Conversation design
Conversation design is the practice of planning and specifying how users and conversational systems interact through language-based dialogue.
Natural Language Processing in Action, Second Edition
Conversation design is the practice of planning and specifying how users and conversational systems interact through dialogue.
- How it is used
- Guides chatbot teams from goal definition through dialogue planning, implementation choices, deployment feedback, and redesign.
- How deep it goes
- Explains planning stages, flow-chart elements, user research, and feedback loops, while stopping short of detailed algorithm implementation.
- Examples
- Uses Rori’s math-tutor onboarding, conversation diagrams, creative student replies, confidence-ranked utterances, and “This is too easy” handling.
- What you can do after
- Builds and iteratively improve chatbot dialogue plans by modeling states, anticipating intents, and responding to observed user behavior.
Read how Natural Language Processing in Action, Second Edition explains conversation design →
Effective Conversational AI
Conversational design is the practice of structuring dialogue, interaction steps, and responses to support user goals.
- How it is used
- Simplifies conversational exchanges so users can reach successful outcomes with less effort.
- How deep it goes
- Explains flow simplification, trade-offs, prioritization, and progress signaling, but stops short of implementation detail.
- Examples
- Uses claim-search dialogues, agent requests, immediate claim details, fax options, and progress cues in multistep tasks.
- What you can do after
- Evaluate and improve conversational flows by reducing needless choices, prioritizing high-value changes, and signaling task progress.
Read how Effective Conversational AI explains conversation design →
Related concepts
- UI designkind of · UI design is the practice of planning the visual elements and interactive behavior of interfaces through which people use software.
- error messageproduces · An error message is human-readable diagnostic text that reports a problem or failure encountered during software processing.
- generative marketingused by · The application of generative artificial intelligence to marketing ideation, audience creation, customer-journey development, and creative production.
- milestoneuses · A milestone is a planned point, achievement, deliverable, or checkpoint used to mark and track progress toward a goal.
- conversation flow diagramhas part · A conversation flow diagram is a branching representation of possible conversational states, user inputs, and system responses.
These guides are generated from the text of Manning books by Manning's knowledge graph and link to the sections they draw on. The full books are available on liveBook and at manning.com.