DOSS is more than an assistant. It’s an entirely new, disruptive business model for real estate. We chat to CEO, Bobby Bryant, about all things conversational AI and disruption.
Presented by Deepgram and Symbl.ai
Deepgram is a Speech Company whose goal is to have every voice heard and understood. We have revolutionized speech-to-text (STT) with an End-to-End Deep Learning platform. This AI architectural advantage means you don’t have to compromise on speed, accuracy, scalability, or cost to build the next big idea in voice. Our easy-to-use SDKs and APIs allow developers to quickly test and embed our STT solution into their voice products. For more information, visit:
See how easy it is to add simple but powerful call coaching and call tracking functionality to your customer experience solutions with Symbl.ai’s customizable Conversation Intelligence APIs. From calls to videos to text conversations — apply best in class contextual AI in no time by getting started for free.
What voice user interfaces and voice assistants need…
Think about what a voice user interface or a voice assistant needs for it to be genuinely useful.
It has to have access to relevant data.
Alexa would be useless if it didn’t have access to data.
Data that answers your questions. Data that can tell you the weather. Data that’s used to communicate recipes. Data that’s used to retrieve music. The list goes on.
Productising voice capabilities
When you look at some of the products that utilise voice technologies, it’s easy to think that ‘voice’ is the differentiator.
Take Disruptel, who we’ll have on the podcast next week (register here).
When you think about the ability to be able to ask your TV a question about what you’re watching, and have it answered. That’s powerful.
Voice grabs the attention, but it’s not the key
Nine times out of ten, it’s the voice capability that gets the attention in a product like this. The reality, though, is that products like this wouldn’t even be conceivable without data.
You need to be able to have the computer vision that can actually parse what it’s seeing on screen, sure, and the natural language element, of course. But all of that needs to be tied to the data behind the scenes that will allow you to actually find the exact car that James Bond is driving when you ask that question.
And the same is true for Bobby and DOSS.
Voice as an interface layer is nothing special
A voice user interface on top of a normal retail or real estate search tool is kind of just the icing on the cake.
What really makes a digital assistant really useful is when it is able to answer the specific questions that a user asks.
In DOSS’ case, that can be: “Find me a house that’s 10 km from the beach and close to local schools and has a white kitchen.”
For that to become a reality, you need to make sure that you can access all of that data, which is often the sticking point.
The true value of voice
While some people might think that voice assistants or voice user interfaces are gimmicky, and voice user interfaces are just trendy layers that you can put on top of existing solutions, the reality is that true voice capabilities go above and beyond existing interfaces because they surface data that is otherwise inaccessible. And that, arguably, is the true value of voice.
But that’s also where the challenges lie: getting access to that data, making it available and then surfacing it in a natural, humanised, natural language interface. That’s easier said than done.
Timestamps
00:00 Intro and presenting Deepgram and Symbl.ai
03:29 Welcome Bobby Bryant, CEO and co-founder, DOSS
08:10 Riding the Apple Siri wave
09:30 What is DOSS?
11:44 Standalone service vs interface layer
13:48 Going to production
18:00 Understanding user needs
20:15 Data or die
22:40 Value prop: VUI or data?
27:00 Enabling disruptive business models
31:50 Where the money flows
34:00 Real estate markets
36:00 Disrupting the real estate industry
42:44 Protecting user information and privacy
46:45 Technology ready, user adoption lacking
47:35 Beginning on IBM Watson
53:30 Transitional moments, Simon Sinek’s why…
56:50 Wrapping up
