Designing an AI Financial Chatbot

The Ask

Charlie Finance (since acquired by Chime), a fintech startup approached frog to help integrate product, brand, and marketing for a financial assistant chatbot that users interacted exclusively over text.

The Process

The frog team was comprised of interaction designers, visual designers, and copywriters. My role included:

• Brand strategy, character and product bible and origin story
• Contribute to interaction model conceptualization and on-boarding design
• Marketing and storytelling narrative for landing page
• Facilitation of key client alignment and reviews
• Engagement scoping, planning, contracting, and frogVentures investment documentation

Integrating Product, Brand & Marketing for a Cohesive Experience

During our brand/character discovery phase, the team looked to several areas of inspiration - from animals to robots to abstract chat bubbles:

Outcome

We selected a robotic penguin mascot because of its innate friendly demeanor, its loyalty, and intelligence. Through many rounds of iteration, we tailored the penguin to visually demonstrate intelligence with details such as its delightful antennae and dot matrix belly. We also conducted quantitative A/B tests to assess the penguin’s performance relative to other identity/brand strategic directions.

We designed the Charlie marketing landing page to feel like you were engaging with Charlie the instant the page loaded. As the user scrolls through the page, you see potential value prop scenarios that Charlie can help with - from helping you reduce your bills to guarding your bank account against extra charges.

Because Charlie’s primary product and experience interface was delivered through chat, we conceptualized a new type of product deliverable, a Character Bible. This bible included canonical dialogues, verbal/non-verbal response types, modes of behavior, and even a few jokes.