• by Chuck Martin , Staff Writer, March 2, 2018

While consumers are using smart home speakers to listen to music and answer questions, they’re also increasingly using them to buy things.

Voice shopping is already a $2 billion business and projected to grow to $40 billion within four years.

Online retail giant Amazon is projected to dominate the home speaker market, which will grow from 13% to 55% of homes, according to a study comprising a survey of 1,500 smart speaker owners conducted by OC&C Strategy Consultants.

Three tech giants lead the virtual assistant AI space in the U.S. Amazon’s Echo has 10% penetration, Google’s Home 4% and Microsoft’s Cortana 2%. Apple just recently launched its high-end HomePod smart speaker.

There are some twists in voice commerce, however:

• Only 39% of consumers trust the personalized product selection of smart speakers
• Voice purchases tended to be standalone, lower value items
• There are only 39 retailer connected applications within the voice shopping category
• Only 44% of consumers believe that smart speakers offer the best value selection of products

However, Amazon still has the upper hand. A large majority (85%) of consumers select the products Amazon suggests.

That Alexa is one smart voice retailer.