Chat with Cliff
Brookfield Zoo Chatbot
Conversation Design Case Study
Growing up in the greater Chicagoland area, I used to visit Brookfield Zoo often. Now, as a conversation designer, I saw an opportunity for a unique bot persona that can help families navigate around and encourage kids to learn more about animals. This chatbot is able to show off the zoo’s brand to families and gives them a new reason to be excited to visit.
Deliverables
User & Bot Personas
Conversation Flows
Happy Path Prototypes
Tools
Figma
Whimsical
project goal.
Brookfield Zoo wants to connect with their visitors, facilitate their trip, and pique their interest with animals and shows they can see. The goal for this chatbot was to help visitors navigate the zoo, persuade them to go to shows and events, and teach them something new about the animals they can meet.
Jump to section
discovery.
Company Research
To better understand the company mission and brand, I completed research through their website at https://www.czs.org/Brookfield-ZOO. If I took this project into development, I would conduct interviews with stakeholders and team members to get a better understanding of the company’s needs and any information they have on their customers.
Why Design a Chatbot?
In this stage, I had to figure out the scope and expectations for my project. I evaluated using chat or voice interfaces, open-ended conversations or more linear options, and what deliverables to expect for the MVP.
I decided on using a chatbot for a few reasons. For one, chatbots can be a great way to show your brand’s personality and connect with your users. Also, this experience is designed for use in a zoo, using a voice interface could pick up input from strangers (or monkeys) being a little too loud nearby.
Identifying Use Cases
I had to understand what people wanted to do during their trip to the zoo, frustration points, and what a chatbot could help them with. Should the bot be more service-oriented, or persuasive? I decided on creating 3 use cases that could show off the company’s personality and help their customers enjoy their visit.
personas.
User Personas
Carmen Mendez
Biography
Carmen and her husband have 2 kids: a 6 year-old and a 2 year-old. They hire a nanny to look after their 2 year-old while they’re at work. Because they’re busy during the week, they try to make their weekends special with their children.
Needs
- An entertaining and educational experience for her children. She wants them to be happy and learn something.
- An efficient, helpful interface. She wants to spend her time with her family, not on her phone.
- It’s important to her that her children are exposed to positive influences.
Maria Wendt
Biography
Maria has been an elementary teacher for 21 years, and has loved seeing how technology has affected the structure of education. She's looking forward to visiting the zoo with her class next week because it's a chance for her students to have fun and learn something new.
Needs
- Personalized reccomendations for events that accomodate large groups.
- A kid-friendly experience that will help inspire her students to learn more about animals.
- An efficient interface that can help her navigate the zoo to maximize her time on the field trip.
Bot Persona
Cliff
The Adventurer
Biography
Cliff studied zoology at the University of Miami. After graduating, he traveled abroad to help protect various endangered species. He knows a lot about the world and is warm and friendly, especially with children. Cliff grew up hiking, camping, and visiting national parks. Cliff is a vegetarian.
Personality
- Tone of Voice: Enthusiastic, Educational, Fun, Friendly, passionate, Happy, Informal
- Sounds Like: Talks quickly, but clearly. High energy, and excited to talk about animals.
- Types Like: Likes using exclamation marks. Uses images to educate. Quick responder, but takes some time to think.
happy path.
For each use case, I went through the process of Design Canvas - Sample Dialogue - User Flows. The Design Canvas helps establish the context of the conversation, and leads to a more natural and realistic sample dialogue. Each sample dialogue was made referring to a specific goal, like “buying tickets to the dolphin show,” and allowing two humans to play the role of user and bot. From there, I created a high-level flow of the conversation and a more specific flow with questions and different answer paths. Check out my deliverables for each of use case below.
Use Case: Navigation
Design Canvas
Sample Dialogue
Conversation Flow
Use Case: Booking a Show
Design Canvas
Sample Dialogue
Conversation Flow
Use Case: Fun Animal Facts
Design Canvas
Sample Dialogue
Conversation Flow
next steps.
This project is ongoing, as a way for me to practice what I've learned about conversation design. As I continue with this project, here it what I plan to do next:
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Testing & Revision -
I plan to take these happy paths for each use case and do some testing and revision. First, I'll conduct some WOZ testing to see how they hold up against a human. Second, I'd like to do an expert rewrite session with some peers. This will help me improve the effectiveness of these happy paths, for the 80% of users who would go through them.
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Detailed Design -
This is the next big part of the project I will tackle. Recognizing intents, designing for the long tail, and creating repair flows will help the 20% of users who deviate from the happy paths navigate the chatbot. No conversation design will work for everyone, so it's important to realize what we can do for the rest to resolve their issues.
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Develop the Chatbot -
While this is only a project for me to practice conversation design, having a finished chatbot would be a great way to wrap everything up. At the very least, I plan to create a chatbot for fun animal facts that people can talk to and learn from.
conclusion.
This project is ongoing, and has been a great way to practice conversation design! I've learned a lot about the design process, practiced copywriting for a bot persona, and created real deliverables to show my work. I'm excited to learn even more as I head into the testing and detailed design stages of this project. Free free to contact me if you're interested in my work and want to get in touch!