Amazon's Alexa Now Lets You Order Tens of Millions of Products With Your Voice
July 01 2016 - 5:46PM
Dow Jones News
By Nathan Olivarez-Giles
Alexa, Amazon.com Inc.'s voice-controlled digital assistant,
just got a lot better at shopping. Amazon announced on Friday that
Alexa will be able to purchase "tens of millions" of products from
Amazon's massive online store.
But Alexa -- which is built into Amazon's Wi-Fi-connected Echo
and Tap speakers and its Fire TV set-top box -- won't be able to
place an order for everything in Amazon's online store and shopping
apps. However, it will have access to all of the products in
Amazon's Prime shipping program. These are items Amazon already has
ready to ship, including Amazon's own products and those sold by
third-party retailers who have authorized Amazon to handle their
inventory and fulfillment. Generally, Prime products appear at the
top of Amazon searches.
Before Friday's update, Alexa could be used only to reorder
items a user already had purchased or to buy products through a
service called Amazon's Choice. With Amazon's Choice, you could
request a product but not a specific brand. Instead, Amazon would
decide which type of, say, toothpaste or toilet paper, to add to
your shopping cart.
Now you can ask for a product and a specific brand as well,
saying "Alexa, order Colgate toothpaste," or "Alexa, order Charmin
toilet paper."
Interestingly enough, by expanding Alexa's shopping skill set
the company could be usurping the utility of its Dash buttons,
which are physical buttons Amazon hopes consumers will place around
their home to buy specific items, like Clorox disinfecting wipes or
Ziploc bags. Amazon introduced dozens of new Dash buttons earlier
this week.
An Amazon spokeswoman declined to say whether Alexa would ever
be able to order items that fall outside of the Prime purview.
"We're adding more products every day into that Prime product
wheelhouse," the spokeswoman said. "We really want to see how
customers are using it and get their feedback on how it can be
improved. We'll continue to figure out expansion as time goes
on."
Write to Nathan Olivarez-Giles at
Nathan.Olivarez-giles@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
July 01, 2016 17:31 ET (21:31 GMT)
Copyright (c) 2016 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
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