Nest, the man­u­fac­tur­er of intel­li­gent ther­mostats and smoke alarms, was acquired by Google for $3.2 bil­lion at the begin­ning of 2014, and rep­re­sents one of the fastest growth areas for emerg­ing tech. Google’s lat­est evo­lu­tion of the search engine has enabled users to adjust inte­grat­ed Nest devices via the search engine, match­ing search intent to peo­ples’ homes.

Ear­li­er this year, Google’s acqui­si­tion of Nest marked a nat­ur­al move for the com­pa­ny. Both com­pa­nies val­ue con­nec­tiv­i­ty, seam­less syn­chro­niza­tion of prod­ucts and devices, and both strive toward improv­ing user expe­ri­ences. The prod­uct is one of the most promis­ing research and devel­op­ment prospects in bring­ing dig­i­tal inno­va­tions into con­sumer homes.

Recent devel­op­ments to Nest’s prod­ucts are using increas­ing­ly intel­li­gent sig­nals from dig­i­tal con­nect­ed devices to per­son­al­ize home heat­ing, light­ing, and oth­er envi­ron­men­tal vari­ables. A part­ner­ship with Mer­cedes for exam­ple, enables Nest users to have their heat­ing switched on and off as they return and leave home, as a means of sav­ing ener­gy. It also con­nects to Jaw­bone devices, enabling users to sleep and wake up at the per­fect tem­per­a­ture.

The lat­est update to the Google Nest plat­form means that users now have the abil­i­ty to con­trol the Nest hub via Google Now. That means that from here on in, set­ting the tem­per­a­ture in users home will be as easy as send­ing an email or text; all one needs to do is say: “OK Google, set Nest to 73 degrees.” and it will be so.

As is the case with many of Google Now’s fea­tures, Nest will also col­lect the nec­es­sary data on a users pre­ferred tem­per­a­ture set­tings and ther­mo­stat acti­va­tion times to per­son­al­ize a users home heat­ing envi­ron­ment – with­out lift­ing a fin­ger.

It rep­re­sents an excit­ing devel­op­ment for the search giant, pro­vid­ing an oppor­tu­ni­ty to extend dig­i­tal influ­ence with­in user homes. Increas­ing­ly Nest is becom­ing the de fac­to hub for con­sumer dig­i­tal devices, and Google Now inte­gra­tion her­alds a wealth of poten­tial oppor­tu­ni­ties.

How Will Nest And Google Now Provide Value To Businesses?

An arti­cle by Har­vard Busi­ness Review recent­ly spoke of the con­cept of “dig­i­tal ubiq­ui­ty” caused by an explo­sion of con­nect­ed devices. One of the con­cepts behind this was in the idea of dig­i­tal per­me­at­ing every aspect of con­sumer lives to the extent that busi­ness­es are able to form com­plex under­stand­ings of peo­ples’ needs and behav­ior and cater to them.

Addi­tion­al­ly, the way dig­i­tal devices inte­grate with each oth­er brings a cohe­sion to oth­er­wise sep­a­rate data insights that can trans­form cur­rent expe­ri­ences. Nest pro­vides excep­tion­al data on con­sumer behav­iour in peo­ples homes. It knows when you wake up, or when you do your laun­dry, when you watch TV, and when you tend to leave the house.

Search, on the oth­er hand, remains the great­est indi­ca­tor of user intent. Search can make rea­son­able pre­dic­tions, for exam­ple, on where and when you intend to trav­el, based on what tick­ets you are buy­ing, or the route maps you are look­ing at, as well as the prod­ucts or ser­vices that you’re inter­est­ed in pur­chas­ing.

Com­bin­ing Nest and search pro­vides an even more pow­er­ful pic­ture of how dig­i­tal devices can enhance lives.

For instance, hav­ing the right data on a cer­tain con­sumers look­ing to improve the effi­cien­cy and cost effec­tive­ness of their ener­gy bills, is a per­fect exam­ple of how Google Now and Nest data can be used. Users would be able to find the most com­pet­i­tive ener­gy pack­age for their needs. Future sce­nar­ios may even allow users to ben­e­fit based on the time of day or how heavy users con­sume ener­gy.

As the HBR arti­cle points out:

“We have seen that dig­i­tal trans­for­ma­tion is no tra­di­tion­al dis­rup­tion sce­nario: The par­a­digm is not dis­place­ment and replace­ment but con­nec­tiv­i­ty and recom­bi­na­tion. Trans­ac­tions are being dig­i­tized, data is being gen­er­at­ed and ana­lyzed in new ways, and pre­vi­ous­ly dis­crete objects, peo­ple, and activ­i­ties are being con­nect­ed. Pacif­ic Gas and Elec­tric, for exam­ple, will be more valu­able if it con­nects with Nest.”

Google Now, Tomorrow

The devel­op­ment sees an imple­men­ta­tion of Google Now that extends beyond the realm of the fea­tures native to peo­ple’s smart­phones (such as email, sched­ul­ing, or GPS nav­i­ga­tion), to some­thing that actu­al­ly con­trols real world envi­ron­men­tal vari­ables based on intel­li­gent analy­sis of user behav­ior and intent.

With a grow­ing num­ber of con­nect­ed devices now tak­ing their places inside con­sumer homes – every­thing from smart fridges to Google’s home media stream­ing device, Chrome­cast – the inte­gra­tion of Google Now and Nest plat­forms pro­vides a glimpse of the kinds of dig­i­tal inno­va­tions we will see in com­ing months and years, and a vision for mar­keters in which per­son­al­iza­tion based on inte­grat­ed data from dig­i­tal devices con­tin­ues to enhance every aspect of the con­sumer expe­ri­ence.