Commentary

Amazon, KFC Create 'Brand Voice' Via Alexa

The voice of Amazon’s Alexa is changing.

A new feature called Brand Voice can be used to create a unique voice that represents a brand’s persona.

The customized voice feature can be created with the Amazon Polly team of artificial intelligence research scientists and linguistics. Amazon Polly is a cloud service of Amazon Web Services that converts text to lifelike speech.

The team has been working with Kentucky Fried Chicken Canada and National Australia Bank to create unique Brand Voices.

The KFC voice sports a Southern U.S. accent for Colonel Sanders.

“We are one of the first brands to adopt the Amazon Polly enhanced text-to-speech voice technology to create a seamless and distinctively KFC re-ordering experience for our fans.” stated Jason Cassidy, marketing director, KFC Canada. “The Colonel was passionate about his fried chicken and this new skill makes re-ordering KFC menu items easier than ever.”

Marketers just got a new customized voice option for brands.

Next story loading loading..
About the Author

Chuck Martin is Editor of the AI & IoT Daily at MediaPost and writes the daily Connected Thinking column. He is a NY Times Business bestselling author and his latest book is “Digital Transformation 3.0” (The New Business-to-Consumer Connections of The Internet of Things.) He is CEO of Net Future Institute and a frequent keynote speaker internationally. Follow him on Twitter @chuckmartin and contact him at Chuck@MediaPost.com.