Alexa in the hotel room

Last year, I wrote about how Alexa should make in-roads into the Enterprise territory rather than stay in the consumer space.  It looks like this is already happening, now that Alexa is becoming mature.

I travel on work and end up spending a lot of time in hotels in various parts of the world.  Recently, I was at the Copenhagen Marriott and that got me thinking about how VUI (Voice User Interface), and specifically, Alexa, could have made my life a little better and easier.  I started thinking about use cases where Alexa and Echo can be deployed in the hospitality industry.  Today, everything is done by human agents and it is not always efficient or pleasant.

Imagine the following scenarios and see how seamless they can be, with Alexa.

1. Calling front desk:
Me: Alexa, call front desk
Alexa: Calling front desk
Front Desk: Hello, Mr. Shashidhar, how can I help you today?

The reason this is a simple but powerful use case is because of the fact that I can be anywhere in the room while I talk to Alexa.  I wanted to talk to the front desk as well as pack my bags at the same time.  The speaker phone is not very effective in far field communication, which necessitated me to be near the phone during the call.  Alexa would have made this a hands free communication, and I could have continued to pack while talking to the front desk.  A minute saved in the hotel is an additional minute enjoyed at the airport lounge!

2. Summoning your car from the valet:
Me: Alexa, get my car from the valet
Alexa: Getting car from valet.  Do you have a ticket number?
Me: 5842
Alexa: Ticket 5842.  When do you want the car?
Me: Now
Alexa: Summoning car from valet.  Your car should be at the front of the hotel in 5-10 mins
Me: Thanks
Alexa: Is there anything else I can do for you?
Me: Nope

There were instances when I had to call the valet and had to hold for them to answer my call.  Instead, the system can log my call and provide the ticker number to the valet staff on their system. 

3. Ordering room service:
Me: Alexa
Alexa: Good evening, Mr. Shashidhar.  How can I help you?
Me: Please order one margarita pizza from the room service menu
Alexa: Margarita pizza ordered from room service.  Is there anything else you would like to order?
Me: A glass of orange juice
Alexa: A margarita pizza and a glass of orange juice.  Anything else?
Me: That's it
Alexa: When would you want this delivered?
Me: As soon as possible
Alexa: <thinking for a moment> Your order has been placed.  It will be delivered in 40 mins
Alexa: Is there anything else?
Me: That's it for now

Room service orders anyways end up as a ticket in the kitchen.  Why not remove the layers between the guest and the kitchen?  This system would seamlessly take the order and print a ticket in the kitchen.  The system can determine the wait time based on the current open orders as well as the estimated prep time.

4. Ordering extra amenities:
Me: Alexa, could I get two additional bath towels?
Alexa: Two extra bath towels ordered.  Is there anything else, Mr. Shashidhar?
Me: Ah, I forgot toothpaste.  Could you please get me a toothpaste as well?
Alexa: Two extra towels and toothpaste.  They should be delivered in a few minutes
Alexa: Anything else, Mr. Shashidhar?
Me: Nothing for now
Alexa: Have a good day

Alarms, local weather, room controls, etc. are straightforward use cases.

What these use cases need is a echo device in every room with a unique address.  The devices would talk to a central server and the server is integrated to the existing enterprise hospitality systems (room service, valet, phone system, etc.).  These are hotel specific and not generic as the context for most of the use cases is just the hotel.

With the advances in robotics, the use case of delivering extra amenities could be completely autonomous.  The intent is transferred to the server which orders a robot to fetch the goods and deliver it to the room.  As seen in Eatsa, the San Francisco robotic restaurant, a time will come when robots will make food and deliver it to your room as well.  Since the hotel is a known and controlled environment, it becomes easy to deploy these technologies.  Hospitality industry can be the incubator of all this technology and then it can enter the rest of the world.

What this would do is eliminate the need for human intervention in a lot of the cases.  Initially, when automated phone systems came around for customer service, we cringed.  But, nowadays they have become more efficient and in some cases, better than their human counterparts.  The same way, automation and VUI will make a difference and as it matures, the transactions become seamless and more pleasurable.  We don't have to worry about human emotions and the mood of the person on the other end of the line.

Currently some of the hotel chains are trying to integrate Alexa for in-room controls like lighting and climate control.  But, the bigger ROI is in the other areas where hotels can cut expenses.  In-room automation is cool and sexy, but the big bang for the buck is automating the back office services that are currently manned by humans.

