From Screenplay Writing to Conversation Design
My journey and similarities in creating an engaging dialogue.
The spine of human communication is ‘Conversation’. Voice is the medium through which we understand one another since a very young age. But Conversation today is about being able to speak with our devices and homes just like we do with our family and friends.
So where did it all start?
Well, every story in the reel or the real-life starts either with a character (i.e. character-driven saga) or with a problem statement (i.e. situation-driven tale). Either way, what we take back from these stories are morals and characters that resonate with our quirks.
What makes a character unique?
Other than the physical appearance, it is Voice and Language that add a distinct flavour to a person’s personality. Just by listening to a voice, the accent (the emphasis on the vowels, the rolls of the r’s), the pauses and the pitch… we can gauge a person’s age, gender and most likely which part of the world he/she hails from. If we can create the WHO, WHERE, WHY AND HOW of a person, we have created a unique character.
My Journey -
As a Screenplay writer, I learnt to live with my characters. I had to know them so well that I could answer questions like which toothpaste does she use, how does he communicate and respond in a situation — to what drives them to perform their day-to-day tasks. These things helped me empathise with my characters and understand why must I root for them or agree with their opinion.
As I transitioned from screenwriting to branding, this quality helped me personify brands with qualities that aligned with their target audiences. After 10 years of shapeshifting roles in Media and Branding, I decided to gain some foothold into UX design. My curiosity led me to discover a medium that brought together all streams of my learning and experience — Conversation Design.
I studied Google’s design guidelines to start creating some sample dialogues and pay close attention to Conversation Design best practices. But while doing so, I instinctively assigned a few dialogue writing techniques I had learnt as a Screenplay Writer. Let me share these with you.
Dialogue techniques -
1. Sound different for each character —
To create a character or a persona with a unique voice, it is important to answer -
- What sort of an audience is your persona catering to?
Children/ Old people/ Couples
- What is this persona’s environment like?
Location/ Context/ Day-to-day world
- Which traits make the persona unique?
Fun-loving, geeky or cool
- What goals are to be achieved?
Does this person help children with special needs or does he play a match-maker in people’s lives?
All these questions help create a rough sketch of a person in our minds. If we can associate this persona to someone we know in real life, we can take the aid of our memory in etching out his traits better!
In designing a conversation, you assign the same attributes to your persona. Therefore, your research needs to give away age, location and most importantly the social context or environment of your user before you can create an agent that can speak the same language as your user.
Decide if your persona is a Companion or just an information provider. In each of the cases, the persona would sound different.
VIRTUAL COMPANION
Good morning. How are you feeling today?
USER
Not so great. I am feeling low.
VIRTUAL COMPANION
I’m sorry to hear that. Would you like to tell me more?
________________________________________________
TRAVEL DIGITAL ASSISTANT
Hi, I am Sam, your travel assistant. Would you like to book a flight or a hotel?
USER
A flight, please.
TRAVEL DIGITAL ASSISTANT
Ok, where and when would you be flying?
USER
To Singapore, from 7th March to 16th March.
TRAVEL DIGITAL ASSISTANT
Got it. I’m sending you flight options on your screen. Would you also like to book a hotel?
USER
No, that’s all, thank you.
TRAVEL DIGITAL ASSISTANT
Always a pleasure. Have a nice day!
2. Reveal your Character and its purpose right away —
This falls in with the 2 Cooperative principle maxims, as introduced by Paul Grice -
1. Maxim of Quality — Make a contribution you believe is true.
2. Maxim of Quantity — Make that contribution informative, but not more than what’s required.
A story should give away who the Protagonist is and why is he in the story in the first place.
Apply this to Conversation Design: If you have placed a chatbot on your banking or your restaurant site, it acts as the protagonist of your site. The chatbot needs to give away why it exists by making a contribution that is true and informative enough to be understood.
“Hi, welcome to Delicious Cakes. I’m Jessie. I can tell you the menu, help you place an order or share a few recipes. Which would you like?”
By doing this, you know right away what the function of the bot is and why is it placed there.
3. Move the story forward -
Any piece of a conversation or speech has to elaborate the plot or reveal something about the character. It has to move the story forward.
Same is the case with a conversation because speech is intricately bound to the passage of time. A conversation needs to make sure it is to the point, it allows for turn-taking and makes progress.
VIRTUAL ASSISTANT
Good morning Samantha. Would you like to listen to a joke or go through the headlines first?
USER
No time for a joke. Headlines, please.
VIRTUAL ASSISTANT
World trade deals stalled due to Coronoavirus….
USER
Next.
VIRTUAL ASSISTANT
Confirmed cases are just tip of the iceberg…
USER
Next. Umm… you know what? Let’s do this later.
VIRTUAL ASSISTANT
Ok, sure.
4. Repetition is a big no-no!
Writing a Screenplay requires you to know the purpose of each of your scenes and crafting the dialogues accordingly. Repetitive dialogues can be trite and boring. Hence, dialogues need to be short and subtle and serve the purpose right away.
Conversations do the same. They are natural and intuitive. Rather than repeatedly telling the user “I’m sorry I don’t understand” or “Can you please repeat that?”, you provide subtle cues like saying or doing nothing. This prompts the user to repeat himself or ask a follow-up question.
USER
I won’t make it for the meeting this Thursday. Just take it off my calendar.
MEETING SCHEDULING ASSISTANT
Which one?
USER
Umm… I think…umm… the one at 3:30
MEETING SCHEDULING ASSISTANT
— — — No response — — —
USER (now articulates clearly)
Can you please cancel the meeting scheduled for 3:30?
MEETING SCHEDULING ASSISTANT
Done. The meeting at 3:30 pm on Thursday is cancelled.
5. Write the Dialogues to entertain. Witty and quotable lines are memorable -
Comic timing is the toughest to achieve while writing dialogue. Aristotle said, “The secret to humour is — surprise.” We laugh at things that run out of our expectation or seem out of place.
Sometimes systems like Google or Alexa can provide a funny retort to a user’s cheeky comment, which can take the user by surprise.
User: “Do I look old?”
System: “I don’t know how to help with that. But you could try the Face app and find out for yourself.”
This would leave the listener baffled, but also with a smirk on his face.
If a user’s anxieties, his motivations, and his context are kept at the core of every conversation design; we can create an experience, wherein the user feels understood and empowered.
What is your approach to creating an engaging conversation?
On this note, I will leave you with an interesting quote I read on Cathy Pearl’s tweet— “The question is not whether I can trick you into thinking a bot is human. The question is whether I can engage you on a particular topic in a way that is comparably compelling as speaking to a human who’s also interested in the same subject.” — OREN JACOB
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