Millennials are Frustrated with AI: Clinc Gets it Right

If you own a smartphone you’ve probably had a frustrating conversation with a voice assistant. Whether you’re asking where to buy a flux capacitor or just want to know the best brunch spot based on your budget, Siri, Alexa and Google Home fail to deliver.  Across the board, the customer experience with these assistants is tedious, pedantic and unhelpful. According to The Economist,

“Only around a third of smartphone owners use their personal assistants regularly, even though 95% have tried them at some point.”

This is incredibly significant considering that over 85% of the millennial generation now owns a smartphone. When nearly an entire generation has smartphones, but less than a third use their voice assistants, something is seriously wrong.

While other generations enjoy the ease of hands free, millennials are quick to dismiss software that doesn’t save time or increase efficiency. Currently, it seems as if no mainstream voice assistant has the functionality to execute in the areas that matter most to young consumers.

With a vernacular that is constantly expanding and difficult to track, requests and questions become challenging for traditional AI software to answer. Standard voice assistants lack the ability to decipher the nuance, subtlety and colloquialisms of everyday conversation. But why exactly is this software so inferior?

Traditional voice assistants rely on old-fashioned NLP (natural language processing) techniques and rule-based grammars. This processing is only capable of comprehending speech in a specific, structured way, which means the user has to speak in an ordered, particular fashion if the assistant is to understand the user’s intention.

Enter Clinc, whose state of the art research has the ability to create an interactive AI experience that is intuitive, unrestrained and authentically conversational. Unlike Siri, Alexa, and Google Home, Clinc’s conversational software allows for the user to interact with the system like a human being. This capability increases efficiency and convenience for the consumer. Instead of speaking under the constraints of calculated and explicit language, users of Clinc’s technology are able to speak less while the system understands more.

Clinc’s Difference: The Next Generation of AI

Millennials get easily frustrated with technology that does not move forward and push the boundaries of its own functionality. Meanwhile, Clinc’s AI does just that. Clinc’s dedicated team of professors, AI experts, and PhDs employ new Machine Learning and Natural Language Processing techniques right as they are being published. This means Clinc users have access to cutting-edge technology right at their fingertips. One such development is Clinc’s approach to NLP known as Deep Learning. The Deep Learning approach is used to train Clinc’s technology in a way that mirrors the learning processes of the human brain. In other words, Clinc’s AI is able to learn from examples, just like humans do.

Unlike the archaic, rule-based approaches of Siri, Alexa and Google Home, Deep Learning allows for the system to learn and adapt in artificial neural networks that are several layers deep. Each layer of a neural network is composed of many “neurons”. These neurons are able to learn optimal configurations in what is called the “training phase”. These layers are connected together so that each input passes forward from layer to layer, deeper in the neural network. This creates a deep network “architecture” which gives the AI the capacity to learn and understand natural language in a humanlike way. This technology does not merely understand words; it comprehends fine distinctions in language such as context and nuance. Traditional voice assistants are nowhere near this level of understanding; they just can’t compete.

Clinc has created a product that appeals to millennial consumers. And yet, it is so much more than that. The difference intuitive conversation makes in AI must not be overlooked. Not only does it enhance the capability of the product but it also provides a customer experience that is seamless and easy. When the conventional wisdom of a generation of consumers under 30 dictates that voice assistant technology is blundering and inadequate, Clinc’s AI software has the ability to make an enormous impact.