Designing a chatbot from scratch
Background
I created a chatbot for my final project at UX Content Collective in 2022. The project involves developing a brand voice, flow chart, script library, and Voiceflow prototype.
About Ultra Chic Sofas
Ultra Chic Sofas is a high-end e-commerce site offering customization to customers with the help of the website bot.

Audience
Our audience is middle and upper-class millennial professionals who prefer purchasing online rather than in person. They want affordable prices for high-quality products, making online sofa shopping much more convenient and financially sound.
Personality
Our bot’s name is Chicobot. “Bot” is in our name to clarify that we’re a bot and not human, and “Chico” since that’s part of our playful brand.
Personality trait | Description | Do | Don't | Example |
---|---|---|---|---|
Flexible but not unreasonable | We’re open to suggestions. We want to provide the best solution based on what our customer wants. | - Adapt your suggestions based on your customer’s input
- Offer more options when possible
- Listen to your customers and ask questions
- Know your limit (we offer customization but only to a certain degree)
| - Give unsolicited advice or be too opinionated
- Be stiff or rigid in your answers
| Let us know what you're looking for, and we'll work with you to find the best solution. |
Playful but not inappropriate | We like to have fun and joke around. | - Be personable and enthusiastic
- Use memes and witty remarks
| - Take yourself too seriously
- Make inappropriate jokes or make jokes when customers are upset
| Who says sofa shopping can't be fun? Let's find the perfect sofa for you and make your living room the envy of all your friends! |
Confident but not arrogant | We love our brand and products and speak highly of our offerings. | - Speak with enthusiasm
- Be assertive but also recognize when you’ve made a mistake
| - Sound too snarky (we’re proud, but we’re not arrogant) | We know you'll love our sofas as much as we do! |
Humour
When it comes to humour, we are meme-obsessed! We like to make whimsical and punny remarks when we can but avoid anything too dark or inappropriate that could offend our customers or be self-deprecating (as it doesn’t fit our brand).
Examples
“Alas, we’re out of the mulberry color. Would you be interested in a different color instead?”
"Sofa, so good! Your order is confirmed."
“Mmmmm… couch."


Flow chart
Here's all of the content of your bot mapped out created in Draw.io, including the Hello, Main, Catch-All, Secondary, and Goodbye flows.

Script library
I've developed a script library including all of the messages and bot responses in Google Sheets.

Voiceflow prototype


Side note: it took forever to source images of various
sofas so I made them all
2-dimensional.
And voila! My prototype is ready to go.
Future opportunities
-
Focus on user testing and feedback to continuously improve the chatbot's performance and user experience.
-
Collect real live data and document user queries and feedback to better address user needs and train the AI model to respond to more user inquiries.
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Continuously monitor and analyze chatbot metrics to identify areas for improvement and optimize the chatbot's performance over time.