Voice recognition and virtual assistants are definitely becoming a staple in everyday life and a trend companies and marketers can’t ignore.
While virtual assistants can answer your questions, they also have the ability to do much more.
That’s where Alexa Skills come into play.
What the Heck is an Alexa Skill?
If you have an Amazon Alexa, you know exactly how powerful and impressive the technology is and how useful Alexa Skills can be. If you’re like me, however, you might be asking yourself that same question. What the heck is an Alexa Skill?
Similar to your smartphone, Alexa Skills are essentially apps that can be added to your device that make you more productive and allow you to perform specific tasks. The best part is that all of these skills can be activated by your voice (after you download/enable them, of course).
Just check out how handy Alexa was in our game of “Voice Assistant Trivia” on Behind the Screens:
Amazon Alexa Skills Video:
The best part is that Alexa Skills aren’t just for playing your favorite Spotify playlist, setting kitchen timers, or turning off your hallway light.
There are Alexa Skills that will help you work smarter, allowing you to have a more personalized experience based on your needs and areas of interest.
As a marketer, here’s a look at the top 16 Alexa Skills you can use in your work life.
1. Marketing School
If you’re looking to take your business and marketing to the next level, then you definitely need to check out Marketing School by Neil Patel and Eric Siu.
This is set up as one of Alexa’s “flash briefings,” meaning you’ll get a new bite-sized update on the topic at hand every day.
Each day, this Alexa Skill brings you 10 minutes of actionable marketing advice (from the popular podcast) you can implement into your marketing strategy today.
2. GaryVee 365
If you enjoy The #AskGaryVee Show, you’ll want to download his Alexa Skill (also a flash briefing), which will provide you with daily motivational quotes that you won’t hear anywhere else.
He covers self-awareness, hustle, culture, and more — and if you’ve ever seen or heard him speak, you know he’s just the guy to get you pumped in the morning!
3. The IMPACT Show
If you enjoy listening to The IMPACT Show, but aren’t able to catch it live on Facebook, than this Alexa Skill makes it even easier for you to stay up to date on the latest episodes.
The IMPACT Show is a weekly digital marketing podcast, where Bob and Nick broadcast live on Facebook and dive deep into one issue that’s plaguing growth leaders in marketing and sales. Just download and say “Play The IMPACT Show” and Bob and Nick will join you wherever you are!
4. Web Analytics
As a marketer, staying on top of how your website is performing is essential.
With Web Analytics, staying on top of your website metrics is a breeze. This Alexa Skill is able to pull website and blog traffic for any specific day, month or even year, as often as you want it.
5. Authentic Digital Marketing Tips
Authentic is a Virginia-based digital marketing agency. It developed an Alexa Skill that provides you with daily short and sweet actionable tips that will help you innovate your marketing strategy. Download and try one of these commands:
6. Chat Bot for Slack
If you’re like us, Slack is a great tool for communicating with the members of your agency or marketing and sales teams.
With Chat Bot for Slack, you can easily post messages to various Slack channels, simply by linking up your account.
While this Alexa Skill isn’t an official Slack App, it’s a great resource for chatting with your team while multitasking.
For instance, you might say, “Alexa, start Chat Bot. I want to post ‘UPDATE: Client ABC just signed their SOW for 40K, with a start date of Feb 15’ to ‘Sales.’”
7. TED Talks
Whether you’re looking for inspiration or tips on how you can better manage your team, use the TED Talks Alexa Skill.
New TED Talks are added every weekday, giving you access to world-renowned speakers and thought leaders providing ideas worth spreading.
Using the skill is easy. Download and try one of these commands:
8. Unofficial Seth Godin Blog Post Reader
Do you start everyday by reading Seth Godin’s latest post? If so, with this skill, Alexa can read it to you. All you have to do is ask Alexa to:
9. Growth Hacking Tips
With advice that’s focused around growth marketing, search engine optimization, conversion rate optimization, and social media. You’ll be sure to find daily tips that will help you make improvements to your marketing strategy.
To get started, download and say commands like:
10. Social Media Marketing Tips
With social trends and strategies routinely changing, staying up to date with the latest social media tips, is easy with this skill.
11. Sales 365
If you’re new to sales or interested in learning more, this Alexa Skill covers everything from selling in a tough market to handling objectives.
Upon activating the skill, you’ll receive daily sales tips from sales coach Tony R Sanders.
Download and try one of these commands:
12. Voice Metrics
Knowing how your business is performing is essential, especially if you’re trying to grow.
You probably already have a spreadsheet containing all of your most important metrics. By setting up a “business briefing” in Voice Metrics, you’ll be able to know how your business is doing, simply by asking.
Through Voice Metrics you can connect any Google Sheet, Slack channel, or programmable with their REST API.
Use these commands to see how your business is performing:
13. VoxSnap
If you work at a digital marketing agency like us at IMPACT, you might have clients from a variety of industries.
Learning about those industries is simple with VoxSnap. All you have to do is tell Alexa to open VoxSnap and then say, “teach me about [insert area of interest].”
Some areas of interest you can ask VoxSnap about include:
- Marketing
- Finance
- SEO
- Health
- Big data
VoxSnap works by scanning Google and the top blogs to show you the top content in that space.
14. SimilarWeb
What if there was a way for you to identify basic statistics about every website and search keyword?
That’s now possible with SimilarWeb’s Alexa Skill. You can check for things like a website’s top referrer, website’s top organic keywords, website visits, and more.
If you’re looking for more statistics, go to www.similarweb.com, you’ll be amazed at the information you can learn about your competitors.
15. Edit Docs
While you need to have a Gmail account to connect this Skill to your Google Drive, Edit Docs is great for helping you jot down ideas and notes you might have from an internal or client meeting or maybe while you’re getting ready for the day.
Edit Docs has the ability to create new files (documents, sheets, or presentations) and it can even list off the last ten files you’ve used.
Once you’ve linked your account, you can start asking Alexa the following commands:
16. AnyPod
If you love listening to podcasts, you’ll need this Alexa Skill.
With over thousands of podcasts indexed, you can easily stay up-to-date with your favorite podcasts with AnyPod.
Not only can you play any podcast or episode, you can also subscribe and unsubscribe directly.
Here’s a look at some of our favorite marketing podcasts to get you started.
What Alexa Skills Do you Use?
There are new Alexa Skills being created everyday! These are just some of the Skills we’ve tried, so I’d love to know what skills you’re using to help make you a better marketer.
Photo by Andres Urena on Unsplash
