Published on | Prototyping: From UX to Front End — Medium Adam Glynn-Finnegan

It was a total surprise, it happened at the start of the day, in a public place, and it left me feeling 😢. Here’s how it all went down.

Penny and I have been through a lot together.

I jumped headlong into the relationship. In fact, since we first shared our digits, I’ve probably overshared a bit. We opened bank accounts together right away, I shared all my spending habits with her, and — to be fair — she really helped me get my (financial) life sorted out.

Well, that all changed this morning.

My phone pinged. A notification.
‘I have some news to share…’

Shit. This can’t be good. Or maybe it is. Maybe Penny found that lost Savings Bond Account my grandmother opened for me in the 80s and I’m a millionaire!

I opened the app to see what all this emotional drama was about.

Like we do after most breakups, I talked about how it could’ve gone differently with a friend afterwards. Here’s what we came up with:

Assigning emotions to a bot

Assigning emotions to a bot is weird. We all know they’re not real people. Having a personality is great, but emotions just feel awkward.

And when you do create a personality, make sure you really know your audience first. Why would I trust a young, goofy, overly-emotional minion with my most important financial decisions?

2. Giving the user only emotional responses

Avoid telling people how to feel. Try to provide actions and options when you can, or stay neutral when you can’t — something like “Got it” usually works. Your product can have personality, but you shouldn’t assign that personality to the people who use it.

Oh, and always use emojis with extreme caution. Having words put in your mouth feels 👎. It feels even worse when you have no idea what those words mean. 😢? 💪?!

3. Not being clear from the start

Be direct, be clear, and be transparent — from the start. Don’t hide important information behind cutesiness, that just leads to frustration.

In a case like this, could one or two screens suffice?
Penny was acquired. Here’s what that means for you.

By spreading it across seven screens, you risk not only turning people off from your bot, but from your brand (or, ahem, the new brand you’re introducing) too.

And lastly,

whatever you do, don’t ever call yourself a minion. Unless you look like this –

Bots are a tricky, new world. We’re not just picking on Penny. We think about, and work through, these same challenges in our everyday work at Airbnb too.

Adam Glynn-Finnegan, Designer
Madelyn Taylor, Content Strategist

Penny was acquired by Credit Karma today. They plan to shut down the service on June 1st 2018.

Today, I went through an awkward break up. was originally published in Prototypr on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Today, I went through an awkward break up.

Cool stuff, every week

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