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What’s All The This Hype Around Voice Recognition Technology Anyway? Key Points of Interest, Key Risk and Some Important Information.

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Voice Recognition Technology (www.motocms.com)

In 2018 Boyd notes that voice is the future and according to some big brands such as Apple and shipped out which includes Siri and Cortana respectively. In 2004 an anonymous source highlights that as voice recognition technology becomes more complex, their accuracy increases, providing opportunities for increased security. This shows scope for use of voice recognition to improve safety within a business. Voice recognition allows for development of business function as security checks can be strengthened through its implementation however there are some risk factors which need to be taken into account before considering introducing voice recognition into your business.

Key Points of Interest

Voice Recognition Makes The User Feel Heard + Continues To Improve

In 2017 Chowdhury’s Blog in Venture Beat highlights that making the users feel heard is key with implementation of voice recognition technology. Confirmations and acknowledgements are pivotal in allowing users to feel heard as it is same confirmations that users look for when speaking to a human. The development of voice recognition has allowed the technology to replicate human conversation and with the massive growth of interest in the area, developments will only continue to make the technology better. In 1998 Fass highlights that real estate agents have been using voice recognition technology to find out information about properties and also speed up their clients buying process in order to get them to the top of the list. This technology has been in use for 20 years and has already been speeding up the users transaction times. In 2017 Myers notes that Microsoft can now transcribe human speech with a 5.1% error rate therefore its development since then, and planned development for the future means that this technology could outperform human agents sooner rather than later. The graph below from Kleiner Perkins in 2017 shows voice recognition accuracy has been improving since 2013, and is nearing 100% accuracy.

Voice Recognition Makes Websites More Viable For Everyone.

In 2018 Discover Technologies highlights that Voice Recognition has become an intelligent software product, able to teach itself to recognise one’s particular voice patterns so that there is no need to interact with a computer or a keyboard or mouse. This has made websites more accessible for people of all abilities therefore it is key in ensuring that any voice technologies deployed can be activated and used without relying on a keyboard or mouse. In 1994 Blenkhorn notes that speech synthesis technology is increasingly being used to enhance products as well as  to make them more accessible to blind and visually impaired people therefore it is pivotal to use these technologies in order to cater for that market.

A great piece of content which highlights some more key points can be found

>>HERE<< and >>HERE<<

Key Risk

Scrutiny Agains’t Voice Recognition

In 2017 ExpressVPN highlight that voice technology requires smart devices that are constantly listening and potentially recording users which threatens user and business information. In 2017 The Independent exposed Google’s new Home Mini voice assistant which had been spying on some of its users, due to a “phantom” issue. This can effect users outlook on the brand and make them believe that they are irresponsible as well as the possibility of security risks due to the inactive recording. In 2016 Bennakhi highlights that the progression of sophisticated technologies such as voice recognition makes for more comfort and entertainment but recent security threats and distractions have been uncovered with the upsurge usage of new technologies. Voice recognition can definitely benefit users however the risks involved are huge. The fact that these types of technologies are constantly updating means that they are hard to monitor and keep safe however if they can act as a sufficient boost to efficiency then businesses may decide to take on the risk if it remains smaller than the reward.   

A great piece of content which notes more about the risks of voice technology can be found

>HERE<<

Siri Hack  (www.gadgets.ndtv.com)

Important Information

Voice Technology Devices Are On The Rise

In 2018 WEBITMD highlight that voice recognition devices in the household are increasing and the graph by Forrester below shows that smart home devices will be used in more than 60 million homes by 2022. The sheer growth of these smart home devices show that voice recognition technology is growing and being more universally accepted all over the world. In 2017 Business Wire highlight that the global voice recognition market is expected to reach a market size of $126.5 billion by 2023 therefore it is clearly a booming market with more space to grow which means that the venture can be profitable. In 2006 Carneiro notes that by understanding the capacities of these technologies and their adequacy to each business you can achieve excellence, enhance productivity, and strengthen competitiveness.

