The document provides guidelines for designing chatbot user experiences. It discusses understanding user expectations and the strengths and limitations of artificial intelligence. Key recommendations include communicating the chatbot's capabilities clearly, providing structured responses, employing conversation repair techniques, and introducing complexity gradually. The guidelines cover strategy, crafting the conversation, and designing the container and platform integration. The overall approach is to meet but not overpromise user expectations based on the chatbot's capabilities.

1. Boon Yew Chew
IxDA London
Lessons from writing chatbot UX guidelines
26 July 2017
Uncovering chatbot
IxD basics

2. Lessons learnt
Popular chatbot literature
isn't helpful for design.
Make your own guidelines.

3. Chatbot interaction design
Facilitating conversation-
based interactions through
dynamic text and visual-
based dialogue

4. Side-stepping misconceptions
Not everything needs AI
Chatbots failure rates are high
Personality is only the tip of the iceberg
Bot conversation involves a learning curve

5. Let's design to...
build confidence
meet expectations
enable (re)usability

6. Let's avoid...
designing for novelty
majoring on personality
being trapped by the tool

7. Discovery:
2 things to understand
User expectations and needs
AI strengths & weaknesses

8. Broad perceptions and
expectations
People expect chatbots to be...
useful for assisting in basic tasks and queries
efficient and get things done faster
straight to the point
...but not to...
answer all their questions
fully understand their responses
be very intuitive or reliable
offer opinions
be too informal or expressive
Chat Bots: A consumer research study, myclever.com (2016)
Chatbot Strategy: Market research report, Fifthquadrant (Nov 2016)

9. Expected qualities of a
chatbot
Chat Bots: A consumer research study, myclever.com (2016)
Chatbot Strategy: Market research report, Fifthquadrant (Nov 2016)
Knowledgeable
Helpful
Informative
Problem solver
Responsive
Friendly
Polite

10. Uncovering specific user needs
Input only trial
Chat logs
Call centre logs
Top tasks survey
etc.

11. Novice vs. expert users
“Just give me the answers.
I’m not interested in chatting.”
“It’s nice that I can ask it things,
and get the answers right away.”
New to chatbots
Will default to common sense approaches
May give up early and not persist
May be open to chatter
Strong expectations for chatbot behaviour
May attempt a few ways to get answers
Speaks in a way that’s appropriate to task
Less patience for chatter

12. Understand AI strengths and
limitations
Firstly, build / test and validate the experience
Understand cognitive technologies, and how it
impacts the experience
Know the difference between effort to understand
vs. effort to answer

13. Do an audit
Does this chatbot experience match user expectations and
needs?
What’s getting in the way of the conversation?
What’s making the conversation feel odd, pointless, wrong?
Is the AI weakness at fault? What is it good at?
Is it the content that needs fixing?

14. Writing guidelines and
recommendations
Strategy
Craft
Interface

15. Chatbot strategy 101
Does it need to exist, and why?
What problem does it solve?
Who is it for?
How will it support users?
How does it fit within the wider experience?
Strategy

16. H I G H U S E R
E X P E C T A T I O N
L O W U S E R
E X P E C T A T I O N
C H A T B O T
W E A K N E S S
C H A T B O T
S T R E N G T H
D E L I V E R
A N D
D E L I G H T
S U G G E S T
A N D
G U I D E
L I M I T
A N D
C L A R I F Y
P A R T N E R
A N D
R E D I R E C T

17. Confidence is the currency of
conversational experiences
Complex responses
Open-ended questions
Expressive personality
Too much assistance
Limited knowledge
Clinical personality
SWEET
SPOT
V E R Y C L O S E DV E R Y O P E N
Craft

18. User confidence comes from
Knowing what the bot can do
Feeling understood
Successfully completing tasks
Ease of use
Craft

19. Communicate limitations and capabilities
Offer structured, suggested answers
Employ conversational repair techniques
Gradually provide tips and suggestions
Provide short, concise responses
Provide shortcuts and quick commands
Support chat saving and resuming
Recall and reuse user data
Integrate useful services
Supporting novice and expert
users
Craft

20. Three layers of chatbot experience
Conversation
(text, rich media)
Container
(chat window)
Platform
(website, app, Facebook messenger)
Interface

21. Consider the ecosystem
Platform
1 2 3
Universal CTA Footer Promo Hero In-page
"How can I help?" "Who would you
like to speak to?"
"Try me out" "Let me introduce
myself"
"What about this
can I help you
with?"

22. A landing page!
Platform
1 2 3
How does it work?
Who is it for?
Why is it good?
What can it do?
...

23. Layout strategies, behaviours
Container

24. Keep it simple
Container

25. Emulate real conversations
Conversation

26. Introduce complexity gradually
Conversation
tips and suggestions
asking for feedback
rich, dynamic UI
complex logic

27. Good defaults
Conversation
examples up front
structured prompts
concise and simple
avoid repetition

28. more advanced stuff...
Conversation
self-correction
multi-line handling
context tracking
'undo'
transparency, privacy and security
...

29. Work to the AI from the user
experience, not vice versa
“better use cases – those real-world tasks and
interactions that determine everyday business
outcomes – offer the biggest payoffs”
https://hbr.org/2017/04/ai-wont-change-companies-without-great-ux

30. Let's avoid making
more human puppets

31. Thank you.
boon.chew@gmail.com
@boonych