Flash Briefing Skill Certification Checklist

Note: Sign in to the developer console to build or publish your skill.

This checklist helps you prepare your flash briefing skill for certification. Before you submit your skill, make sure that you thoroughly test its functionality. In addition, make sure that the skill's content, images, links, and descriptions meet Amazon's policy, content, and security guidelines.

Policy guidelines

Your adherence to the following Amazon policy guidelines helps maintain customer trust, protect intellectual property, and safeguard Alexa users' privacy and security:

Verify that all content is original and owned by you (or your company), or that you (or your company) have the right to distribute the content.
Verify that the following aspects of your skill meet Alexa policy guidelines:
- Skill name, image, and descriptions
- Feed content
- URL destination pages

Content guidelines

A flash briefing skill gives users a quick overview of essential news and content. For a good user experience, check to make sure that your skill is unique:

Verify that your flash briefing skill and its feeds are different from an audiobook experience.
Verify that your flash briefing skill and its feeds are different from a music streaming service.

Security guidelines

Customer trust is important to Amazon. To protect customer data, make sure your flash briefing skill meets Amazon's security requirements:

Verify that your skill follows HTTPS protocol where required. URLs for content links must use HTTPS, but it's a good idea for all URLs in your skill to use secure protocol.
If you include a privacy policy URL or terms of use page, verify that the page content loads correctly. Make sure the page doesn't redirect the user, contain malware or viruses, or download files.
If you include a URL to appear in the feed when Alexa reads or plays your content, verify that the content loads correctly. Make sure the page doesn't redirect the user, contain malware or viruses, or download files.

Format guidelines

Each feed in your flash briefing skill must be formatted in JSON or XML/RSS. For details, see the Flash Briefing Skill API Feed Reference. Before you submit your skill for certification, check for the following common formatting errors:

Verify that your text-to-speech (TTS) content contains only standard punctuation. Check to make sure that the content has no special characters, such as HTML, XML, or SSML tags.
Verify that your feed items include all required metadata, such as date and unique ID.
Verify that the date entries for your feed items accurately indicate the date of the content.
Verify that your JSON or XML code is formatted properly, with the correct opening and closing brackets and no extra characters.
Verify that your audio feed URLs use HTTPS protocol.

Functional tests

Customers expect your skill to function smoothly and consistently. Verify that the description of your skill in the Alexa app accurately describes the skill and its content. Perform functional tests of your flash briefing skill to verify that Alexa reads or plays the feed as expected.

In the developer console

Use the arrow button to listen to the error message for your skill. Verify that the message is clear and accurate.
Use the arrow buttons to listen to the preamble for each feed. Verify that the preamble is clear and error free, starts with "in" or "from," and correctly identifies the feed.

In the Alexa app

Access Alexa on your mobile device, on your Fire tablet, or on the web, and perform the following tests.

View your skill in the list of skills

Verify that the skill name contains no errors and that it accurately indicates the purpose of the skill.
Verify that the brief skill description is in the right language for the skill locale.
Confirm that the brief skill description contains no errors and accurately describes the skill content.

Read the full description of your skill

Verify that the full skill description is in the right language for the skill locale.
Confirm that the description contains no errors and accurately describes the skill content.
Verify that the description includes a list of all the feeds that your skill offers.
Verify that the description identifies the default feed.

Enable each feed and ask Alexa for your flash briefing

Verify that you hear the right preamble for each feed.
Verify that Alexa reads or plays the feed correctly.
Verify that Alexa reads or plays the feed content in the right language for the skill locale.
Verify that the content displayed in each home card is related to the feed content that's playing.

For audio feeds

For audio feed guidelines, see Tips for Audio Clip Content and Audio Content Requirements.

If your feed contains multiple items, ask for the next and previous items in the skill language, and verify that Alexa moves between items as expected.
Verify that the audio volume of each clip is similar to the volume of Alexa's speech. For details, see Normalizing the Loudness of Audio Content.
Verify that the URLs in the home card link either to content associated with the current feed or to the content provider's website. Links to unrelated content do not meet certification requirements.
Verify that the related content is readable on small and large screens.

For text feeds

For text feed guidelines, see Tips for Text-to-Speech (TTS) Content.

Verify that each feed is clear when Alexa reads it.
Verify that no feed item exceeds 4,500 characters. Items that exceed the character limit are shortened, so that they end with the nearest sentence that falls under the limit.

Next steps

After you submit your flash briefing skill for certification, Certification appears in the Status column in the developer console. While your skill is under review, you can't edit its configuration. To stop the certification process, select your skill and then choose Withdraw from Certification.

After Amazon reviews your skill, you receive an email at the address associated with your developer account.

If your skill is certified, the email provides an estimate of when the skill is expected to be released to end users.
If your skill is not certified, the email recommends issues for you to correct. You can make the necessary changes, and then re-submit the skill.

Was this page helpful?

Provide feedback

Last updated: Oct 13, 2023