Image courtesy: Amazon.com

Maximizing store productivity

The other day I was at the mall and visited a clothing store.  Walking inside I noticed a line formed in front of the dressing rooms.  Here we had a bunch of customers who were wasting their time waiting to get into the dressing room rather than perusing the clothes and accessories being sold by the retailer.  What a great wasted opportunity.

What if they had an app that customers could download and use it to reserve the dressing room.  If no room was available, they would be put on a waiting list and pinged when one came available.  This would allow the customer to roam around and shop for more things.  Once the retailer's app is installed on the customer's mobile device, and once the customer logs into the app, the retailer will have all the customer's information so the app can provide tips or sales information to the customer based on her/his taste.

This would not only provide a pleasant experience to the shopper but also help the retailer maximize the customer's time in the store.  Which retailer would want a shopper standing in line rather than browsing the aisles and picking up products to purchase?  

Amazon Dash Button - departure from corporate principles?

Amazon seems to be going away from its basic principles with the latest Amazon Dash button.  Amazon has always been for empowering the customer, providing all the information (choice, prices, reviews, etc.) to the customer so that the customer has all the freedom to make intelligent decisions.  But, with Amazon Dash, all this is going out of the window.  Well, almost all.

Amazon Dash is a new service (and device) that Amazon has recently released.  Amazon supplies stick-on buttons to Prime customers so they can stick these buttons to relevant things in their home/office to seamlessly order supplies before they run out.  The following video from Amazon illustrates it.

The biggest gripe I have with this service is that it is too specific.  It locks customers to specific brands. 

With Dash buttons, Amazon has just driven all new comers out of the playing field.  If Amazon ships me a Tide button, I am voluntarily signing up to buy Tide for the foreseeable future.  Any new competitor to enter the field of washing soap will have a tough time to sell their wares.  The principle of 'Choice to the customer' goes right out of the window.  What if I wanted to try other brands?  Do I have to go to Amazon and get another button for that? 

Amazon is slowly entering our homes and introducing the concept of 'Internet of Things' (IOT) with this device.  All this device is an IOT. albeit not a very smart one.  A smart IOT would have figured out when I am getting low on my supplies and would have automatically placed an order for me.  Well, we will have to wait a bit longer for that. 

What Amazon should have done is create a generic button and sent a dozen of them to each Prime customer.  The customer would then affix the buttons wherever appropriate (like fridge, washing machine, coffee machine, etc) and program them to a particular category.  Note I am saying 'Category', not a specific product.  So, the customer would affix a button on a washing machine and program it to the category of 'Laundry Detergent'.  This is a one time activity.  Once programmed, the device has a specific job.  Its job is to order a laundry detergent. 

This is where Amazon can still empower the customer.  When the user presses the laundry button, the system automatically adds a few choice detergents into the shopping cart as options.  User would then preview the options and choose the one that made the most sense based on brand, quality, reviews, price, etc.  Of course, we could go further and mark one of the choices as a default choice for the next 6 months so that Amazon picks that choice automatically without prodding (at least for the next 6 months).  This way Amazon can still provide the power of choice to the customer.  The customer can always choose the same product and set it as default. 

By not sending brand specific buttons, the customer is free to choose the brand she wants (at that point in time).  Also, the buttons can be made re-programmable so that they can be moved around and assigned different categories as the user sees fit.

New devices and ideas should always be aligned to the corporate vision and should never waver from it.  Otherwise, the company loses its vision and will soon become irrelevant. 

Of course, with the present design, Amazon can flex its muscle and charge brands to position themselves on the Dash button.  This is similar to the retail shelf space they compete for, in a brick and mortar store.

Amazon should use this opportunity to innovate and slowly position themselves within every home.  As long as they stick to their original vision of empowering the customer, this will be a grand success.

Brand Love

I was at a Marriott in Minnesota recently.  It was cold and snowing that week.  One morning I get up and look out of my window to see the road and the lawn completely blanketed by snow.  I got ready and came down to go to the client office.  I had equipped myself with a muffler around my neck, ear muffs, winter gloves and a coat.  I was ready to brush the snow off my car and scrape the ice off the windshield. 

