If you ask most people what Alexa is, they tell you it’s Amazon’s AI-based voice assistant service but we content creators know a different Alexa that does an entirely different thing and it’s also owned by Amazon.
For those unaware, Alexa is an old service for web traffic analysis and it’s been operational since 1996 until Amazon acquired the company in 1999.
But because Amazon’s branding/naming guy hates the service so much, he decided to give the voice assistant the same name as the ancient site ranking service which ultimately led to its untimely demise.
Ok, that’s a made-up story but a separate name for the AI voice assistant would have been a good thing for the outgoing Alexa Internet web ranking service which will go offline by May 1st, 2022.
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The team at Alexa after breaking the sad news says they’ve stopped offering new subscriptions effective Dec. 8th.
Existing paid subscribers will get the chance to export their data from the service and delete their accounts.
Why is Alexa getting killed? There is no solid reason given by the company.
Alexa had operated as a go-to resource for content research, competitive analysis, keyword research, and several other web traffic metrics.
With Alexa, you could find what is popular in a given region or country and you can target a given area with your content or product/services.
Alexa is highly revered among webmasters but the rise of other web analytics services like Google Analytics, SEM Rush, and SEO-focused Ubersuggest.io could be part of the reasons for the untimely demise.
Also, Amazon might just feel the need to use the domain name for its virtual assistant which is much more popular now.