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1. Introduction
Voice assistants (VAs) are a virtual assistant category that “simulate intelligence through vocal interaction” (Fivesights Research, 2017, p. 5). According to recent studies, in the USA alone, these technologies are used by approximately 200 million people and the global market is expected to reach US$8bn by 2023 (Voicebot, 2019a). The main applications of VAs include smartphones, stand-alone smart speakers and in-car multimedia systems. In 2018, approximately 114 million users in the USA used a VA in their car at least once, while only 58 million have used a smart speaker (Voicebot, 2019a). In general, the car is becoming highly relevant as a context of the use of VAs and in particular, cars favour the development of so-called name-brand voice assistants (NBVAs), e.g. Mercedes’ Mercedes-Benz user experience (MBUX) and BMW’s intelligent personal assistant (IPA). NBVAs are developed in-house and are activated by saying the brand name (e.g. “Hey, Mercedes!”). These user interfaces have the peculiarity of speaking with the voice of the brand (e.g. Mercedes) instead of with the voice of the technology provider’s VA (e.g. Apple CarPlay) (Gollnhofer and Schüller, 2018).
Marketing scholars have begun to study the role of technology providers’ VAs in advertising (Jones, 2018; Smith, 2020) and conversational commerce fields (Vassinen, 2018; Whang and Im, 2018). Moriuchi (2019) have focussed on VAs’ perceived ease of use and perceived usefulness, as well as their positive effects on engagement and loyalty. However, less attention has been paid to the branding implications related to the spread of VAs and, in particular, of NBVAs. In this regard, a first conceptual study was conducted by Vernuccio et al. (2019), who emphasise the role of the brand voice in the brand anthropomorphisation process and highlight the potential relationships in the NBVA experiential context amongst brand voice, brand personality formation and certain relevant cognitive, evaluative and relational branding outcomes (e.g. brand trust, brand loyalty, brand advocacy).
Despite the growing popularity of in-car VAs and the resulting possibility for automotive brands to create an experience centred on their own voice using NBVAs, no study has investigated the branding strategies that can leverage these nnovative user interfaces. This study is aimed at deepening the understanding of the multiple managerial perspectives on developing voice-based branding through in-car NBVAs. Firstly, the...