Yelp is working on the deployment of AI-powered “voice agents” on Tuesday, allowing service providers and restaurants to handle calls, answer basic questions, and accomplish tasks like adding customers to restaurant waitlists.
Yelp says that its agents don’t require complex setups or API integration and can extract data from existing metadata from companies, such as pronunciation guides, customized voice greetings, and forwarding rules. For example, for restaurants, Yelp agents can connect to restaurant management software and send reservation details to customers after mail.
Yelp’s agents can also handle automated spam filtering and call analysis. They hand over the conversation to humans for more complicated requests, and after each call, the company receives a summary of the call along with a transcript and recording.
“Many times, professionals work in difficult situations and can’t make calls,” Yelp’s chief product officer Craig Sardanha told TechCrunch in an interview. “It helps you build (ED) products and translate leads that you might (usually) miss.”
Yelp uses Openai’s real-time API to handle end-to-end calls. This allows Yelp agents, extended by the company knowledge graph, to ask and respond to follow-up questions.
Yelp said it constantly evaluates new models of its products to provide the best results in terms of latency, voice recognition accuracy, and overall customer experience.
Saldanha believes Voice Tech will become commoditized over time, and the key to differentiation will be the way that underlying data and AI handle customer queries. He added that he believes Yelp is competitive in these areas.