A great piece of content which highlights more important information on voice recognition can be found

>>HERE<<

References:

  • Anonymous (2004) “The History of Voice Recognition Technology”, Information Management Journal, vol. 38, no. 1, pp. 54.
  • Bennakhi, A. & Safar, M. (2016) “Ambient Technology in Vehicles: The Benefits and Risks”, Procedia Computer Science, vol. 83, pp. 1056-1063.
  • Blenkhorn, P. (1994) “Designing products that speak: lessons from talking systems for blind people”, Computing & Control Engineering Journal, vol. 5, no. 4, pp. 172.
  • Boyd, C. (2018) The Past, Present, and Future of Speech Recognition Technology, Available at: https://medium.com/swlh/the-past-present-and-future-of-speech-recognition-technology-cf13c179aaf (Accessed: 6th April 2018).
  • Brandon, J. (2017) Google is recording everything you say to a bot, Available at: http://www.news.com.au/technology/online/security/google-is-recording-everything-you-say-to-a-bot/news-story/fcf90d5c6b20acb9cf35d1e6c029a3ac (Accessed: 6th April 2018).
  • Buckner, A. (2017) 5 best practices for implementing voice marketing in 2018, Available at: https://venturebeat.com/2017/12/15/5-best-practices-for-implementing-voice-marketing-in-2018/ (Accessed: 6th April 2018).
  • Carneiro, A. (2006) “Adopting new technologies”, Handbook of Business Strategy, vol. 7, no. 1, pp. 307-312.
  • Discover Technologies (2018) Dragon – Speech Recognition Software for Blind People, Available at: https://discovertechnologies.com/blog/dragon-speech-recognition-software-for-blind/ (Accessed: 6th April 2018).
  • ExpressVPN (2017) The Siri-ous benefits and dangers of voice technology, Available at: https://www.expressvpn.com/blog/siri-voice-technology-benefits-dangers/ (Accessed: 6th April 2018).
  • Fass, A (2003) ‘Speak Easy’, Forbes, 171, 1, pp. 135-136, Business Source Premier, EBSCOhost, viewed 7 April 2018.
  • Gadgets 360 (2017) Siri, WeChat and Other Apps May Put You at Risk of Voice Hacking: Study , Available at: https://gadgets.ndtv.com/apps/news/siri-wechat-and-other-apps-may-put-you-at-risk-of-voice-hacking-study-1708501 (Accessed: 6th April 2018).
  • Google (2014) Behind the Mic: The Science of Talking with Computers, Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yxxRAHVtafI (Accessed: 6th April 2018).
  • Moyers, S. (2018) Voice Recognition Technology Vs. Graphic User Interface, Available at: https://www.motocms.com/blog/en/voice-recognition-technology/ (Accessed: 6th April 2018).
  • Myers, E. (2017) Little Known Facts About Speech Recognition Technology, Available at: https://www.temi.com/blog/2017/10/11/little-known-facts-about-speech-recognition-technology/ (Accessed: 6th April 2018).
  • Saunders, J. (2018) It’s a Voice-First World, Is Your Content Optimized for It?, Available at: http://webitmd.com/blog/advanced-seo/its-a-voice-first-world-is-your-content-optimized-for-it/ (Accessed: 6th April 2018).
  • TheDrum (2017) NEWS The Future of Audio: Better Voice, Deeper Personalization and Richer Immersion, Available at: http://www.thedrum.com/news/2017/03/06/the-future-audio-better-voice-deeper-personalization-and-richer-immersion (Accessed: 6th April 2018).
  • The Independent (2017) Google Home Mini secretly recorded everything its owner said, Available at: https://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/gadgets-and-tech/news/google-home-mini-secretly-recording-everything-you-say-voice-assistant-my-activity-a7994261.html (Accessed: 6th April 2018).
  • Wood, L. (2017) Voice Recognition Market – Expected to Reach $126.5 Billion by 2023 – Research and Markets, Available at: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20171213005500/en/Voice-Recognition-Market—Expected-Reach-126.5 (Accessed: 6th April 2018).

Words: 840

Implementing Voice Recognition Technology online in an ever changing and diversified market. The benefits and risks towards integration of voice technology into a businesses virtual interface in order to simplify and update the checkout and customer service elements.

