Public Relations & Social Marketing Insight

While still far from mass adoption, virtual assistants are becoming more widely used by Americans, according to eMarketer’s first forecast on users of digital assistants, such as Siri, and voice-enabled speakers, like Amazon Echo.

This year, 35.6 million Americans will use a voice-activated assistant device at least once a month. That’s a jump of 128.9% over last year.Amazon’s Echo speaker will have 70.6% of users. Meanwhile, Google Home will trail far behind with just 23.8% of the market. The remaining portion will be shared among smaller players, such as Lenovo, LG, Harmon Kardon and Mattel....

Amazon's Alexa, the personal assistant that launched with the Amazon Echo smart speaker, completely dominated this year's Consumer Electronics Show. Just ask anyone: "Alexa Just Conquered CES. The World Is Next," read one Wired headline. CNBC, the BBC, MIT Technology Review, and many others all had equally laudatory reports. 

Companies like Ford, Huawei, LG, as well as a long parade of startups, all unveiled home appliances, phones, cars, and more gadgets with Alexa integration.

It's a reflection of the sheer power that Amazon is starting to wield in the nascent smart home market, as a growing number of people come to rely on their Echo devices to run their homes and to automate their lives. The market for the Echo is still small compared to smartphones, but it's growing fast....

I love the Echo/Alexa combination at home. Just this morning my kids were arguing with me about the word "kids" coming from the name of young goats. Easily rectified with a quick yell of "Alexa - Define Kids" in the general direction of my Kitchen Echo. Boy, I sure showed those ignorant children of mine a lesson as the virtual assistant proved my extra 32 years on Earth have been spent learning only the best facts.

But according to ATFV News (image can be seen via that link) there might soon be Echo hardware on the way with a built in screen. This is exciting, not least because Alexa can show my kids a picture of a goat to really ram home just how smart daddy is. But of course, it's entirely possible that the video screen won't be used for that at all, but will instead offer ways to call family members on their mobiles, using video.

Rumours from various outlets have suggested that a new Echo, codenamed, Knight, will make an appearance within the next month or so. This could be that device, and from the tiny leaked image there's a vague chance that the device will feature a video camera built-in....

If you happen to live in one of the six million US homes that have so far purchased an Amazon Echo, you may think Alexa is just a voice emanating from a cylindrical speaker that knows a couple of tricks. It plays the Beatles on command. It can order more toilet paper. It has jokes, some of which are even kind of funny.

In fact, that’s only the start. Just as Apple taught us that a small portable phone could be a more powerful computing method than our lumbering desktops, Amazon is introducing us to a new computing interface — a voice devoid of a screen—that will eventually grow to be more ubiquitous and more useful than our smartphones.

Forget the onerous process of pulling your Pixel or iPhone from your pocket, unlocking it, opening apps, and tapping your desires onto a screen. (Ugh!) Soon, you’ll speak your wants into the air — anywhere — and a woman’s warm voice with a mid-Atlantic accent will talk back to you, ready to fulfill your commands....

Amazon.com Inc. sold out of its voice-activated Echo speakers, highlighting the difficulty of correctly predicting demand for the holiday shopping season.

The $180 Echo is out of stock until Jan. 19 and the $50 Echo Dot won’t be available until after Christmas Day, according to Amazon listings. Both products were heavily discounted recently to compete with the newly released $129 Google Home with similar functions.

With the Echo sold out, some people might buy Google’s Home speaker rather than wait for the Amazon devices, said Rob Cheng, head of growth at Elementum, a supply chain software company....