Soon, Google Assistant/Duplex could actually call local businesses to check for inventory availability. First noticed by Android Police, the notification appears on a support page mostly about appointment booking through Duplex: “Google Assistant will only call you when a customer wants to book an appointment or when it needs to check your business hours or the status of […]

A new “confirm with voice match” payments feature has been introduced into Google Assistant for smart speakers and displays. This feature can be enabled on an iPhone by opening the Home app. You then tap your image in the upper right and then select assistant settings, then choose payments and toggle on the “confirm with […]

Google is going to make it possible to buy movie tickets online using the Assistant (via Duplex). The company announced it was expanding the AI-powered Duplex beyond restaurant reservations to booking rental cars and buying movie tickets at Google I/O back in May. Users will have the ability to use the Google Assistant for new reservation and purchase […]

Google’s rich results testing tool has been updated to allow recipe publishers to preview how their recipe results look on smart displays using Google Assistant. “If your recipe mark up is eligible for guidance with Google Assistant, you can now use the Rich Results Test to preview your results on Google Home and smart displays,” […]

The latest version of Perficient Digital’s now annual Digital Personal Assistants accuracy study is now out. The study compared responses to about 5,000 queries on seven different devices, which includes Amazon’s Alexa, Microsoft’s Cortana, Google Assistant and Siri. Google Assistant performed the best at the highest level, but Cortana tried answering the most questions. An […]

For the first time, Google is testing the Duplex technology internationally, which was announced on Tuesday. The service will be used to confirm holiday operating hours for a pilot group of New Zealand businesses. “Businesses in this pilot group will receive an automated call from Google asking to confirm their hours for the upcoming Labour Day […]

Google’s automated concierge feature, Duplex, has finally made it to Chrome browsers. Google confirmed that, as part of the Google Assistant in Chrome, the test is currently being applied to movie ticket booking sites, Android Police reported. Ads are already being tested in Assistant, although handling transactions seem to be a big part of the monetization […]

It’s time to say hello to Google Assistant and goodbye to voice search. The company is removing the familiar blue and red mic and in its place, the Assistant. The news was first reported by 9to5google. Greg Sterling of Search Engine Land asked Google for more context, but its pretty clear that the company wants to […]

The new unofficial mantra Google is using is “helping users get things done” (GTD). Under this mantra, Google is making its many channels, properties and ads much more “transactional.” Google’s strategy to monetize the Assistant utilizes transaction fees as part of that strategy. A manifestation of this GTD strategy is bringing food ordering into Google […]

First showed off at Google I/O last year, App Actions is expanding with built-in intents for four new App Action categories: Health and fitness Finance and banking Food ordering Ridesharing These new intents are aimed at enabling developers to integrate their apps with Google Assistant. Developers can start integrating the new actions immediately. Google says […]