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  Voice recognition Technology (www.vensi.com)

The face of technology as we know it is constantly changing and the fact that over 26 million amazon voice recognition devices have been shipped out in the third quarter of 2017 (Kinsella, 2017) shows the massive scope of its growth and adoption. In 2012 Kenealy highlights that an outmoded technology backbone may be inhibiting technology-savvy people from joining businesses which questions whether it is a necessity rather than a choice to invest in new technologies as it might be damaging the companies reputation and harming recruitment capabilities for the future. This blog post will highlight the benefits and risks behind the implementation of this type of technology outlining whether it will be beneficial for firms to integrate this sort of technology today.

Benefits

  • Increased sales through reduced checkout times.

TechRadarPro highlight that the time saving factor behind voice recognition technology is what drives business and consumers to adopt it. This is because it makes it quicker to communicate with consumers as well as document data. In 2016 Serasinghe and Vasanthapriyan note that in todays world people do not waste their valuable time waiting and that reducing the waiting time of customers at checkouts improves customer satisfaction. This implies that consumers demand quicker checkout times as well as that reducing customer waiting time directly leads to improved customer satisfaction. Furthermore in 2007 Shapiro highlights that customer satisfaction significantly influences purchase intentions, the amount of dollars spent and quantity purchased which means that improved customer satisfaction has a direct relationship with increasing sales.

  • Reduced complaints through self service capabilities.

Sestek‘s blog on speech recognition notes that businesses which provide customer service benefit from the technology in a way that enriches customer experience and reduces organisational costs. Voice recognition can be used to simplify checkout processes and make a businesses webpage more accessible to a wider range of abilities. It is also feels a bit safer giving confidential information to a Voice recognition  system rather than typing it down and sending it over an encrypted (or potentially not so encrypted) platform. The use of Voice recognition  technology in the banking sector led to less people reporting problems and complaints, and notably 82.4% of customers said that their most recent interaction was right first time, up from 77% a year ago (IoCC, 2017). In 2000 Matthew et al denote that self service technologies delivery options can be an excellent means of creating a competitive advantage for a business which in turn will effect the businesses image.

Virtual Helping Hand (www.whatsnext.nuance.com)

Some content which illustrates the benefits of voice recognition technology further can be found >> HERE << and >>HERE<<

Risks

  • Customer susceptibility to hacking and fraud.

RMMagazine highlights in their blog that Nathan Wenzler, a chief security strategist at a leading consultancy firm, says that the addition of voice absolutely increases the risk level for technology users. He says that when you add more features to a device, you are also adding complexity and more code and, as a result, you are introducing more avenues for people to hack into the device. TalkTalk recently reported a loss of £60million in revenue and 101,000 customers due to a hack (TheRegister, 2016) which shows the level of damage they can cause. In 2004 Schneier stresses that computer security is not a problem that technology can solve. He says that security solutions have a technological component, but security is fundamentally a business problem and that whether a business continues to use the resource is measured through a cost-risk ratio therefore the benefits for the firm and consumer must outweigh any risks in order for the venture to be considered.

A great piece of content which illustrates the TalkTalk hacks further can be found

>>HERE<<

  • Customer information leak, including private and confidential information. 

In Kapersky’s blog Kuksov notes that in relation to voice recognition technology the first possibility that comes to mind is the leaking of personal and corporate data. He highlights that some dictate their credit card numbers and one-time passwords to fill in forms online which has a direct link to information leak and potentially identify theft for customers. Furthermore he says that some systems are unable to differentiate people by voice therefore if a voice recognition device is stolen or used by someone else it is possible for them to make purchases online as well gain confidential information about the owner. In 2009 Kirkpatrick stresses that if you think your computer network is well protected against attack, you might be right however your company may still be highly vulnerable. This is because employees are still vulnerable to social engineering techniques (which is the use of psychological techniques to extract information from people in order to gain access to computer systems). In 2017 Engadget reported of an Equifax security breach which leaked the personal information of 143 million US consumers (about 44% of the whole US population). This led to the share price of Equifax falling severely which shows how detrimental an information leak can be.

