Summary: When we encounter the message, “Unfortunately, the provided text does not contain a narrative story that can be extracted and rewritten. The text appears to be a JSON error response indicating an insufficient account balance,” it’s easy to dismiss it as a simple developer error or a technical misstep. But under the hood, this isn’t just code—it’s a missed opportunity. It shows how fragile the interface between your service and your user really is, and how poorly handled errors can sabotage trust, credibility, and ultimately, revenue. In this post, we’ll pull apart what that message really means, why it fails both as communication and as a user experience, and what steps need to be taken to fix it at the business and technical level.
The Facepalm-Level Mistake That Happens More Often Than You Think
At first glance, this message seems like something you’d only see in the weeds of a development sprint or API documentation. But if it’s showing up in front of your customers, then something already went wrong long before the user saw it. You’ve taken internal system language—specifically a JSON error handling message—and exposed it to a human audience that doesn’t speak JSON. This is like handing your customer a blueprint when they asked for a key.
The technical cause is simple: an API or system script returned a system-specific debug output rather than a properly translated end-user message. But the consequences? They extend well beyond the codebase. They touch product credibility, brand reputation, and conversion rates. And the longer it goes unfixed, the more embedded that poor perception becomes.
Let’s Break the Message Down
Here’s the original message again, with the key pain points highlighted:
“Unfortunately, the provided text does not contain a narrative story that can be extracted and rewritten. The text appears to be a JSON error response indicating an insufficient account balance. There is no main story to be extracted and rewritten in this case.”
What’s actually being said here?
- It assumes the recipient is asking for a story when they clearly pasted technical output.
- It calls out the format—JSON—but provides no next step or solution.
- It points to a symptom, not a diagnosis. Telling someone they have an “insufficient balance” but not whether it’s tied to a bug, a payment issue, a configuration error, or a plan limitation leaves them stuck.
Blowing the Sale in 0.2 Seconds
Let’s not skirt around the commercial reality: messages like these lose sales. If this appears during a workflow where a user expected service delivery—say, generating content, retrieving data, or accessing premium features—then frustration sets in faster than you can say “churn rate.”
Worse, it doesn’t just lose that transaction. It breaks the psychological contract of clarity and reliability your service promised the moment the user signed up. And once users start seeing your application as unpredictable or cryptic? Getting them back is twice the effort.
The Psychological Triggers: Breaking Cialdini’s Laws
Robert Cialdini’s persuasion principles aren’t just marketing tools—they’re trust-building levers. Every time you show users a robotic error message with no empathy, no translation, and no path forward, you’re violating several of them at once:
- Reciprocity: The user gave you time, data, or money. You gave them what looks like a system error from 1997.
- Authority: Error messages like this demonstrate lack of polish. You start to look like a junior developer’s weekend side project, not a trusted platform.
- Commitment + Consistency: The user believed in your offer. Mixed signals like this break the illusion and kill repeat usage.
So What Should Have Happened Instead?
The fix here goes deeper than changing the output text. Fixing it begins with asking the right question during product development: “What does the user need to understand right now, and what do they want to be reassured about?”
A functional message might read:
“It looks like your account balance isn’t high enough to complete this request. Don’t worry—your data is safe and nothing has been lost. You can resolve this by updating your payment method or checking your plan limits. [Go to Billing] [Contact Support]”
See the difference? It names the problem directly. It reassures the user’s fear (loss or error). And it offers a path. That’s not fluff—it’s conversion-saving UX.
Root Cause: Build Culture That Values Communication as Much as Code
Developers are problem-solvers. But if the only problems they solve are internal technical ones, the business suffers. If your error messages haven’t been reviewed by someone with product instincts, marketing instincts, or support experience, you’re gambling with your conversion rate.
Product teams need to build a habit: every error condition in code should have an output reviewed through the eyes of a skeptical, non-technical user. What would this message make them think? Feel? Do next? Use Voss’s method: ask, mirror, label. “How would this message make someone feel?” “Feel like they hit a wall.” “Seems like confusion.” Now you’re getting somewhere.
Empathy By Design: Voss, Warren, and Marketing Discipline
Chris Voss taught us that ‘No’ is a beginning, not an end. The message in that JSON response? It’s a useless ‘No’ with no context. Instead, a good interface uses what Blair Warren calls a persuasive sentence structure:
- Encourage dreams: “We’re here to help you complete your task…”
- Justify failures: “Sometimes payments lapse or settings glitch.”
- Allay fears: “Your data isn’t lost.”
- Confirm suspicions: “You might have hit a system limit.”
- Empathize with struggles: “This happens more often than you’d think. Let’s get it fixed together.”
Good error design isn’t fluff. It’s the difference between retention and churn, peace of mind or panic, user advocacy or public complaints. And if you don’t fix these lines of friction, someone else will—and your customer won’t wait for you to catch up.
What Can You Do Right Now?
1. Review every single system message your product delivers to users, especially under failed conditions.
2. Ask your support team for the top 5 most confusing or frustrating messages users complain about.
3. Rewrite them with empathy, clarity, and action cues. And test them with real users.
4. Train product and dev teams to write errors as conversations, not logs.
5. Treat these fixes not as polish, but as conversion drivers and retention safeguards.
The next time you see a message like that JSON error response, ask: “What would this make a skeptical, busy, distracted user feel?” Then rebuild from there.
#UXWriting #ProductMarketing #ErrorMessages #ConversionKillers #CustomerRetention #SaaSDesign #CommunicationMatters #ChrisVoss #BlairWarren #DevOps #ProductManagement
Featured Image courtesy of Unsplash and Pawel Czerwinski (Q4X078YTABg)
