A Current Look at Smart Speakers

Smart speakers have been around for a while, but they haven’t exactly changed the world. To be fair, they are good for playing music, setting timers, and answering random trivia questions, but beyond that? Not much has evolved. So, how did we get here, and what’s next? More importantly, can they actually be useful for businesses, or are they just another gadget collecting dust?

How Smart Speakers Took Off

Back in 2014, Amazon started the market when they released the Echo, featuring Alexa, and suddenly, voice-controlled assistants were a thing. Google jumped in with Google Home in 2016, and Apple followed with the HomePod in 2018.

At first, smart speakers felt like the future. They were hands-free, voice-controlled magic that could run your home, give you answers, and make life easier. Alas, something happened that made them less useful as time went on. In fact, they’re still mostly used for playing music, setting reminders, and turning on the lights. Not exactly life-changing and necessary technology.

Why Haven’t Smart Speakers Evolved Much?

Despite the advancement of artificially intelligent systems, smart speakers haven’t evolved as much as people hoped. Some of the reasons why, include:

• AI limitations - They’re still not great at having real conversations or handling complex tasks. If you ask a follow-up question, they often get confused.
• Privacy concerns - People don’t love the idea of an always-listening device in their home. That’s slowed down how much data companies can collect to improve AI.
• Not essential or very useful for business - Unlike smartphones or laptops, smart speakers haven’t found a real niche in the business world.
• They’re competing with smartphones - Why ask your smart speaker when your phone can do the same thing, often faster and with a screen?

What’s Next for Smart Speakers?

So, will they actually get better? Probably. Most IT gets improvements over time, but with a decade of use and a myriad of problems, we wouldn't bet on them becoming suddenly more effective.  

Future versions could comprehend conversations better, making them more useful for multi-step tasks. Rapid improvements to AI make this the most probable outcome. It’s not out of the question that instead of just turning off the lights when you ask and answering your questions a little off, they could learn your habits and do it automatically.

As far as business use goes, they could start to do a better job helping manage meetings, answering relevant questions, or integrating with some of the management software to improve the actual “assistant” features. They could improve automation for taking the need to manage lights, HVAC, and other technology. They will also likely get better at answering more complex series of questions (hey, they better).

For now, though, smart speakers are more of a nice-to-have device than a must-have for anyone, especially for businesses. While they do provide some degree of convenience, they won’t move the needle as far as the efficiency, capability, and overall productivity of a worker or workforce goes. 

At Macro Systems, we give honest assessments of technology that can help you in your quest to run a more profitable business. If you would like to talk about any technology, consumer or otherwise, give us a call today at 703-359-9211.