Project Overview:

Artificial intelligence generated content is commonly utilized in content creation industries.

For this project, we were given a brief for a client that uses Artificial Intelligence to generate content for Marketing teams, Content Creators, and Product Managers. After reviewing the prompt, I conducted domain research, competitive analyses, and sourced interviews from Content Creators to further define a potential adopter of the product and inform the information architecture of a potential design solution.

For this case study, I’ll be referring to the client as “byteType.” It was a fun chance for me to name a product, referencing “byte” the unit of data used to encode a single character of text in a computer, and “type” the core output from the client’s technology.

Challenge:

Design an experience for a capability that only exists in code

Based on the project brief, byteType’s capabilities only existed in code. I was tasked with designing the user experience and interface for Version 1 of their progressive web app, however to begin I needed to identify users' needs and motivations to help inform the design of the interface and represent functionalities potential user would need the most when creating content.

Research:

Matching up to the competition + understanding Content Creators' tasks

I reviewed the competitive landscape and transcoded interviews from Content Creators to better understand the use cases for AI in the content creation space and user sentiments towards it.

When analyzing the competitive landscape and learning how AI is used, I noticed that AI was most utilized in creating written content like articles, short and long form copy, and content brief recommendations. The competitors that had similar functional capabilities to byteType were able to create more than one form of content, connect to other products, and gave users the ability to customize the content output.

To understand their main goals and type of content that is often needed by creators, I conducted an interview with a Podcaster and transcoded transcripts from interviews with a Business Coach and social media Photographer/Videographer.  Although each creator varied in the type of content that they made, the following sentiments were common amongst all of them.

Insights:

Habits and needs of Content Creators

Overall, I noticed that there was opportunity for version #1 of byteType’s products to focus on helping users efficiently create written content that is timely, relevant, and easily shareable across social media sites.

Persona created to provide direction for design decisions

With the persona in mind, I began to identify what jobs a content creator goes through when making content for their social media platforms. I considered the steps that the creators we interviewed take, along with how key competitors allowed users to interact with their product.

User Need:

Researching and writing is time-consuming + Content Creators want to stay relevant

Based on research insights, Content Creators needed a way to quickly review topics and trends, write content, and control their brands tone & voice, to engage their audience with their content.

I utilized a questioning technique to help visualize potential root causes of the problem to begin thinking about how they can be addressed in the designed solution.

Ideation:

Exploring competitor capabilities to prioritize features

byteType expressed the need for a design that reflects the market space they are competing in. Before developing rough ideas, I considered the functionality, organization, and visual design of AI powered content generators and social listening tools to identify core functions that would be necessary to represent in a minimum viable product for version #1 of their progressive web app.

To understand what features to represent in the first iteration of the prototype, potential features for byteType were evaluated based on the impact it would have on users and the effort it may take from developers and other teams.

Wireframes:

Organizing the structure of information based on key interactions

Creating a task flow for a new registered user who wants to write and schedule a new blog post helped me get a sense of what key interactions would need to be represented.

Using the insights from the visual research and user interviews, I landed on a potential design that allowed users to easily find the core functions they needed, while allowing them to focus on individual tasks associated with completing an action.

Visual Design:

Developing the brand style

After wireframing, I started developing the visual style that would portray byteType as being simple, minimal, and futuristic. I landed on those 3 brand adjectives based on the service byteType aims to provide its users.

• Simple: The client is helping make content creation simple and less time consuming
• Minimal: The product is meant to minimize the effort needed from creators
• Futuristic: The product is equipping individuals and small teams with an AI powered tool, that based on user interviews they weren't aware existed.

For the UI, I focused on creating color palettes that represented the brand adjectives and were color contrast compliant for accessibility. People’s attitudes towards each color palette were measured using a controlled list of product reaction words, that led to me moving forward with the color palette in which participants had a more positive reaction and the selected words more closely aligned with the brand adjectives.

Solution:

Helping Content Creators save time producing content while engaging their audience

The first iteration of byteType demonstrates the combined ability of an AI content creation and social listening tool that helps creators save time writing content, researching topics and trends related to their industry, and allows them to still have a level of control over their narrative.

Content Composer

As a part of the core functionality, the app uses AI to generate content based on the users initial input.

Users are able to control their narrative by having the choice of using their own written content, having the app generate ideas, or a combination of both. This functionality allows for customization so users can make selections in relation to what the AI generates for them.

Topic Finder

byteType allows users to research topics by keywords related to their industry.

This functionality allows users to view the most recent conversations and trending topics based on their connected social media feeds, to help inform future content that may resonate with their audience.

Reflection:

Setting up timed goals + thinking of the MVP, helped me stay organized

For this project it was a challenging exercise taking on the role of a project owner, where I had to suggest and execute a research strategy to identify insights, prioritize the design features based on user and client needs, while considering the information architecture to avoid cognitive load within the suggested design solution.

Maintaining organization and setting up timed goals helped me meet the timeline to submit the main deliverables, however based on the timeline I was unable to test the user flow for the represented scenario with participants. If I had additional time, I would've liked to conduct usability testing to understand how a potential user would navigate the site and see if there are any additional features they would find helpful that is also in line with the client's functional capabilities.