A great piece of content which shows Equifax’s response can be found

>>HERE<<

References

  • Bakanay, H. (2014) “The Advantages of Speech Recognition”, Available at: http://www.sestek.com/2014/11/the-advantages-of-speech-recognition-technology/(Accessed: 21st February 2018).
  • Channel 4 (2016) “TalkTalk hack: a closer look at the scammers”, Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mYvVtsqNk6Q (Accessed: 21st February 2018).
  • Deschenes, S. (2012) “5 financial benefits of voice recognition technology”, Available at: http://www.healthcarefinancenews.com/news/5-financial-benefits-voice-recognition-technology (Accessed: 25th February 2018).
  • Equifax (2017) “Rick Smith, Chairman and CEO of Equifax, on Cybersecurity Incident Involving Consumer Data”, Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bh1gzJFVFLc (Accessed: 25th February 2018).
  • Hall, K. (2016) “TalkTalk admits losing £60m and 101,000 customers after THAT hack”, Available at: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2016/02/02/talktalk_hack_cost_60m_lost_100k_customers/(Accessed: 21st February 2018).
  • Kirkpatrick, J. (2006) “Protect your business against dangerous information leaks”, Penton Media, Inc., Penton Business Media, Inc. and their subsidiaries, Cleveland.
  • Koksov, I. (2017) All ears: The dangers of voice assistants, Available at: https://www.kaspersky.co.uk/blog/voice-recognition-threats/8443/ (Accessed: 25th February 2018).
  • RM Magazine (2017) “The Risks of Voice Technology”, Available at: http://www.rmmagazine.com/2017/10/02/the-risks-of-voice-technology/ (Accessed: 21st February 2018).
  • Howell, D. (2016) “How voice recognition can be a major asset for your business”, Available at: https://www.techradar.com/news/software/applications/how-voice-recognition-can-be-a-major-asset-for-your-business-1321534 (Accessed: 20th February 2018).
  • IoCC (2017) “Is voice recognition a secure enough customer service tool?”, Available at: https://www.instituteofcustomerservice.com/media-centre/customer-service-news/article/is-voice-recognition-a-secure-enough-customer-service-tool (Accessed: 21st February 2018).
  • Kenealy, B. (2012) “Technology upgrades can help attract younger workers; Legacy systems, outdated devices deter tech-savvy”, Business Insurance, vol. 46, no. 40, pp. 17.
  • Kinsella, B. (2017) “Bezos Says More Than 20 Million Amazon Alexa Devices Sold”, Available at: https://www.voicebot.ai/2017/10/27/bezos-says-20-million-amazon-alexa-devices-sold/ (Accessed: 20th February 2018).
  • Lawler, R. (2017) “Equifax security breach leaks personal info of 143 million US consumers”, Available at: https://www.engadget.com/2017/09/07/equifax-hack-143-million/ (Accessed: 25th February 2018).
  • Mauro, A. (2015) “Artificial intelligence: Bringing the humanity back to customer service”, Available at: https://whatsnext.nuance.com/customer-experience/artificial-intelligence-turns-customer-service-into-something-consumers-love/ (Accessed: 21st February 2018).
  • Meuter, M.L., Ostrom, A.L., Roundtree, R.I. & Bitner, M.J. (2000) “Self-Service Technologies: Understanding Customer Satisfaction with Technology-Based Service Encounters”, Journal of Marketing, vol. 64, no. 3, pp. 50-64.
  • Schneier, B. (2004), “Hacking the business climate for network security”, Computer, vol. 37, no. 4, pp. 87-89.
  • Serasinghe, M. & Vasanthapriyan, S. (2016) “Intelligent Retail Checkout Management System”, IEEE, pp. 929.
  • Shapiro, M. & I. Gómez, M. (2014) “Customer satisfaction and sales performance in wine tasting rooms”, International Journal of Wine Business Research, vol. 26, no. 1, pp. 45-60.
  • Techquickie (2015) “Voice recognition As Fast As Possible”, Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AWWjN1QqoYY (Accessed: 20th February 2018).
  • Vensi (2017) “Voice recognition Technology”, Available at: http://www.vensi.com/voice-recognition-technology (Accessed: 20th February 2018).

