2013. Empirical.
We found ourselves texting the same things over and over, many of which were quite structured in their workflow. Taking what we learned from the previous product, Comma, we built SmallTalk to be an intelligent chat app that gave you one-touch buttons for common communication flows.
For example, On my way in traditional texting typically went like this:
A: When are you coming home?
B: Leaving now
A: Whats your eta
B: I dont know like 20 minutes
A: ok
B: running 15m late
A: ok
We were able to create some novel UI around these kinds of flows, where on my way was a tap, and if you were in that state, you then had options for running late or im here or send my location. Running late gave you a quick dial for sending how many minutes, location gave you options for local look up or map coordinates, and so on.
We applied this lens to many flows, like getting food and directions.
It's still one of our favorite chat experiences.