FT Assistant

Financial Times

Learns and automatically delivers the content you need before you ask

The Challenge

How can busy Financial Times readers rapidly find the content important to them?

We met with the B2B team at the FT, who described a highly bespoke service for premium customers, which manually packages up key content for executives into a quick and easily digestible printed format known as a 'taxi pack'.

We wanted to see whether such personalised content gathering could be extended to all Financial Times readers, and whether using context-awareness capabilities could make the content selection and delivery process more automated and personalised.

Design Highlights

  • Direct access to the FT readership was limited, but we were able to get some useful demographic information data that helped to shape our priorities.
  • We decided that a smartphone solution, built as a native Android application would be the most effective way to get granted access to the information we wanted about each user: their daily activity patterns such as location, sleep, charging & wi-fi access as well as when they typically read FT content. It would also scan through upcoming events in their calendar, to see where they were travelling to and what companies they were meeting with.
  • We declared and agreed up-front that issues with privacy would not not limit the scope of this prototype.
  • The design objectives for the app, then, were to create a minimal interface, where most functionality is concealed beneath the surface, and the relevant content takes centre stage. However the user is still able to correct and refine the selection process, and also to dig deeper into any other FT content that they wish.

Outcome

The app was able to pull information relevant to you from the FT incredibly quickly

Usability testing helped to refine the experience, and demonstrate that the concept added value to users. Our clients at the FT showed the app to some of their clients and received positive feedback also. The app was then demonstrated to the leadership team at the FT, and went on to be included in their future product roadmap.

Wireframes illustrating high-level transitions: