Project Overview
CHALLENGE
Seamlessly integrate a feature that allows user to personalize and customize their experience when using Character.AI’s AI chat model so that their interactions with characters are more engaging and meaningful.
SOLUTION
User-driven personas that allow users to create and switch between different personas, each with its own name, appearance, and background.
Enables users to tailor their interactions based on different roles or contexts
MY ROLE
UX, UI Designer
Research, Visual design, Prototyping
TIME
August 20, 2023 - August 29 2023 (~1.5 Weeks Duration)
TOOLS
Figma, Unity, Procreate
Design Process
EMPATHIZE
Research
To better understand Character.AI’s background, market space, and who Character.AI’s users are, I started by conducting research with the following goals:
Research Goals
Understand the market trends of the AI Chatbot market
Identify Character.AI’s target market and user base
Identify Character.AI’s competitors and evaluate their strengths and weaknesses
Discover goals, needs, motivations, and frustrations of users
Preliminary Research
Through secondary research, I gained a deeper understanding of trends of Character.ai’s market as well as their user base.
Below is a summary of what I found.
General
The launch of the Character AI app was a record-breaking success because it garnered 1.7 million installations within the first seven days.
As of June 2023, the app has been downloaded over 10 million times across the App Store and Google Play
Majority of user traffic comes from Direct Marketing which accounts for 84.34%— 8 in 10 Character AI visitors are direct.
Usage
Approximately 9 million users engage with Character.AI daily.
Character.AI's users’ average session duration of around 120 minutes
Users typically view 13.91 pages per visit
The site has a relatively low bounce rate of 20.87%, indicating that visitors are not leaving quickly after arriving
Around 75% of Character.AI's web traffic came from mobile browsers
Demographic
The majority of Character.AI users are aged 18 to 24, making up about 57% of the user base. 22.49% are aged 25-34.
Gender distribution shows a male majority at 60%, followed by females at 30%, and other genders making up the remaining 10%.
The largest portion of users comes from the United States (25.32%), followed by the Philippines (7.60%)
Sources
Competitive Analysis
Persona Archetypes
Using the insights gained from my research— reading reviews, reddit threads, and comments, I created provisional persona to represent potential users.
Empathy Map
Patterns
Desire for Higher Engagement
Users expressed a strong desire for customization and personalization in their interactions with the AI Characters.
Community and Shared Experiences
Users expressed a strong value for community engagement and the ability to share their experiences with others.
Balance Fun and Function
Users want to see engaging and authentic interactions with characters, so seeing repetitive or superficial responses hampers experience.
Insights
Deeper customization and easy personalization enhances realism and overall user experience.
Communal features in some form are essential for enhancing user engagement.
Absence or ill-execution of utilities will impact entertainment, no matter how fun the experience is.
Needs
To adjust and guide content to personal preferences
To co-create with and share characters with other users
To experience smooth storytelling modules that cater to both fun and function
User Persona
Based on my research, Junie is the representative of the target user.
DEFINE / IDEATE
Defining the Problem
To help define these problems, I used the insights gained from research and interviews to create a user story to frame the problem from Samuel’s. Then, I use the persona and story to craft How Might We questions that will guide my ideation process.
Brainstorming
Mind mapping focused on specific How Might We questions
Task Flow
Steps to creating a Persona
User Flow
Junie makes a new persona to use for a new character she wants to start chatting with.
Design / Sketch
Lo-Fi Wireframes
Wireframes for Creating a Persona
Wireframes for Selecting a Persona in chat
Design / Prototype
Building a Prototype
Lo-Fi Digital Wireframes
Mockups
Feedback and Priority Revisions
Trait Text Input
It wasn’t clear if users needed to type a trait on their own or select from a list they couldn’t see.
Old Placement
New Placement
After
Before
Button Location
Back button felt too detached from the button to progress forward.
Final Mockup
Reflections and Takeways
I considered this to be a fun branding exercise where I was able to really deep dive and learn about Character.ai as a platform while also studying and understanding the user experience design choices they have made so far.
I faced new challenges during this project that I haven’t faced before - integrating a new feature into an existing design and designing for a mobile application that I wasn’t entirely familiar with. Conducting thorough preliminary research was very essential to identifying best solutions.
The next steps I would take this project through from here are:
01 USABILITY TESTING
To validate and make meaningful, user-centered edits to the design, I want to conduct structured and planned out user testing.
02 IMPLEMENTATION
Once I’ve tested to make sure the changes improved the features’ usability, I would then get assets and files ready to then pass off for implementation. Testing would still need to be conducted through feedback to improve the design.
