On an episode of IT Visionaries, host Ian sat down with Leyla Seka, Executive Vice President of Mobile for Salesforce. Leyla shares how she got her start with Salesforce, the way brands will win in the coming years, and her thoughts on mobile as the fourth industrial revolution.
Here are some of her thoughts on the shift toward mobile.
How mobile is becoming more of a focus:
More and more, people across the world are turning to their mobile devices to do everyday tasks. In fact, many tasks that used to be only possible on a computer are now quick and easy, thanks to mobile apps. Leyla believes that this is the future, and developers will soon shift toward being mobile-only developers. She also believes that the next frontier in mobile is voice technology.
She brings it all back to the customer experience and expectation. If the customer is doing everything on their phone, they are only going to do business with you if you offer a mobile app. If they are connecting their home to a voice assistant, they are going to want you to offer voice-assist technology.
“What we’ll be starting to expect from mobile is really a voice-oriented experience,” she says. “Just look at the way I live in my personal life with Alexa. I no longer turn on the stereo. I no longer turn on the light. I mean, these are things that I thought I would do all my life. Now I simply say, ‘Alexa, play Bob Dylan,’ and boom, Bob Dylan started playing in my house and the lights go on. And that’s now become normal. My children think that’s normal, which is insane. It was like Judy Jetson for me back in the day. So when we think about that in the context of business – and especially businesses that are trying very hard to put their customer at the nucleus of what they do – you have to consider the fact that your customer is mainly going to interact with your brand on the phone.”
Looking into the future:
If you think back just a dozen years – when the iPhone first came out – it’s incredible to see how much our technical lives have changed. Our entire worlds often revolve around our phones. So what will our technical lives look like another ten or twelve years from now?
Mobile technology will transcend not just work, Leyla predicts, but the way people live and the quality of their lives.
“Think about what voice does to someone that can’t see,” she says. “and how empowering that’s going to be for them. How that’s going to shift the way they can do their work. I mean, that’s an interesting and amazing responsibility – and it’s a problem to think through as we ponder what mobile is going to look like in the future, and how voice is going to come online.”
What’s most exciting about mobile:
Leyla thinks the most exciting thing about mobile is what users have been able to do with it on their own. Whether it’s building an app or creating something new, everyday people with no coding or developing experience are working, playing, and innovating on their mobile phones.
To hear all of this conversation, click here.
