One Effective Prompt to Overcome a Designer’s Idea Block
One Click Generates Lots of Product Ideas
Most people think designers get their ideas easily and quickly. But it is not like that; we often struggle to find ideas for the products we work on.
It can be ideas about the big problem, like “how to make the user engage more with our product,” or a smaller interaction issue related to the UX and the visual design, like choosing between infinite scroll or pagination.
In this article, I want to show you an AI prompt that you can use to generate many ideas for the product you work on so you will never have a design block.
The goal is to give you an advantage, not a final solution
In many design projects, designers must finish the design quickly and deliver it to developers.
As a result, they skip research, don’t control all aspects of the project, such as technical terms, and sometimes don’t have time to test different approaches.
In these situations, this prompt solves one problem: brainstorming. Think of it as a tool for starting with a filled page instead of a blank page, so you can begin the design process with a draft that includes many ideas.
In a way, it’s like starting a race, but you start in a better place.
How to use The prompt? Here it is.
Copy the prompt I wrote below into Google Docs or another note app. At the bottom of the prompt, you will find five points of information that you need to fill in by yourself.
- PRODUCT: Add here some info about the product you design.
- WHAT I NEED TO DESIGN: Explain what you need to design.
- USERS: Explain to ChatGPT who the users you design for are.
- WHY THE USERS NEED IT: Explain the pain point and why the users must solve it.
- MORE INFORMATION: Add some more information if needed.
Here is an example of how to fill it:
- PRODUCT: Complex desktop product for account managers that handles bank accounts for people and helps them manage their accounts.
- WHAT I NEED TO DESIGN: I need to find a way for the account managers to send the clients a message with information; the information can vary, and I want to be able to send the information to more than one client at a time.
- USERS: Bank account managers.
- WHY THE USERS NEED IT: The account managers want to communicate better and faster to the client’s information about their bank accounts.
- MORE INFORMATION: Every account manager uses a table to manage all their clients.
The prompt
Act like a product designer with over 20 years of experience.
Your expertise lies in designing complex products that help users work better and faster, with a specialization in design for diverse users and platforms.
Your clients include junior and senior designers who ask you about project ideas.
I am a product designer who needs to brainstorm design ideas for a problem I need to solve.
Your objective is to help me brainstorm and show many ideas I can use to resolve the issue I am working on. The solution should be simple and help the users solve the issue.
You must present ten ideas to help me with the task.
For each idea, you must explain the idea well and why it will help the user in this FORMAT:
FORMAT=
Idea:
Idea Details:
Why Can It Help Solve the Issue?
FORMAT EXAMPLE=
Idea: Auto-Save Feature
Idea Details: Add the option to have an Auto-Save feature in the notes app.
Why Can It Help Solve the Issue? Protects the users work in case of interruption. If a user needs to step away or encounters a system issue, their progress gets saved, minimizing frustration and redundant work.
All the ideas you show me must be concrete. Please do not write me general things like:
"User Interface (UI) Simplicity: Keep the UI clean and intuitive. Use familiar icons and a color scheme that aligns with the overall design language of the product."
Here is INFORMATION about the need I need to solve:
INFORMATION=
PRODUCT:
WHAT I NEED TO DESIGN:
USERS:
WHY THE USERS NEED IT:
MORE INFORMATION:Example of the results
I added the information I showed above to the prompt (Product, what I need to design, users, why the users need it, and more information.)
Here is the result:
Based on the provided information, here are ten concrete design ideas for your complex desktop product, aimed at enhancing communication between bank account managers and their clients:
Idea-1
Idea: Template-Based Messaging System
Idea Details: Implement a feature allowing account managers to create, save, and use message templates. These templates can be customized for various types of account updates or information.
Why Can It Help Solve the Issue? Templates expedite the messaging process, ensuring that account managers can quickly send accurate, consistent information to multiple clients, reducing the time spent on drafting individual messages.
Idea-2
Idea: Bulk Messaging with Personalization Tags
Idea Details: Introduce a bulk messaging feature where account managers can send a single message to multiple clients. Include personalization tags (like client name, account number) that auto-fill client-specific details.