I walk out and am greeted by a car that had no snow or ice on it.  I glance around to see that someone had cleared the snow and ice off all the cars in the parking lot.  I was, to say the least, pleased with the pleasant surprise Marriott offered.  They made my life easier and they made me look cool.  While all my colleagues (staying at another hotel chain) were sweating in the Minnesota cold scraping ice off their windshield, I simply got in my car and drove off.  It not only saved my time but also saved me from the trouble of clearing show and ice in sub-zero climate.  You can bet I am going back to that Marriott.

This got me thinking about customer loyalty and brand loyalty. 

What is Customer Loyalty?

Customer loyalty is where a customer is loyal to a particular company/service/product.  Customer loyalty can be garnered by offering rewards, discounts and other perks. 

A simple act like clearing snow off cars, which is not part of their SLA or contract goes a long way in making the customer happy and finally loyal.  What Marriott did was make me cool and kick ass.  This reminded me of one of Kathy Sierra's posts on this subject (Image courtesy: Kathy Sierra).  

Brand loyalty, however has to be earned in a whole different way.  Brand loyalty is earned by offering exceptional products and services.  

Companies like Apple command brand loyalty mainly by producing excellent products that consumers want.  The products are of such high quality that they command a cult-like following of brand loyalists.  Apple has also creates an ecosystem (iTunes) that ties the customer into their products for a seamless experience (and forced brand loyalty).

Other companies indirectly force brand loyalty.  Take for example Canon or Nikon in the imaging market.  Once a consumer invests significant amount of money on the foundation product (say, the camera body) and a few accessories (say, lenses, flash, etc.), it is hard to switch to another brand due to the fact that they are different standards (say, lens coupling).  Switching would mean an entirely new investment to get back to where you were.  Not that these companies produce inferior products.  Both produce products on par with each other which makes it even more difficult to keep customers from wavering.  Hence, proprietary standards like lens coupling ensure brand loyalty. 

Customer loyalty is directly related to cost, discounts and rewards.  Once the rewards and discounts vanish, the customer will easily wander.  But, brand loyalty is not related to any of the factors mentioned above.  Irrespective of the cost or rewards, customers will always be loyal to the brand.  This kind of loyalty can only be commanded by producing exceptional products.

Everyone takes great service for granted.  Great service is not going to garner loyalty.  But the opposite is absolutely true.  Bad service will absolutely drive away customers.  Businesses should concentrate more on dispute resolution than on exceptional customer service.  It is human to make mistakes.  But, what sets apart great businesses is how they resolve disputes.

Businesses should concentrate on both customer loyalty as well as brand loyalty.  They both require different strategies and resources, but go a long way in customer retention.

Remember, the cost of customer acquisition is always higher than the cost of retention. 

16 Things from A16Z

Andreessen Horowitz published 16 areas they are focusing on for 2015.  This list is a good bellwether of what areas to research, work on, invest in, etc. 

Enterprise startups are sexy

“The door to the consumer is through the enterprise, and not vice versa.”

This is what RIM co-CEO Jim Balisille said in 2007 when RIM was flying high.  This was the comment made when Apple released its iPhone to the consumer market.  That was then, and this is now.  RIM is struggling to stay alive, and corporate America has embraced the iPhone.

With technological advances, mobile computing, cloud computing, connectivity, BYOD phenom and a host of other factors, there has been a major shift in how new technology is being introduced into the enterprise.  Here is a very insightful article on this issue.  If that was interesting, read the full interview with Marc Andreessen here.

Web 2.0 Internet trends

Every year, Mary Meeker looks into her crystal ball and gives a presentation on the internet trends. These presentations are filled with a lot of data and analysis. In case you haven't seen the 2011 presentation, here it is:



Here is the PPT if you want to go over the slides at your own pace.

KPCB Internet Trends (2011)

Lessons from the demise of TouchPad

It was Saturday morning and I am at Best Buy standing in line outside the door waiting for the store to open. There were around 20 people with me, all excited to get their hands on the $99 TouchPads. The door opens and we all walk in and start looking for TouchPads, only to be told by the sales staff that they have none in stock. Everybody is flabbergasted that the store has lots on stock the previous evening and none this morning. We all return empty handed.

