Alexa offers a new sales channel for brands and merchants who want to sell their products and services through Alexa skills. Today, we are excited to announce Amazon Pay for Alexa Skills is now generally available to US-based merchants and developers. With Amazon Pay for Alexa Skills, you can use Amazon’s simple voice purchasing flow to sell physical goods or services (like event tickets, transportation, flower delivery, and more).

How It Works

If you sell physical goods or services on Alexa, a customer can now complete the purchase experience within your skill without having to leave the voice experience to enter credit card or shipping address details. A merchant first registers with Amazon Pay to use Amazon Pay within their skill. Once you’ve registered with Amazon Pay, you simply add Amazon Pay to your Alexa skill. Amazon Pay integrates with existing CRM and order management solutions, so merchants can manage their sales as part of the current process.

For customers, the experience is simple. With Amazon Pay for Alexa Skills, customers can pay for physical goods and services in your skill using the information already in their Amazon account—without needing to remember their username and password. Alexa users grant your skill permission to use Amazon Pay as their default payment, which uses their payment details already pre-configured in their Amazon account.

How Companies Are Using Amazon Pay for Alexa Skills

TGI Fridays and 1800 Flowers have already created Alexa skills leveraging these new capabilities. For example, TGI Fridays is enabling customers to place orders and reservations through their Alexa skill with Amazon Pay. Just ask "Alexa, open Fridays" to start the process, and with Amazon Pay customers can complete their orders quickly and with ease, as their payment information is already stored in the Amazon account.

1-800-Flowers.com added Amazon Pay to their Alexa Skill in early 2018.  “Integrating Amazon Pay into the 1-800-Flowers.com Alexa Skill has allowed us to expand our reach well beyond existing customers. By replacing the account linking flow in the 1-800-Flowers.com Skill with Amazon Pay, all Amazon customers are now able to easily get curated gift recommendations and purchase flowers without leaving the voice experience in order to link their account, enter their credit card or provide shipping address details. We are passionate about elevating our customer experience and leveraging emerging technologies like Alexa and Amazon Pay allows us to further make the gifting experience seamless for shoppers.  Initial consumer response has been good and provided many valuable insights, with an increasing number of new and repeated shoppers making purchases.” – Amit Shah, CMO, 1-800-Flowers.com

Other Ways to Make Money with Alexa Skills

Many developers already make money on Alexa by participating in the Alexa Developer Rewards, selling connected devices, or connecting skills to existing business models using account linking (for example, booking a ride or ordering food).

• Make Money with In-Skill Purchasing: With in-skill purchasing (ISP), you can sell premium content to enrich your Alexa skill experience. Examples include game products, interactive stories, unlocked features or content, and more. ISP supports both one-time purchases for entitlements that unlock access to features or content in your skill and subscriptions that offer access to premium content or features for a period of time. Learn more.
• Make Money through Alexa Developer Rewards: With Alexa Developer Rewards, you can make money for eligible skills that drive some of the highest customer engagement. Skills in eligible categories are automatically considered for the program each month. We will notify you if your skill qualifies. Today, you can make money through both ISP and Alexa Developer Rewards. Learn more.

Get Started Today

For more information on Amazon Pay for Alexa skills, visit developer.amazon.com/alexa/amazon-pay.