Sweet Disposition
Within every voice assistant, a content ecosystem
The independent film 500 Days of Summer (2009) cost $7.5 million to make, and returned north of $60 million.
In addition to winning numerous awards, the film shined a light on Australian indie band The Temper Trap, whose hit song “Sweet Disposition” is used prominently in the romantic comedy.
The song, which had charted in the top 10 in several countries internationally upon release, didn’t get much attention in the United States until this film released. Afterward, the song exploded, reaching as high as #9 on Billboard.
The song got so popular that when Taylor Swift learned The Temper Trap was on site at an awards show in Australia she was attending, she personally went to their dressing room to make an unusual request.
We won’t spoil the story for you.
Years ago, it would be common to read of comparisons between voice assistants driven by accuracy, word recognition, and other rudimentary metrics that all hinted at the same reality: this technology is kinda new and, uh, a lot of times it doesn’t work all that great.
The pandemic came along and brought an end to that almost entirely.
When was the last time you heard someone compare one voice assistant to another using these metrics? Or even a chatbot or other medium for conversational AI?
Those days are gone, ushered out by a pandemic that accelerated voice/AI to the point where the technology works well on a consistent basis, and the public expects it.
With the stability and consistency of voice assistants and the underlying conversational AI in place, what’s next?
Every voice assistant is now its own media and content ecosystem.
It’s now no longer nearly enough to simply understand most users, most of the time.
Now, you need to entertain them, and provide content that adds value.
Consider three examples:
SoundHound, one of the earliest independent voice/AI players, has a music discovery app that leverages the company’s proprietary voice AI.
That legacy is a competitive advantage for them moving forward - they’ve got entertainment already baked in to their DNA.
Amazon has hit us, in just the past couple of weeks, with not just music content being added to Alexa, but healthcare content, political content, International Women’s Day content, and yet another healthcare announcement that is essentially providing even more healthcare content, albeit in the form of telehealth access.
Spot the trend?
Cerence, the automotive spinoff from Nuance (acquired by Microsoft for $19.7B), just today announced Cerence Sing, a partnership with Canadian music company Stingray to bring 20,000+ songs worth of karaoke to cars all over the world that use Cerence voice AI.
These examples were immediate and easy to reference. I could’ve named 20 more from 2022 alone.
Voice/AI corporate castles and strongholds are built with core technology. Patents, engineers, and sheer functionality.
But the moats around these castles and strongholds - the defensive distance imposed on would-be competitors - will be increasingly found in media and content.
The companies that will make themselves irresistible acquisition targets will be ones that view themselves just as much as media ecosystems as core technology.
Project Voice 2022 takes place April 25-28 in Chattanooga, Tennessee.
The floor plan for Project Voice 2022, which co-locates 30+ exhibitions inside the same ballroom as the conference program, is below. We've had success with this model previously & look forward to how it will cultivate customer and partner conversations.