I started following a Twitter feed for tips on where to score one. And, I do get a tip that it is in stock at barnesandnoble.com. I immediately rush over and place an order for my TouchPad. Everything goes smooth and my order in place, I relax for the rest of the weekend.

Monday arrives and I get an email from BN and I immediately open it to see when my TouchPad is arriving. But, to my dismay, the email says:
Due to unexpected customer demand for this item, our inventory was depleted prior to your order being processed so we are unable to fulfill this item as requested. Consequently, we have canceled your order and you will not be billed for this amount.

Dang.

Later on, I hear that another of my friend's order met with the same fate, albeit with another retailer.

What this tells me is that Best Buy had a lapse of communication, corporate not relaying the information to their stores in a timely manner. I did hear that the same store sold the TouchPads later during the day.

And, the Order Management (OM) system is not integrated with the Supply Chain and Inventory Management system at B&N. The OM system doesn't have a clue of the real-time inventory. They didn't have a clue what their Available To Promise (ATP) was. If BN had an integrated multi-channel OM system that was in sync with their Inventory Management system, this would not have happened.

What the TouchPad fire sale showed us was that most of the retailers are yet to mature in managing their multi-channel OM, Inventory and ERP functionality. This is a tremendous opportunity for them to squeeze more profits out of their supply chain by maximizing their supply utilization and inventory productivity. Maybe, the brick and mortar retailers can still survive (for some more time) if they get their houses in order and streamlined to reduce costs.

Photo credit: HP.com

Lessons from StartupWeekend

I have attended a few StartupWeekend events and it is always exhilarating to participate in them. All the energy and enthusiasm is contagious to say the least.

One pattern I have noticed so far is that a majority of the projects just fizzle off, after the weekend. One of the main reasons is the fact that the team realizes that the idea is either not feasible or does not make sound business.

In reality, VCs always look for 'the team'. If you have an A-team, come what may, they will execute. If halfway through the endeavor, they discover that the idea doesn't hold water, they will come up with another one which will. Remember, they are the A-team.

The biggest problem at StartupWeekends is that there isn't enough time to iterate, and come up with fresh ideas. You present an idea on Friday, and have two days to execute. If the Product Manager determines that the idea doesn't make business sense, it is too late to turn the ship. The developers are already half way through the project and are not going to stop. Even if you stop, and change course, the chances of having a demoable application by Sunday evening is pretty slim. So, in order to save face, the team moves along and completes the implementation (demo app).

After the weekend, the idea fizzles off since the momentum is lost and no value is seen in continuing the idea. In cases where there is a lot of synergy and great teams are formed, they continue to meet and hash out ideas that they finally implement.

So, the key to a successful StartupWeekend is not the idea, per se, but the team you form. Next time, pick people who complement you and make a great team and success will follow.

SWSEA

Business plan competitions are a thing of the past.

That was my conclusion after last weekend's experience. I was at the Startup Weekend event where high performance teams worked for 53 hrs straight (most did sleep for some time , I assume), and came out with a product/service at the end of it. This is a great way of prototyping an idea and throwing it on the wall to see if it sticks. No more business plans, exit strategies, funding, etc. Get the idea implemented, present it in front of a panel, gather immediate feedback as well as get voted (or booted). If it is an acceptable solution, then sit down and figure out how to monetize it. In fact, the reality is that the revenue potential dawns on the team during implementation. As the team implements the solution, and starts understanding the functionality, new avenues for revenue dawn on the team.

Startup Weekend is an event organized by Jeremy Lightsmith and Marc Nager, and is a great way to meet smart people. I was fortunate to be able to work with a team of exceptionally talented people. In fact, one of my team mates is a kick A$$ marketer and another is a Heavy Guerrilla. SW is an event for energized teams that are ready to crank out something meaningful in 53 hrs. And, all the teams did!

A pattern I noticed is that almost every pitch was geared towards leveraging the social sites and the data they offer. Several ideas were harnessing the power of iPhone (location, usability, motion sensing, etc.). There was one team working on the iPad and trying to leverage its form factor over the iPhone.

Another pattern I noticed was that majority of the attendees were attracted to ideas that were cool or ground breaking or funky. Not many were interested in ideas that were not cool, but had great revenue potential, IMHO.

