on Alexa
American Red Cross – Early Adopters
16

17. • Highly-rated skill, but trending downwards
• Initial release in 2016, rarely updated since
• Supports basic functionality, but not the basic functionality
customers want
• Does not support account linking in Chrome browser
• Only supports one Fitbit per account
Fitbit – Limited Investment Post-Adoption
17

18. • Consistently one of the highest-ratedAlexa skills
• Daily updates
• Customized voices
• Effectively monetized with consumables
• Effective multimodal support
• Tracks historical progress
Jeopardy – Voice Gold Standard
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19. • Only support basic commands
• Experience and interface differ wildly from other platforms
• Do not maintain account session with other platforms
• Recurring issues with account linking
• Rarely updated
Other Entertainment Platforms – Stuck in the
Commercial Break
19

20. HOW TO OPTIMIZE
VOICE DEV

21. • Commit to voice as a vital part of your brand, like you
would any other digital, customer-facing asset
• Focus on delighting the customer with simple tasks and
do them really well, but recognize that it may not be
immediately (or ever) monetizable
• Design a voice development roadmap that gives your
team a chance to succeed
Determine Where and How Voice Fits
into Your Digital Strategy
21
DetermineYour Strategy1
Capture Feedback from Users2
DesignConversational Model3
EmpowerYour Developers4
Conduct In-Lab RegressionTesting5
Use the Crowd for Real-WorldTesting6

22. • Conduct rapid, broad surveys to learn what matters to
your customers (cheaply and easily)
• Conduct rapid, formal studies with prototypes, before
you ever type a line of code
• Leverage that feedback to determine what voice
platform(s) are appropriate for investment
• Ensure, today, that you know what is meaningful to your
users today and in the future
• Ensure, tomorrow, that you know what is meaningful to
your users then and in the (further) future
Capture Feedback from Target Users to
Inform Voice App Design and Features
22
DetermineYour Strategy1
Capture Feedback from Users2
DesignConversational Model3
EmpowerYour Developers4
Conduct In-Lab RegressionTesting5
Use the Crowd for Real-WorldTesting6

23. • Begin by mapping sample dialogs on paper and speak
through them with another person
• Then leverage a prototyping tool to see how it feels with
a digital assistant
• Ensure you’re constantly validating with people outside
the voice team
Spend Time up Front to Design
Conversational Model
23
DetermineYour Strategy1
Capture Feedback from Users2
DesignConversational Model3
EmpowerYour Developers4
Conduct In-Lab RegressionTesting5
Use the Crowd for Real-WorldTesting6

24. • Implementing simple scripts with the CLIs delivers an order
of magnitude return on time invested
• Easily handle common tasks such as building/deploying the apps,
committing to source control tools, and executing automated tests
• Test-driven development is the best way to reduce the
tedium of developers testing small changes as they work
• Implementing unit tests ensures your basic modules work
individually
• Implementing end-to-end manual and automated tests ensures
your entire ecosystem works, today and tomorrow
• The format and structure of these tests can help you refine your
conversational model
• These tests are the best and quickest way to identify otherwise
unknown platform changes
Empower Your Developers Through
ASK/gactions CLIs, Test-Driven
Development, and Automation
24
DetermineYour Strategy1
Capture Feedback from Users2
DesignConversational Model3
EmpowerYour Developers4
Conduct In-Lab RegressionTesting5
Use the Crowd for Real-WorldTesting6

25. • Focus on common customer pain points
• Lack of proper multimodal support
• Failing account linking
• Poorly-designed multi-turn conversations
• Parity with your other digital properties
• Maintain and expand your manual and automated test
suite
• Any time a defect is encountered, write a test for it!
• Any time a new feature is developed, write a test for it!
Let Internal Teams Conduct Critical
Regression Testing
25
DetermineYour Strategy1
Capture Feedback from Users2
DesignConversational Model3
EmpowerYour Developers4
Conduct In-Lab RegressionTesting5
Use the Crowd for Real-WorldTesting6

26. • Does it understand my customers?
• Conduct dialog verification to ensure the platform properly
interprets real users speaking in real-world environments, and
broaden your conversational model based on how your real
users speak
• Does it work for my customers?
• Conduct manual functional testing to make sure what you
developed actually works in customers’ homes, cars, and mobile
devices where they live, work, and play
• Do My Customers LikeThis?
• Capture user experience feedback to make sure you are
meeting your customers’ expectations today and in the future
Use the Crowd for Real-World Testing
26
DetermineYour Strategy1
Capture Feedback from Users2
DesignConversational Model3
EmpowerYour Developers4
Conduct In-Lab RegressionTesting5
Use the Crowd for Real-WorldTesting6

27. Optimize Your Voice Development Lifecycle
27
Determine
Your Strategy
1
Capture
Feedback from
Users
2
Design
Conversational
Model
3
EmpowerYour
Developers
4
Conduct In-Lab
Regression
Testing
5
Use the Crowd
for Real-World
Testing
6
Powered by Applause
Applause Services:
• Rapid Surveys
• Rapid Design
Validation
Applause Services:
• Dialog
Verification
• Functional
Testing
• User Experience
Feedback
Applause + Bespoken:
• Implement Unit
Tests and
Manual/Automated
End-to-EndTests

28. Driving the Future of
Voice Innovation
Wednesday, July 24th
1:30 PM - 1:55 PM
Voice Summit Mainstage
–Visit Applause –
Booth 112
Join Applause this July
atVoice Summit!
July 22-25, 2019 | Newark, NJ

29. Q&A