How BBC iPlayer can increase its users
Disclaimer
My attempt at taking on the challenge of providing an alternative UI design solution for the current BBC video service (iPlayer), is an exercise of expanding my skills, but also I love innovation and marketing, and I have the Design OCD; meaning I like to find problems and ideate on those problems. Now that I have explained my self, let’s dive into the BBC video-page interface. The first thing you will notice on the iPlayer UI is that the platform has a large combination of media content ranging from News, Documentary, Movies, Sport, etc. After all, the company is a statutory corporation, and the result here is that the platform contains to vast information for the end-user to organize the choices. So I wanted to turn these findings into a streaming video-on-demand platform like Netflix.
Design Critiques
Because of the vast content of media, the UI does not direct the end-users on taking certain actions or directing them on what to watch. This is noticeable when the users are trying to explore the platform via the navigation header as they are presented with 11 optional channels without indicating on what category each channel contains or why they are different.
Each channel is named differently, yet they all offer the same categories. To make this relatable for those who are not familiar with BBC, imaging if Netflix had:
Netflix 1: Only American movies, documentaries and TV shows.
Netflix 2: Only famous International and American movies.
Netflix 3. Only American and international Documentaries.
Well, you get the picture!
I acknowledge that this approach works on cable television. However, in today’s streaming era the end-users expect that all content from a production studio category to be combined into one interface with interactive and fluid sub-categories.
UI: Designed not to keep its viewers
When you first visit the site, you get the sense that you are there only to pick up TV shows that you follow, this layout in-terms feels like it doesn’t pay attention to other shows that might fall within your interest. To make sure that my hypothesis was on the right track I did some research to gather some evidence that could back up my statement. With some digging, I found an article by The Guardian stating:
The BBC is facing a crisis over its youth audience after admitting that young people are spending more time watching Netflix than all of its BBC TV services each week, and listening to more music on streaming services such as Spotify than BBC radio stations.
The reason Millenials do prefer to use Netflix is that Netflix does pay attention to individual users’ interaction while changing their service and UI to fit the users’ behavior change. Nevertheless, everything Netflix offers to an individual is personal but supported by data and analytics, to hook its viewers and to re-directing the users exploring more of its content.
So “how” can BBC iPlayer become more user friendly?
The idea behind the design was to create a sleek user experience and keeping the users longer on the platform.
Usability
Usability is all about how quickly people can learn and interact with a product. There is five injunction for Efficiency, Memorability, Errors, Learnability, and Satisfaction. I won’t cover everything on this one; instead, I will focus on the strength of this design.
Efficiency
The interface design is relatively straightforward, as users are presented with relevant information. The users no longer have to wonder whether different words, situations, or actions mean the same thing (BBC 1, BBC 2,)
Satisfaction
Users have more control of filtering out the right information, as all the information that’s being presented on the page is relevant.
Tags
I wanted to increase the user traffic, by inserting tags on the art covers, to increase awareness as well helping the user’s selection easier and staying longer on the platform.
Live chat with friends
My idea of creating a live chat with friends stems from my experience of watching this particular Game of Thrones moment! I was texting back and forward with friends on how bad ass Jon is. And….what can I say about the scene with The Night king!!!!!!
With the new design, users can activate live feed to tune into a show together while having fun. I don’t have much to offer in this section, as I am still working on the Live Chat Interface, nevertheless we live in an era where people like to socialize and share their experience through a screen, and because of that BBC should maybe try implementing this, as we see this already happening with platforms like Twitch.
Sooo…yeah thats all folks! :)
