Amazon Alexa Horoscope Skill

Amazon Alexa Horoscope Skill

Digital Design, Voice Design, Alexa Skill

Digital Design, Voice Design, Alexa Skill

Designed and prototyped a daily horoscope Alexa Skill to be demonstrated to Head of Digital Content at Vice Media during their first annual hack week. The Alexa skill could find your zodiac sign based on your birthday and read your daily horoscope. As an easter egg we built a lucky numbers feature.

Designed and prototyped a daily horoscope Alexa Skill to be demonstrated to Head of Digital Content at Vice Media during their first annual hack week. The Alexa skill could find your zodiac sign based on your birthday and read your daily horoscope. As an easter egg we built a lucky numbers feature.

Research

I conducted a preliminary audit of Alexa skills and began making buckets. The Alexa skills marketplace is currently categorized by their subject similar to the iOS app store. However I thought it would be helpful to create buckets based on how frequent someone may use a skill. Since getting my Alexa enabled device I found that even though I had added a ton of skills enabled, I didn’t use them as frequently as I thought I would.

I conducted a preliminary audit of Alexa skills and began making buckets. The Alexa skills marketplace is currently categorized by their subject similar to the iOS app store. However I thought it would be helpful to create buckets based on how frequent someone may use a skill. Since getting my Alexa enabled device I found that even though I had added a ton of skills enabled, I didn’t use them as frequently as I thought I would.

Vice Media Amazon Alex Skill

Skills I use everyday.

Vice Media Amazon Alex Skill

Skills I use occasionally.

These categories could be further developed but this was a great way to start the conversation. Ultimately we wanted to create a skill that could be used everyday and add value to a user. We then quickly searched the content that was created on Vice which lead us to the Broadly horoscopes. This fit right into the everyday bucket since the content is published daily and a user could potentially learn something new they didn’t know before.

These categories could be further developed but this was a great way to start the conversation. Ultimately we wanted to create a skill that could be used everyday and add value to a user. We then quickly searched the content that was created on Vice which lead us to the Broadly horoscopes. This fit right into the everyday bucket since the content is published daily and a user could potentially learn something new they didn’t know before.

Vice Media Amazon Alex Skill

Skills I rarely use.

Interaction Model Design

Once we settled on the content we began to design our simple interaction model. First we defined what our user’s requests could be by drawing them on a white board. These requests would later be used as intents for our skill. We wanted user’s to be able to get their daily horoscope, and find their sign if they didn’t already know it. For the purpose of the hack week we didn’t rely on storing any personal information from the user but would be a great feature to develop in the future.

Once we settled on the content we began to design our simple interaction model. First we defined what our user’s requests could be by drawing them on a white board. These requests would later be used as intents for our skill. We wanted user’s to be able to get their daily horoscope, and find their sign if they didn’t already know it. For the purpose of the hack week we didn’t rely on storing any personal information from the user but would be a great feature to develop in the future.

Vice Media Amazon Alex Skill Interaction Model

After we had our requests, we created a grid that represented the potential dialogue a user could have within our Alexa skill. To simulate this I played the part of the user and my friend Himmy on the team played the part of Alexa. It may sound silly but this small exercise really helped us discover all the potential ways someone could ask the same question. This resulted in a more natural dialogue for our Alexa skill. As we explored the potential outcomes we began adding more labels to our grid until we agreed we had enough. During this part of the design it is helpful to know that you do not have to define every possible situation. Alexa is able to fill in the gaps using it’s machine learning engine Lex.

After we had our requests, we created a grid that represented the potential dialogue a user could have within our Alexa skill. To simulate this I played the part of the user and my friend Himmy on the team played the part of Alexa. It may sound silly but this small exercise really helped us discover all the potential ways someone could ask the same question. This resulted in a more natural dialogue for our Alexa skill. As we explored the potential outcomes we began adding more labels to our grid until we agreed we had enough. During this part of the design it is helpful to know that you do not have to define every possible situation. Alexa is able to fill in the gaps using it’s machine learning engine Lex.

Vice Media Amazon Alex Skill Model Complete

Presentation & Demo

Presenting in front of a room can always be scary. I have learned over the years the more you practice the better you will get. It also helps to prepare ahead of time and have an idea of what it is you want to say. For this presentation I wanted to focus on the growth and projections of voice assistants and included a slide from the presentation below.

Presenting in front of a room can always be scary. I have learned over the years the more you practice the better you will get. It also helps to prepare ahead of time and have an idea of what it is you want to say. For this presentation I wanted to focus on the growth and projections of voice assistants and included a slide from the presentation below.

Vice Media Amazon Alex Skill Presentation

Advertising projections for 2020

Jon Sorrentino

Jon Sorrentino

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