SW is a very informal event and open to all interested in creating something new and cool. People with ideas pitch at the beginning of the session (Friday evening). The ideas are voted and the top ideas are published. The leader (one with the idea) then 'recruits' a team with varied skills needed for the project. The team sets off and builds the product/service in the next two days. At the end (Sunday evening), the results are presented to a panel who votes on the best product/idea. The beauty is that all the teams had working solutions that they demo'd. The winner finally walks away with prizes (money, services, exposure).

This is a great way to test the waters and see how practical and viable your idea is. This is a very fast paced, and quick way to plan something and execute it to completion.

Imagine, building a web application as well as its equivalent iPhone application and launching it to the public in 2 days. It happened last week. We did it as part of our project!

And, I had RedBull for the first time in my life!

Death of common-sense

I was wondering whether to call this post "Death of common-sense" or "Greed" or "Art of negotiation", and the first one seemed to make more sense.

A street performer came in front of our house with his performing crew (including a few animals), and seeing the opportunity to get some nice pictures of life in Bangalore, I ran in and picked up my camera gear. When I came out, the troupe was getting ready to perform. From what I can remember, street performers are usually paid around Re. 1 during my times, and due to inflation, they may now get about Rs. 10 per performance (my best guess).

As soon as the troupe leader saw my camera, he instructed the group to stop all operations. He came to me and asked for Rs. 200 for the show. When I asked him the reason for the request, he said that I was going to shoot pictures. I told him that lots of people shoot pictures of street performers and most of them don't even pay anything. I also told him that the pictures that I am taking are for my own pleasure and are not going to be used for any financial gains (not that he could figure that all out).

We negotiated for a while and I upped my price to Rs. 100, just to see what he does. I was more concerned about the troupe going to bed hungry than anything else. Finally, the leader did not budge (he had the dreaded "Take it or leave it" attitude, which is a big no-no in good negotiations) and he took his troupe to perform in another street (and make, at most Rs. 10/performance).

I felt so bad for his troupe of hard workers. What a pity to be paired up with a leader (actually, he is just a manager, with no leadership qualities) who lacks common sense.

Know what your options are when you start a negotiation.
Know what you are bargaining for.
Always bargain for individual or collective advantage/gain.
Know when to give way in order to create a win-win situation.
Never let your ego negotiate.

This person did not even know what he was bargaining for. He could not justify his terms, and he did not realize the impact of a standoff. I, for one, did not lose anything in this standoff, while he and his troupe lost their meal.

No wonder there are so many people going hungry everyday in this land of opportunity.

"It's not about the Technology ...

but the problem it solves" says Don Dodge. Well said.

The first time I saw Riya.com, I was impressed by its technology and the potential (for a Google acquisition). The only business case I could see was Google acquiring them to index their image database. Imagine you searching for images of Aishwarya Rai and if the image I have here was named IMG_841.jpg, a search engine would not have picked it up. Since it is named AishwaryaRai_Sketch.jpg, it will get picked up. An image should either be named or tagged appropriately in order for search engines to pick it up. What Riya promises is that even if my file was named IMG_841.jpg, it will also be tagged as a picture of Aishwarya Rai as it does visual pattern matching of the image and not just the file name. Wow. That is pretty cool stuff. Iff, it works all the time.

The problem Riya is facing is an interesting one. You have a solution to an unknown problem. You need to define a problem that is compelling for the audience to invest in you. It has to be timed right, and priced right.

What a sweet problem to have. They have the technological solution, and are searching for an appropriate problem to solve.

Nocturnal fixin'

All of us have scheduled an auto repair or service and had to drop the car off at a designated place, in the morning, and pick it up in the evening after the work is done? You have to figure out how you are going to manage without a car for the day. Lots of repair shops are not open on weekends, or in the evening. This adds to the problem. How many times have we skipped/postponed a service/repair just because we didn't want to go through this pain? And, even if we get the service performed, and then find out that something was not fixed right, we have to go through the whole ritual all over again. What a pain. Especially in most of the US cities where public transportation isn't up to snuf.

Now, imagine this. You drive your car around all day. Send it to a special place at night where people work on it all night long, and you wake up to a squeaky clean serviced automobile. No, I am not saying that we will ship (or better yet, beam) it to Bangalore and offshore the auto service industry too.

This is a new business model that I am suggesting. Imagine an auto shop that works all night (and, maybe all day, in shifts). The reasoning behind this is that autos are a necessity in most cities in tea US. Why take away a necessity when it is needed most. Instead, take it away (for service, cleaning, etc.) when it is needed least. Which is, when the user is sleeping or at home.

