The Walmart-owned eCommerce platform Flipkart has added a feature that allows users to search for their favourite product with the help of their voice. Dubbed as Flipkart Voice Search, the feature is currently available in English and Hindi.
The company believes that the introduction of voice-enabled search will allow users to use the search capability to reach the correct products without the need to know the correct spelling of the product. Flipkart feels that this new feature could have a specific use case in the non-metro cities and smaller towns of the country.
The company said in a prepared statement that the new feature was being rolled out in phases starting January. Flipkart says that Voice Search works for over 150 million products across 80+ categories listed on the platform and it is now getting over 5-million queries every day.
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How to use Voice Search on Flipkart
- To use Voice Search on Flipkart, make sure that you have the latest version of the app running on the phone.
- Nest, tap on the mic icon on the search bar that is located on top of the home page and the app starts "listening" to your command.
- You can try searching anything from grocery to fashion to tech or even footwear by speaking in Hindi or English.
The press statement also cites studies conducted by the platform stating that voice search not only is natural to us but is faster as well. The company claims it is 3x faster than typing in English and 5x faster in Hindi.
Adding features that result in a better user experience and offers a regional connect is not new. Both Flipkart and Amazon have introduced regional languages on their respective platforms. This not only helps them to gain a foothold in the hinterland but also offers an emotional connection with the user who’s able to use the application in their regional language.
With over 75% of users in the country coming from Non-English backgrounds, Flipkart may soon add more regional languages, especially focusing on Southern India, to the list of Voice Search.
Flipkart’s competitor, Amazon already has voice searches on the shopping platform and is powered by Alexa, however, it uses the English language primarily. A quick test on both the applications showed that Flipkart’s implementation of Hindi language in voice search was better than Amazon’s.
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