In the sea of connected home devices, it can be difficult to choose which products to use; whether to take the do-it-yourself (DIY) route, or have a professional do it for you.

In a new industry study released by Icontrol Networks, Inc. today it was revealed that customers are very satisfied with the “Do-it-for-me” (DIFM) approach for smart home adoption.

The Icontrol Networks’ DIFM Smart Home Survey, which was conducted among 552 participants across seven branded smart home solutions, showed that 96 percent of respondents report that they are “very satisfied” or “satisfied” with the professionally-installed smart home implements. Satisfaction aside, 96 percent of the respondents stated that the cost is justified, while 98 percent stated that they will still opt for professional installation if they had to choose again.

“These survey findings validate the importance of the do-it-for-me market in smart home adoption overall, with incredible customer satisfaction rates from decision to purchase through use,” said Bob Hagerty, CEO of Icontrol Networks. “This data should be an eye-opener for what we can expect in the future of smart home adoption.  No one size fits all when it comes to smart home adoption, and consumers want the option to choose what fits their lifestyles and needs.”

Some peace of mind

As for the top reason why the consumer had a smart home system installed, security and peace-of-mind are the strongest influencers during the decision-making process. The survey also revealed that smart home security features are the most used in a connected home, with 70-72 percent of the total respondents using the security system to arm/disarm the system, access video camera feeds, as well as lock connected doors at least once a week.

Consumers are also placing a great level of trust on their service providers as 97.4 agree or strongly agree that the system in place will not be accessed illegally, and 91 percent agree or strongly agree that their data will not be used for marketing purposes.

These numbers are surprising given that the government has already admitted that connected devices, such as those in smart home systems, are easy enough to access maliciously.  And while these respondents believe that their data won’t be used for marketing purposes, a separate survey has revealed that consumers are quite willing to share their personal data in exchange for perks such as low energy bills if their activities will be monitored via their smart thermostat.

Given the very real likelihood of smart home breaches, consumers seem to have a misplaced sense of security in their systems. This could very well be associated with the DIFM market, as familiar brands lend a sense of inclusivity with its hands-off approach.

“I can’t speculate, but my guess is that there is a certain level of comfort in smart home solutions offered by leading, reputable companies like those using Icontrol smart home platforms,” said Greg Roberts, VP of Marketing at Icontrol.

This trustworthiness was reiterated with survey findings that consumers’ final selection of a smart home provider relied heavily on reputation for 60 percent of respondents, even if they’d already been proactively researching multiple options. This beat out word-of-mouth recommendations at 51 percent.

It’s not that complicated

Though 98 percent of respondents stated that the system installed was easy to learn and use, most of them use the systems for single-device control instead of whole home automation where various devices work together seamlessly. It should also be noted that, though all service providers mentioned in the survey offered scheduling or automation features, only 29 and 35 percent of respective users were aware that the features were available to them. This indicates that service providers need to provide customers better information regarding the features included in their offerings. And when asked about difficulty of usage, most of the survey respondents stated that setting alerts, schedules and automation are the most difficult features to use in the system.

The respondents also revealed that convenience and ease of use were factors that influenced them to add additional products or features to the system such as smart thermostats, garage doors, lights, speakers and more.

“DIFM smart home technology platforms have the capacity to take on myriad devices that cover appliances, entertainment, health and fitness and more to create true whole home automation,” continued Hagerty. “The emerging opportunity for DIFM service providers is to educate customers on the possibilities.”

Icontrol’s opportunity

Icontrol is well positioned for the growing DIFM market, powering many of the solutions extended to consumers through familiar brands and existing infrastructure. Partnerships with ADT, Comcast and iTSCOM give Icontrol global reach into countless homes as these brands expand telecom offerings to automation services. Given the data-heavy nature of connected home devices, Icontrol hopes to increase its own value proposition in the way of analytics.

“Our focus is on making sure those systems have the most seamless UI and reliable service. We’re also doubling down on data and analytics in the cloud to better anticipate lifestyles,” Roberts explained. “This ultimately will make the smart home smarter and make it more transparent.”

As far as educating consumers to the benefits of whole-home controls, Icontrol looks to marketing and developers to get the word out.

“To boost comfort levels, we need to market the connected lifestyle to consumers in a way that’s personalized and relatable, and stresses ease-of-use,” Roberts said. “We need to make sure people understand the benefits they’ll get from the technology, and remove the complicated technical barriers (i.e. consolidation of communications standards).”

Nurturing its ecosystem of applications will not only encourage developers but also add data sources in support of Icontrol’s analytics efforts. As with many initiatives in the burgeoning smart home market, strategic partnerships are among the most prosperous paths to mainstream adoption and business success.

“To help shift to full home automation, we’re working with a company called Mnubo to develop a real-time, built-for-IoT data analytics platform that will allow devices to work together seamlessly,” explained Roberts. “We’re also integrating partners like WeatherBug Home, which will feed our deployment customers the largest professional-grade network of weather data, which means more intelligent, automated energy management services.”

Mellisa Tolentino contributed to this article.

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