(Image source: Yext homepage.)

Yext, Inc., a New York-based Digital Knowledge Management (DKM) vendor that markets to insurance and other industries, has announced a global integration with Amazon to give businesses control over the answers Alexa provides about them. As a result of the vendor’s relationship with Amazon, consumers using Alexa for voice search can receive the most up-to-date facts about businesses—locations, contact information, hours of operation, and more—straight from the source: the business itself, according to the Vendor. Yext customers will find Alexa in the Yext Knowledge Network (formerly the Yext PowerListings Network), and their digital knowledge will sync automatically.

“Today is a quantum leap forward in Yext’s mission to give businesses control over their digital knowledge and provide consumers with perfect information everywhere,” comments Howard Lerman, founder and CEO, Yext. “Amazon has changed the world with its innovative, market-leading voice-enabled devices, the Amazon Echo family of smart speakers, and the Alexa voice service. Now, the tens of millions of consumers who ask Alexa questions can get authoritative answers from the business itself with the Yext Knowledge Engine.”

“The customer journey has forever changed, our research shows insurance prospects go to 8.9 different places—for example, maps, search, voice, and chat—to determine what they want to buy and who they want to buy it from,” comments Shane Closser, head, Financial Services, Yext. “Additionally, 73 percent of high intent traffic goes to online publishers like Amazon, Google, Bing, and Facebook to find the answers about insurance companies without ever going to a website.”

“We expect this trend to only continue as consumers ask questions like ‘Find the best insurance agent,’” Closser continues. “It doesn’t stop with discovery either. Yext empowers marketers, digital leaders, and agents to manage these digital facts, their digital presence, and online interactions over 150 publishers. Because it’s difficult to have an amazing customer experience unless you have an amazing agent experience.”

Yext provides the Yext Knowledge Assistant to help agents understand their performance and update their profile, according to Closser. The Knowledge Assistant is a Conversational AI platform, accessible to any agent with a cell phone.

Yext for Insurance Launch

Yext launched Yext for Insurance in May 2018. The solution is designed to The vendor says Yext for Insurance delivers a tool to make digitization easier for insurers by enabling individual agents to manage, organize and leverage distinguishing facts about the brand, their practices, and the relevant information that is sought by their customers. “Coordination of details like types of insurance offered, hours, telephone number, and languages spoken, afford agents a powerful tool to help amplify their digital presence through a single, frictionless platform,” according to a company statement released at the time of the launch.

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