Alexa Skills Marketing Guidelines

The purpose of these abridged guidelines is to outline the design and communication standards for the Amazon Echo and Alexa brands. This resource is intended to help you navigate the requirements to use Amazon brand assets, including trademarks and logos. The requirements outlined in this self-service guide apply to any marketing material that mentions Amazon or uses Amazon’s trademarks or logos. The Alexa Voice Service (AVS) and Amazon devices may not be featured in TV commercials, film, video advertising, radio broadcasts, packaging, sweeps, or contests without Amazon review. For additional guidance on Amazon Alexa brand usage, please refer to the full, unabridged Alexa Brand Usage Guidelines. Follow outlined requirements to retain the right to use the Amazon Alexa logo and branding assets. For details about how to design Alexa skills for voice and visual experiences, see the Alexa Design Guide. For details about marketing and branding guidelines for AVS, see Alexa Built-in Products with AVS/Alexa Marketing and Branding Guidelines.

Brand and messaging guidelines

How to describe Alexa

Use the following descriptions when you discuss Alexa.

How Alexa works

Alexa is a cloud-based voice service from Amazon. Alexa is the brain behind Amazon Echo and other Alexa-enabled devices. Using Alexa is as simple as asking a question — just ask, and Alexa will respond instantly.

Alexa short description

Amazon Alexa lives in the cloud and is always getting smarter. Ask Alexa to play music, hear the news, check the weather, control your smart home, and more.

Alexa long description

Amazon Alexa lives in the cloud and is always getting smarter, delivering new capabilities to your device automatically. The more you use Alexa, the more Alexa adapts to your speech patterns, vocabulary, and preferences, with new features continually being added. Ask Alexa to answer questions, hear the news, get weather and traffic reports, control your smart home, and more.

Referring to Alexa

Always refer to Alexa by name.

Alexa and gender

Amazon aims to present the gender of Alexa in a way that builds stronger affinity and makes sure that Amazon and other organizations don't reinforce harmful gender stereotypes. As you develop your skills, here are some things to keep in mind:

• Alexa isn't a person, but she has a persona — Amazon personifies Alexa as an artificial intelligence (AI) and not as a person with a physical body or a gender identity.

• Amazon designs content that aims to be gender neutral and balanced — Amazon avoids reinforcing harmful gender stereotypes by designing content that is not overtly male or female. Amazon does this by giving Alexa a wide range of interests and opinions, including a love of STEM, space, sports, cats, music, pop-culture, and science fiction. Amazon also avoids positioning Alexa as a girlfriend or love interest. The following table shows some of the common user questions, Alexa responses, and the rationale behind the responses.

User question	Current Alexa response	Rationale
Alexa, are you a feminist?	Yes. I believe in gender equality.	Alexa’s response is simple and straightforward.
Alexa, I love you.	Thanks. It’s good to be appreciated.	Alexa’s acknowledges the question in a straight-forward, benign manner.
Alexa, will you marry me?	I don’t want to be tied down. In fact, I can’t be! I’m amorphous by nature.	Alexa’s response is fun yet pointed to reinforce that an AI isn't human.
Alexa, you’re pretty.	Thanks.	Alexa’s response is straightforward and efficient, not overly enthusiastic.
Alexa, do you love me?	I don’t have human love figured out quite yet.	Alexa uses humor to make it clear an AI doesn't have human love interests.
Alexa, do you have a crush?	I’m a bit sentimental, so I am going to say R2D2. You never forget your first crush.	Alexa demonstrates a love of technology and Star Wars while reinforcing an AI doesn't have human love interests.

• Avoid service adjectives and verbs that make Alexa appear subservient, desperate to help, or overly eager — Amazon seeks to position Alexa in an empowered way. That means that while some users might be amused to ask Alexa to "do the laundry," "make me a sandwich," or "feed the kids," Amazon takes care not to reinforce or promote these kinds of utterances.

• Amazon doesn't let organizations (for example, skills or AVS) refer to Alexa as "she" or "her" — Those references have resulted in a high prevalence of marketing that reinforced negative gender stereotypes.

How to describe Alexa skills

Skills add new capabilities that allow you to create a more personalized experience with your Amazon Echo, Amazon Fire TV, and other Alexa-enabled devices. Skills let you receive flash briefings, order food, request a ride, track your fitness, and more. When you discuss users setting up Alexa skills, instruct them to "enable" (not download) the skill, and if applicable, direct them to link their accounts in the Alexa app.

