Contesto

LettsNews recently achieved a significant milestone with its public beta launch, marking a critical step in its journey to drive revenues and acquire customers for LettsGroup.

Sfida

The media landscape is rapidly evolving, demanding efficient digital tools and streamlined workflows. A significant challenge in the market has been the lack of affordable, professional-grade newsroom solutions for independent professionals, freelancers, and small news organizations. While large media conglomerates possess proprietary systems, independent creators often struggle to find cost-effective tools that meet their needs.

For the LettsNews project, this overarching market need translated into several development challenges:

• Creating a user-friendly, AI-driven platform that simplifies complex news production processes while ensuring accuracy and speed
• Designing an intuitive user interface (UI) that aligns with modern, minimalist, and AI-era aesthetics
• Overcoming technical hurdles related to mobile app store submissions, ensuring robust AI functionality within defined limits, and maintaining seamless content distribution across multiple platforms
• Developing a flexible and sustainable pricing strategy that caters to diverse user segments while protecting gross margins

Approccio

The development of LettsNews followed an agile and iterative approach, with continuous refinement leading up to and following the public beta launch.

Foundational Development & Initial UI: During an initial development phase, the core UI for content items and stories was built, and existing website designs were in place. Early AI generation capabilities were also under development.

Strategic UI/UX Refinement: During an early design phase, initial UI tweaks for content item and story views were suggested, aiming for a more minimal, simple, and AI-era design, taking inspiration from leading AI platforms. This included new login and signup pages for a cleaner aesthetic. Subsequently, new designs for the teams and profile pages were implemented, featuring improved layouts. The rapid prototyping capabilities of AI-powered design tools significantly accelerated this phase.

Core Feature Implementation: Key functionalities were integrated, including the launch of an AI image generation server, the implementation of AI limits for different subscription plans, and the development of a comprehensive subscription and pricing system interface. Enhancements were made to ensure seamless WordPress distribution with proper images and captions.

Marketing Activation Planning: Concurrently, a detailed marketing activation plan was developed for the public-facing website, outlining strategies for driving sign-ups and revenue post-launch. This included identifying target audiences and value propositions for single users and future organizational clients.

Public Beta Launch: After intensive testing and final adjustments, LettsNews successfully launched its public beta. The initial target date for this launch was brought forward, emphasizing its crucial role for the group’s capital raising efforts.

Post-Launch Optimization: The team continues to focus on ongoing bug fixing, improving the usability of video and audio functionalities, and tuning search performance to reduce response times.

Soluzione

LettsNews is an AI-powered newsroom technology for everyone, offering a comprehensive suite of tools to streamline content creation and distribution.

The solution provides:

Comprehensive Content Gathering: LettsNews uses a mobile-first, human-centered interface, enabling fast and intuitive capture of notes, images, video, and audio. Thoughtful information architecture keeps workflows seamless, allowing users to organize and retrieve assets visually in a dedicated digital newsroom.

Intelligent Story Building: The platform’s AI assistant is directly integrated into the UI, offering real-time, contextual design prompts for headlines, structure, and tags, and even full draft generation. By minimizing friction and cognitive load, the UX lets creators focus on storytelling, not formatting.

Rapid Publishing and Distribution: LettsNews features a streamlined multi-platform publishing flow, where smart automation and clear UI affordances make sharing across sites, blogs, and social channels effortless. Built-in visual cues and feedback support trust and speed at every step.

Collaborative Workflows: Collaboration is built into the user experience, with real-time updates and visual presence indicators allowing teams and PR professionals to co-create in a unified, accessible space. Well-defined permissions and roles heighten usability and confidence.

Monetization Opportunities & Content Control: The marketplace model’s design balances discoverability for creators with robust content protection tools in the UI, making authenticity and control a visible, accessible part of the product.

Flexible Pricing Tiers: The three-tier pricing interface is user-experience optimized: it uses clear comparisons, accessible language, and guided plan selection, supporting everyone from new users to growing teams.

Mobile Accessibility: LettsNews is optimized for on-the-go use, employing responsive layouts, gesture support, and large tap targets—ensuring a frictionless and delightful mobile UX from capture to publication.

Cosa abbiamo imparato

The LettsNews project provided invaluable insights into launching an AI-powered media technology in a dynamic market:

Agile Development is Key to Speed: The rapid iteration cycles, constant UI tweaks, and swift bug fixes demonstrated the critical importance of an agile development methodology in delivering a complex product to market “at the speed of light”.

AI Integration Requires Nuance: While AI significantly enhances speed and intelligence, its generative nature necessitates continuous fine-tuning for specific applications, especially in areas like story drafting and tag generation, to ensure journalistic quality. Managing the costs and scalability of AI infrastructure is also crucial.

User Experience Drives Adoption: Investing in a clean, intuitive, and modern UI/UX from the outset is paramount. The continuous refinement of design elements contributed significantly to making LettsNews feel like a “grown-up” and professional tool, which is vital for user adoption and satisfaction.

Navigating Ecosystems is Complex: Challenges encountered with mobile app store approvals, particularly a major platform’s in-app purchase requirements, highlighted the necessity of proactive planning and adaptation when integrating with major platform ecosystems.

Data-Driven Growth Post-Launch: With the public beta recently launched, the project has transitioned to a strong focus on revenue and customer acquisition, emphasizing the importance of tracking key performance indicators (KPIs) to inform strategic decisions and achieve financial sustainability.

Mio contributo

As a Design and UI/UX specialist on the LettsNews project, my primary contribution revolved around ensuring the platform’s visual appeal and usability aligned with its innovative, AI-powered capabilities.

Elevating the User Experience: I led the entire product design process from concept, building LettsNews from scratch rather than refining any legacy system. Every aspect—from information architecture and user journeys to UI patterns and screen layouts—was created new, guided by core UX principles and a mobile-first, AI-enabled vision. Starting with foundational strategy and early sketches, I designed and validated each workflow before developing pixel-perfect interfaces and component systems. This end-to-end approach ensured that every interaction, flow, and visual element was purpose-built for our users and the specific challenges of next-generation digital newsrooms.

Accelerating Design Through AI: A significant aspect of my work involved leveraging AI-powered design tools, such as Figma Make, which dramatically accelerated the design process, allowing for the rapid generation of responsive designs and code. This efficiency was crucial in achieving a polished, “grown-up beta” feel for the platform, even at its early stage.

Strategic Cross-Disciplinary Alignment: From day one, I worked in close partnership with product, engineering, and marketing to maintain alignment across all facets of LettsNews’s development. Early collaboration with engineering ensured design concepts were technically feasible and scalable, while frequent syncs with product leadership kept user needs and business goals central to our decisions. Simultaneously, I was actively engaged with the marketing team—directly shaping activation plans, wireframes, and messaging—so that the product’s design and features would be clearly understood and effectively promoted to our target audience. This integrated approach guaranteed a unified vision, efficient execution, and a cohesive, purpose-built product launch.