 

Increasing Visibility and High Search Engine Rankings. How can you tell whether companies in the Airline Carrier Industry are becoming more visible online through Search Engine Optimisation?

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(SEO Take Off www.beuniquegroup.com)

Auditing can be a healthy tool for boosting your brands online presence in competitive times. In this blog I will explain 2 key methods of auditing SEO in the airline industry in order to get a better understanding of your brands search engine positioning and to learn what is important in boosting visibility and search engine rankings.

1.Traffic overview

Websites such as SEMRush allow users to view and analyse airline carriers traffic online. The free service highlights:

  • Volume and Variability of Traffic
  • Top Organic Keywords
  • Competing Websites
  • Domain Positioning

This tool can be used to weigh up a firms position against others in search engine rankings, and give a view on their market position. It can also highlight trends with volume of traffic and now gone digital – word of mouth advertising. In 2009 Trusov, M et al highlight that ‘outbound word of mouth can be precisely tracked’ which allows firms to follow how they are being shared, who is sharing and precisely what they are saying. This can help a firm develop key words which will boost their search engine rankings. It terms of Airline Carriers this information can be crucial as it also helps them spot trends and forecast hot destinations or locations. A great video which highlights this is >>HERE<<.

Firms with high organic search rates tend to top search engines as they are likely to be what the consumer is looking for. Other than that paid searches also turn up at the top of the page when your search has keywords that may relate to the product or service. What is important for a smaller firm with low rankings is to ensure that they use key and distinctive keywords to what they are providing in order to reach a higher ranking. A great blog post with more information regarding this is Steve Webb’s How to Perform the Worlds Greatest SEO Audit.

(Internet Traffic www.lifehacker.com.au)

2.SERP Appearance

SERP stands for Search Engine Results Page which are the pages in search engines which display your search queries. A study was done in 2010 by SEO-Hacker founder Sean Patrick Si which studied the amount of click-throughs pages received throughout a search engine. He found that ‘11th to 20th results get far less clicks compared to the 1st to 10th.’ He concluded that ‘around 90% of the whole word population only look at the first page result.’ SERP Appearance is important as it can be a make or break for your business. Here are some quick ways you can audit SERP appearance from Search Engine Land in 2014:

First, do a search!

Search your Brand Name and then Brand Name and it’s Location.

-Does your domain appear? Is it in the 1st position?

-Are there site links? If so, are they suitable? How good are the -titles and descriptions that appear?

-Is there a business or knowledge graph listing in the side bar? How accurate is the information, and is there anything missing?

-Do any listings hurt the brand’s reputation?

Then search for your Site:rootdomain

-How many pages appear in the index? Is this high or low? 

(Results www.seo-hacker.com)

-Are the titles well written and contain keywords?

-Is there a lot of keyword duplication?

-Are the descriptions meaningful and attractive? Do they make you want to click them?

In 2007 Jansen, B.J. et al conducted a research into search engine brand awareness. They conducted a study with 32 participants which measured the effect of four search engine brands while controlling for the quality of search engine results. They found that on average there was a ‘25% difference between the most highly rated search engine and the lowest’ showing that there is 25% more visibility for brands which rank highly in search results.

Brand awareness is key for firms within the airline carrier industry as there isn’t much differentiation between brands however this becomes even more important in terms of low cost carriers who basically offer the same homogenous service. Brands which appear at the top of search results are exposed to a large percentage of internet traffic therefore they are more likely to convert views into sales. There is also an element of trust as brands who appear near the top of search engine results connote the idea that they are trusted and ‘the top’ brand in that category.

References

Be Unique Group (2017) Search Engine Optimization, Available at: http://www.beuniquegroup.com/ (Accessed: 30th November 2017).

SEMRush (2017) Homepage, Available at: https://www.semrush.com/ (Accessed: 30th November 2017).