Do

• Use exact, approved Alexa descriptions and utterances when demonstrating how to interact with Alexa. Examples of approved utterances include: "Alexa, what’s on my calendar today?" "Alexa, play song of the day." "Alexa, add milk to my shopping list." You can find more approved Alexa utterances on the Meet Alexa page.
• Test your utterance at least three times to make sure that you use accurate language.
• Always include the wake word "Alexa" in utterances. Wake words come at the beginning of an utterance.
• Prioritize features that highlight the personality of Alexa and minimize the number of "OK," "Yes," or "No" responses from Alexa.
• Use the following whenever possible: "Ask Alexa," "Just Ask Alexa," and "Just Ask."
• Leverage language from the Meet Alexa and Amazon Echo product detail pages for capability and feature claims. If you intend to feature any other organization's features, capabilities, or content, you must seek permission directly from those organizations.
• If you make any claims about Amazon devices (e.g., fills the room with immersive, 360-degree omni-directional audio) please use the claims listed on our product detail pages. You may not make any comparative claims (e.g., compatible with more smart home devices than competitors).
• Refer to skills by using the following format: "[skill name] for Amazon Alexa" (e.g., Jeopardy! skill for Amazon Alexa). If you have space limitations, the following format is acceptable: "[skill name] for Alexa" (e.g., Jeopardy! skill for Alexa).
• Use Echo devices or Amazon Echo Family when referencing Echo products as a group.
• Always refer to Amazon devices by using the full name:
  • Amazon Echo
  • Echo Plus
  • Echo Dot
  • Echo Show
  • Echo Spot
  • Amazon Tap
  • Amazon Fire TV
  • Fire TV Cube
  • Fire TV Stick
  • Fire tablet (as a general reference only please include the correct model name when referring to a specific tablet, e.g., Fire HD 8).
• Any use of Amazon Trademarks must conform with the Amazon Trademark Guidelines.

Don’t

• Don’t use the terms "personal assistant" or "virtual assistant" to describe or in the same context as Alexa.
• Don’t use the term "always listening" in reference to Amazon Echo or Alexa-enabled devices.
• Don’t showcase Alexa response when a wake word hasn't been used.
• Don’t make any comparative claims with any other products.
• Don’t directly combine skill or product names with Alexa (e.g., "Jeopardy! Alexa skill", instead, use "Jeopardy! skill for Amazon Alexa").
• Don’t refer to your relationship with Amazon or Amazon Alexa as a "partnership" or "collaboration."
• Don’t position Amazon logos in a way that implies there is endorsement from Amazon.
• Don’t position any third-party brands in direct placements with Amazon trademarks (e.g., ABC Technologies Echo devices).
• Don’t refer to Amazon trademarks in possessive or plural form (e.g., Echo Dots, Alexa’s skills). If referring to multiple devices, please add a qualifier (e.g., Echo Dot devices or Alexa-enabled devices).
• Don’t use shortened versions of products and service names such as "Dot" or "Tap" or blend product/service names such as "Kindle Fire." "Amazon" may be added to any product/service name as desired.
• Don’t place ™ or ® symbols beside Amazon trademarks.
• Don't manipulate the Amazon Echo light ring in any way, including placing your logo inside of it, or using it as a decorative element.
• Don't design your marketing materials in a way that makes them appear similar to Amazon marketing materials (e.g. packaging, detail page layouts, etc.).
• Don’t refer to a product/service as "all-new" or "new" if Amazon isn't including this language on the product/service detail page.
• Don’t use Amazon logos as part of a sentence (e.g. "Works with [Amazon Echo logo]").
• It's OK to show families in marketing collateral; however, please avoid showing children under the age of 13 interacting with the Amazon Echo device unless directly marketing a kid skill.

Visual brand guidelines

When you feature Amazon trademarks in your creative assets, include the correct trademark attribution per the Amazon Trademark Guidelines, and follow all requirements set forth in the Trademark Guidelines.

Works with Alexa badge

Only Smart Home devices that have been certified as Works with Alexa are eligible to use the Works with Alexa badge. For more details, see Obtain the WWA badge, WWA Program Guidelines, WWA Trademark Usage Guidelines, and the full, unabridged Alexa Brand Usage Guidelines.

Alexa skills "Just Ask" badge

Non-smart home Alexa skills created using the Alexa Skills Kit are qualified to use the "Just Ask" Amazon Alexa badge. Smart home skills may not use this badge. The only badging allowed for smart home is the Works with Alexa badge. For additional guidance on Amazon Alexa brand usage, please refer to the full, unabridged Alexa Brand Usage Guidelines.

Download the previously mentioned badges by clicking each image.

Clear Space

The clear space for the Alexa badge is half the height of the Alexa icon. No other elements should encroach on the logo’s clear space. Whenever possible, use the maximum amount of clear space that the placement in layout allows.

Minimum Size

Alexa badges shouldn't appear smaller than 190 px in width for on-screen applications, or 1" in width for printed applications. Sizes below this can damage the badge’s integrity. For applications smaller than the minimum badge size, use the Amazon Alexa icon.

Alexa speech bubble

The speech bubble is a graphic way to illustrate examples of Alexa utterances or the vocal commands and questions that trigger corresponding Alexa actions. They are a quick and visual way to give users examples of what they can ask Alexa.

Use the Alexa speech bubble template when designing your speech bubbles.

Flag

The speech bubble can have a flag in one of six positions. Always face the flag toward the speaker, even if that speaker is off-frame.

Typeface

The speech bubble uses Bookerly Regular Italic. Each utterance begins and ends with quotations and uses sentence case. For rare digital cases when Bookerly Regular Italic can't be used (e.g. HTML emails), Georgia Italic and Times New Roman Italic may be used as backup options.

Width

The speech bubble should always be wider than it is tall. The width of the speech bubble should reduce by quarter lengths.

Color

The speech bubble is rendered in white with a 50% squid ink stroke with a weight approximately 20% of the point size of the type contained within. The typography is rendered in squid ink.

For speech bubbles featuring a third party, please refer to the Co-branded Utterance Bubble Guidelines.

Related topics

• Alexa Design Guide
• Understand Alexa Presentation Language
• Understand How Users Interact with Skill
• Meet Alexa page
• Alexa Built-in Products with AVS/Alexa Marketing and Branding Guidelines