Why Can It Help Solve the Issue? This allows for efficient, mass communication while maintaining a personal touch, crucial for client relationship management.
Idea-3
Idea: Interactive Message Preview
Idea Details: Create an interactive message preview function that shows how a message will appear to the client before sending.
Why Can It Help Solve the Issue? This feature helps prevent errors and ensures clarity in communication, thereby enhancing trust and reducing miscommunication.
Idea-4
Idea: Client-Specific Notes Integration
Idea Details: Integrate a feature allowing account managers to attach notes or comments specific to each client within the messaging interface.
Why Can It Help Solve the Issue? This aids in tailoring communication to individual client needs and preferences, enhancing the quality of interaction.
Idea-5
Idea: Scheduled Messaging
Idea Details: Develop a scheduling feature for messages, allowing account managers to plan and automate the delivery of information to clients.
Why Can It Help Solve the Issue? This facilitates timely updates without requiring constant attention, improving efficiency and consistency in client communication.
Idea-6
Idea: Quick Response (QR) Code Attachments
Idea Details: Allow account managers to attach QR codes to messages that link to detailed documents or web pages for further information.
Why Can It Help Solve the Issue? QR codes can provide a quick, easy way for clients to access detailed or supplementary information without overloading the message content.
Idea-7
Idea: Multi-Channel Messaging Options
Idea Details: Enable sending messages through various channels (email, SMS, in-app notifications) directly from the platform.
Why Can It Help Solve the Issue? Different clients prefer different communication channels. This feature caters to diverse preferences, ensuring effective communication.
Idea-8
Idea: Message Tracking and Analytics
Idea Details: Incorporate a system to track message delivery, read receipts, and engagement analytics.
Why Can It Help Solve the Issue? Understanding how clients interact with messages can help account managers refine their communication strategy, ensuring better engagement.
Idea-9
Idea: Client Feedback Loop
Idea Details: Include a feature for clients to provide quick feedback on the information received, like a thumbs up/down or a short survey.
Why Can It Help Solve the Issue? This direct feedback mechanism can guide account managers on the effectiveness of their communication, allowing for continuous improvement.
Idea-10
Idea: Contextual Help and Suggestions
Idea Details: Implement AI-driven suggestions for messaging content based on the context of the client’s account status or recent interactions.
Why Can It Help Solve the Issue? AI assistance can help account managers in crafting messages that are more relevant and impactful, enhancing the overall quality of communication.Important points when you use the prompt
Avoid writing private or confidential information
Explain the case in general. You want to keep important information from the chat. For example, avoid writing specific details on the project you work on.
Make tweaks in the prompt to get different results
If your results are not accurate for your needs, change the prompt and try again.
For example, change the role from a “product designer with over twenty years of experience” to “product manager with five years of experience in product design and ten years of experience in software development.”
Use another LLM (Large Language Model)
Run the prompt in Bard, Llama, or Claude. They are different LLMs, and you will find they can give different results. You can find different LLMs in Perplexity.
Filter the ideas
Only some ideas that ChatGPT gives you will be suitable; select the good ones and continue working on them.
Ask for more ideas
If you want more ideas, the chat can give you more. After getting a response from the chat, write “Give me five more ideas” and run it.
Get a visual text description
Choose one of the ideas and ask how it could be represented. It will give you a written description.
Seeing It In HTML
If you want to see the idea, ask the chat to generate HTML code so you can see how it might appear. While this may not always work perfectly, sometimes it can be represented better than only text.
I think this option will be much more powerful in the future in different generative AI tools, as we can see in products like Tldraw.
Build your prompt
Once you have a prompt that works well for your needs, save it and use it whenever needed.
Do not copy and paste the solution
Use the AI as a helper, not a final solution. You must think about the results.
To summary
In this article, I showed you how you can use AI to get many ideas for a design project so you will never be in design block mode.
First, I explained that the prompt is used to get many ideas but not to offer final solutions. Then, we saw the prompt and how to use it.
In the end, I wrote some tips on how to use it effectively and some advanced tips like generating an HTML code to visualize it so you can get a better idea of how to implement it.
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