Trusov, M., Bucklin, R.E. and Pauwels, K., 2009. Effects of word-of-mouth versus traditional marketing: findings from an internet social networking site. Journal of marketing, 73(5), pp.90-102.

Webb, S. (2012) How To Perform the Worlds Greatest SEO Audit, Available at: https://moz.com/blog/how-to-perform-the-worlds-greatest-seo-audit (Accessed: 30th November 2017).

Eticaret SEO (2012) Word of Mouth and the Internet – SEO Experts INC – SEO Pres.flv, Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0FocBTGq2wI (Accessed: 30th November 2017).

Simpson, C (2015) Ask LH: Does A VPN App Hide All My Phone’s Internet Traffic?, Available at: https://www.lifehacker.com.au/2015/11/ask-lh-does-a-vpn-app-hide-all-my-phones-internet-traffic/ (Accessed: 30th November 2017).

Si, S.P. (2010) Lesson #28: How important is it to be on the first page of SERPs?, Available at: https://seo-hacker.com/lesson-28-important-page-serps/ (Accessed: 1st December 2017).

Schmitz, T. (2014) How To Do Your Own 5-Minute SEO Audit, Available at: https://searchengineland.com/5-minute-seo-audit-196513 (Accessed: 1st December 2017).

Jansen, B.J., Zhang, M. and Zhang, Y. (2007). The effect of brand awareness on the evaluation of search engine results.CHI’07 Extended Abstracts on Human Factors in Computing Systems (pp. 2471-2476). ACM.

Critically Evaluating The Role Of www.dx.com

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>>WATCH<<

What is it for?

According to research by Chaffey & Chadwick (2016) the role of DX.com is to be a transactional website as its main objective is to be the trading bridge between consumers and the company. The website is used to advertise the company’s latest gadgets and technology to the market as well as offering a platform to be able to sell their goods to the consumer.

Does it offer good user experience?

AIPD by Simeon (1999) outlines that effectiveness of a website is reliant on Attracting, Informing, Positioning and Delivery. DX.com attracts consumers through their brand name which is ‘Deal Extreme’. This has connotations of the best price, best deals and that the brand goes to the nth degree. Furthermore banner advertisements highlight current trends and seasons which makes the content on the webpage seem more current.

Consumers are informed through user friendliness and a simple graphical interface. The website is extremely straightforward and has the outlay of a user-friendly website. It is easy to navigate and you can use the search bar in order locate whatever you may be looking for. On the left there is a drop down section which sub-categorizes the brands offerings as well as suggestions for other products that consumers might be interested in.

Positioning of the brand is mainly distinguished through discounted pricing and a variety of goods. The brand offers technological, sometimes unbranded, goods for a fraction of the price that their branded counterparts may be priced at. They also offer branded goods for cheaper than anywhere else on the market. The brand sources from warehouses in China where they can cut out the middle man and pass the savings on to consumers. Furthermore the depth of stock they supply is endless and they have the ability to order previous products which may not be stocked anymore.

Customer support is key for DX.com as they work in the technological sector as well as the import/export so a lot of their products may come with instructions in a different language or may not work at all therefore they offer support over email and phone as well as a live assistant. Customer service is key for a technological brand as the return rate can be quite high. Also a brand like DX.com rely on word of mouth advertising especially B2B as they don’t advertise due to low margins for a lot of their portfolio of products.

Improvement?

Even though the website is easy to understand it seems cluttered in presentation which could lead to a larger bounce rate. It’s easy to search for something like a games controller however if you wanted to find a specific replacement part for it then you would have to know either the parts name or its product code which can turn daunting if you aren’t an expert. Through sub-sectioning their sections further they can index certain aspects in order to make the customer experience even smoother and increase conversion rates.

Webcredible (2017) suggest that businesses have on average ‘less than five seconds’ to attract a customer to stay on their page before they leave therefore the design of that website and it’s aesthetical feel is incredibly important in reducing bounce rates and increasing conversions. Experts ‘consider that first impression’ is vital in the image that is envisaged by consumers once they enter a site. It is important to leave a lasting impression on consumers in order to see more conversions but also to see repeat custom.