You drop off your car in the evening on the way home. The shop checks your vehicle and calls you about the service/questions/estimates before 8 or 9 PM. Once all the answers are obtained, the mechanics go to work at night and get the job done. You arrive early in the morning and pick up your car for use throughout the day! The shop, if smart, will throw in bagels/doughnuts and coffee in the morning. That wasn't so bad, was it?

So, how come we don't see places like these. There are several logistic as well as operational details missing in my example above, but I don't see any glaring problems that aren't solvable.

I, for one, would love this kind of convenience.

Ideas, anyone?

I was at a TIE event this evening about the art of recruiting a star team for your startup. It had great panelists and the discussion was lively, but sadly short. I was interested in finding out how to spot and recruit stars in the early stages. Where do you go looking for them? How do you evaluate them? What kind of equity do you share? And so on and so forth. But, the audience was fixated on IP protection and NDAs more than anything else.

This brings me to the "idea" in a business. There are lots of people with lots of great ideas. We see an extremely small percentage of them turning into products and making it big. It is not the idea that matters, it is the execution. Investors (VCs, angels, etc.) do not invest in an idea. They invest in the team (Of course, the team is the one that came up with the idea). If the current idea tanks, the team should be capable of churning out another idea in no time, and take it to market.

If you have an idea for a product, you can rest assured that there are at least a dozen others with the same idea. Several of them are trying to productize it right this moment. There are lots of brilliant people in this world, including you. The fact that you have competition is proof that your idea is a good one. The one that wins is the idea that is executed well and timed to the market appropriately.

Top executives always give seminars and talks on their strategies for success. They give away their secrets in these seminars as well as in books they write. Why do they give away their trade secrets? It is not just their modus operandi that took them where they are, it is their execution.

So, do not be afraid of someone stealing your idea. Of course, you need to share it with people you trust. And you should do everything reasonable to protect it. But, keeping the idea to oneself and not doing anything about it is worse than sharing it and having someone else execute it. At least, you will have a great story for your grand kids.

Spinning Apple

Isn't this good timing or what? Microsoft is getting ready to release Zune, and Apple posts this notice on their web site that a very small number of iPods were released with a virus in them. Apart from the spin Apple put on this story and blamed Microsoft for the failure (which I don't agree), this seems like a well timed (marketing) message than anything else:
- Apple hardware and software are (generally) free from viruses (for a variety of reasons).
- Microsoft software and hardware is susceptible to viruses. So, Zune buyers beware. Zune is Microsoft hardware and runs Microsoft software, and has wireless connectivity. So, it is susceptible to viruses!

Or, is it my imagination running wild?

Smart selling (or lack thereof)

One of my friends drives an Acura and was complaining about the crappy loaner he was given when he had his car serviced at the dealership. I know of several dealerships which do this. You own an expensive luxury vehicle, and you end up driving a sub-compact ordinary loaner for a day.

I fail the understand the stupidity of the dealerships in passing off such a great opportunity to sell/market new cars.

Imagine this:
- Dealership calls you to set up an appointment once they determine that your car is due.
- You take the car in, and are given a loaner which is an upgrade (1-2 levels above) of the car you dropped off.
- You drive the fully loaded upgrade loaner for a day.
- When you come back to pick up your car, you mention how good this loaner was.
- The attendant acknowledges, and casually mentions that his manager took the liberty of doing some calculations, and determined what it would take for you to upgrade to that class of car. And, hands you a "sealed" envelope with the information. AND stops talking. It is completely up to you to open the envelope and peek inside, or chuck it into the garbage.
- You (like most people), salivating over the upgrade, open the envelope.
- If you were one of the people who were sitting on the fence wrt this issue, you fall for it, and will be driving an upgraded vehicle next week!

This is one scenario. You can come up with various other approaches to accomplish the same. There is no compromise of information here. Note that the dealer intimately knows your current car, its condition, and, obviously, its current market value. And, he happens to sell/trade new cars. He is the best person to do the math and give you the above mentioned information. Of course, all this should be done in a very subtle and non-intrusive manner. I wonder when the dealerships will pick this up.

Maybe, that will make me go the dealer for my next service....