Alexa, I Don't Trust You To Be My Shopping Assistant

When Amazon introduced the Amazon Echo in 2014, many people thought that the smart speaker was intended to help the company sell even more stuff online by providing another convenient way for consumers to place an order. And while the Echo, and the entire line of Alexa-enabled devices that followed, can only be described as a runaway success for Amazon, this is the one aspect where it has probably failed to meet expectations.

According to a comScore survey conducted in Q1 2018, only 3 in 10 smart speaker owners have ever placed an order using the device. The reasons for this are manifold, but security concerns are the biggest inhibitor to broader adoption of smart speaker shopping. Interestingly, this seems to be where smart speaker owners, apparently unconcerned with placing a listening device in their home, draw the line.