>>VIEW<<

References:

Chaffey & Chadwick, E (2016) Digital Marketing, 6th ed., Loughborough University: Pearson.

Simeon, Roblyn (1999) ‘Evaluating Domestic and International Web-Site Strategies’, Internet Research, 9(4), pp. p297-308.

Webcredible (2017) Web Design Aesthetics, Available at: https://www.webcredible.com/blog/web-design-aesthetics/ (Accessed: 31st October 2017).

Secrets of Ikea: The Socializers Case Study 2017

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>>WATCH<<

Introduction: 

IKEA is a multinational group of companies that designs and sells ready-to-assemble furniture, appliances and home accessories. As the world’s largest furniture retailer, the organization employs almost 160,000 people across 365 stores in 45 countries. (Ikea Case Study, 2017)

Research Question:

What makes Ikea so successful and how could a business implement similar techniques.

Analysis:

IKEA’s holds a high percentage of market share today due to good implementation of standardized business models. This has helped them sore to the top of flat package furniture within the UK specifically  but also another 44 countries. 

In 2011 the ONS estimated world population to have reached 7 billion on 31st October 2011. The Executive Director of the United Nationals Population Fund, Dr Babatunde Osotimehin, said:- “A world of 7 billion is both a challenge and an opportunity. Globally, people are living longer healthier lives and choosing to have smaller families. But reducing inequalities and finding ways to ensure the well-being of people alive today – as well as the generations that follow – will require new ways of thinking and unprecedented global cooperation” (UN, 2011).

Since 2011 the UK has also highlighted it’s aging population (ACL. Gov, 2017). In this day and age, with an increasingly technologically witty population, Ikea aim to target the ‘Socializers’ in order to get all important feedback to help the company grow. Ikea introduced ‘The Listening Hub’ which allowed key IKEA stakeholders to view what customers were saying about the brand in a digestible and engaging way (Ikea, 2017).

Within a 3 month period in 2016 Ikea had implemented The Listening Hub. It had helped them to discover a number of insights. One Example Brought to the attention of the Digital development team by Brandwatch Vizia was the differences in the perception of the brand’s customer service across different regions (Ikea 2017). Different countries had different views on the companies customer services and they also had different methods of reporting their dismay.

In the US, customer service complaints on Facebook made up to 36/5% of the total conversation during the studied period in 2014, compared to just 5% in the UK over the same time period.

Evaluation:

Ikea is one of the biggest social influencers in the world due to the vast majority of countries they operate in but also due to the product nature. Increases in world population is a boost for the brand as there is an increased demand for more furniture but also innovation in the sense of space saving creations.

‘The Listening Hub’ has helped Ikea’s shareholders develop an understanding of customers needs and wants. It has also be a solid platform for feedback based on consumers experiences with the business. Over ’15 senior stakeholders where engaged over 5 different continents’ (Ikea, 2017) therefore it shows the effect of the feedback can effect stake/shareholder decisions in order for them to create a brand and products viable and acclaimed by their consumers.

Data collected also shows disputes between customer service satisfaction between different continents. In the UK it was recorded that only 5% of products sold received a complaint over Facebook however in the US numbers soared to over 35%. This could relate to our aging population finding it easier to use Ikea products however with nearly a 70% increase in complaints between the UK and US it is definitely something that should be searched more into.

>READ<<

Ahmed Allam

a.badr-allam1@uni.brighton.ac.uk

References

IKEA (2014) The IKEA Group – The Story of How We Work , Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1jn2_nZrivQ (Accessed: 17th October 2017).

IKEA (2017) Case Study/ Ikea & The Socializers , Online: IKEA.

The Office for National Statistics (2012) Measuring National Well-being, Social Trends 42- Population, Online: The Office for National Statistics .

ACL.GOV (2017) Aging Population, Available at: https://www.acl.gov/aging_statistics/index.aspx (Accessed: 17th October 2017 ).

IKEA (2017) Ikea Blog, Available at: http://www.ikea.com/gb/en/this-is-ikea/ (Accessed: 17th October 2017).