Episode description

Braden Ream is the CEO of Voiceflow, a collaborative design platform for voice app development. Voiceflow is currently responsible for powering one million conversations a month and 6% of the world’s Alexa Skills are built on their platform.

In this episode, we discover how to build Alexa Skills and Google Actions without coding, using Voiceflow’s drag and drop interface. First off, we dive into conversation design on Voiceflow, the difference between using flowcharts and stateful design, the limitations of Voiceflow versus coding from scratch, and how Braden views the parity gap between what their platform can produce and what you can produce on the core platforms.

We also get into industry topics such as what it is like to build a voice startup in the context of today’s funding, competition, and timing challenges; whether Braden considers voice to be an interface or platform; and his thoughts on the discovery issue and how it can be improved.

You will also hear Braden’s predictions for 2020 – specifically the rise of intent-less voice app structures, the debate about whether apps are the right model for voice interfaces, and then he shares how he has managed to build such a strong community.

For the Voice Tech Pro listeners, there are a number of bonus questions that reveal more about Braden’s background and the advice he has for newcomers, so be sure to sign up as a Voice Tech Pro at voicetechpodcast.com/pro.

Highlights