#ottexec

[cobblecord]

A Call for More User Control Over the Streaming UX

Will Streaming Heed the Lessons that Cable Didn’t?

We all know that streaming has come a long way over the last 20 years and OTT video usage continues to increase. However, there are some glaring consumer pain points that should be addressed sooner rather than later. If not, percolating dissatisfaction could bubble up and undermine the considerable ‘user good-will’ that streaming services have generally been afforded. It's time for streaming services to start giving consumers more control over their user experience before it comes back to haunt them.

Consider what’s happening to the Traditional TV Providers, that didn’t heed the call for more consumer-centric approach, until it was too late – and obviously, pushed people into the awaiting arms of OTT. Clearly, the user interfaces and smart use of data on the part of the online streaming giants is far superior to that of the Traditional Pay-TV world. But the increasingly frequent lament we all hear is that users (or viewers) spend more time searching for something to watch than actually watching. And the new OTT launches from Apple, Disney, WarnerMedia, NBC, etc. on the horizon promise to amplify the problem.

If you don’t believe me, just take a look at the results of a recent PwC survey that showed almost 90% of consumers are dissatisfied with content discovery and recommendations. That certainly doesn’t sound like a ringing endorsement for the multitude of content recommendation AIs many streaming services have put so much stock in.

Now that streaming has become fully mainstream and the embarrassment of content riches continues to explode, giving users the option to take (at least some of) the reins seems like a logical next step in the industry’s evolution.

Lean Back or Look Forward?

During the early development of video streaming app ecosystem, most of the players decided that the overarching UX approach should give users some straightforward controls (like add to watchlist, basic search and very simple filtering), but largely reinforced the ‘lean back’ nature of video viewing, particularly with apps created for the TV screen.

The assumption was that viewers would want to be served up content while they sit back and passively receive it, essentially recreating the traditional TV viewing experience. Netflix has practically spun its programming recommendations and auto-play features into a veritable product-design art form. Of course, they’ve done quite well with that approach to date.

But the streaming landscape has changed dramatically over the last few years, and the new flood of content choices has made the lean-back model a source of increasing frustration rather than assistance. The endless rows of scrolling content artwork, the seemingly arbitrary arrays of content categories and obscure micro-genres, the limited and confining search and filtering functions, and the infernal auto-play trailers (my personal pet peeve) are really starting to grate on the nerves of streamers.

And of course, the more people stream, the more of an annoyance it becomes. This sad state of affairs is especially irritating to the self-determined millennial generation, who value freedom, control, flexibility and ultra-customization above all else.

Borrowing from the Past to Shape the Future

In a perfect world, relevant content would be easily discovered and displayed to the right person at the right time across the countless walled-gardens of apps. That’s surely a goal to work toward, but there are various corporate conflicts and technical hurdles that have slowed its progress (which is another story for another day).

In the meantime, I’m suggesting to simply give users more control within each individual app or service as an incremental way to improve streaming’s overall experience. Addressing the ‘content fatigue’ issue quickly is key to keeping OTT’s momentum going.

I believe that this is a product-design challenge more than a technology one. We need a shift within the very product-driven culture of Streaming Tech to a more user-empowered approach – specifically when it comes to the content selection and curation process.

Many long-standing online companies have been perfecting the use of interactive customization and filtering tools for decades. In fact, they are some of the basic tenets of the internet and e-commerce. The streaming world could easily borrow from some of the tried and true, ‘lean-forward’ techniques of these businesses, such as online retail, publishing and travel. Granted, translating these concepts to the TV screen using the clunky remote control as a navigation device surely doesn’t lend itself to ease of use. But it’s not an insurmountable hurdle.

Imagine if you could harness the multiple-criteria filtering capabilities of Zappos, the self-curation controls of Flipboard and the sorting capabilities of Expedia to help you determine exactly what you’d like to watch on an average Saturday night. Here are a few ways to start the ball rolling toward more user-empowered Streaming UX.

Customizable Home Screen Displays - The ability for a user to organize and personalize the home screen of an app/streaming service to their taste. For instance:

-- Want to always see New Releases in the top row? And Nature Documentaries below that because that happens to be your thing? And so on… -- Users should be able to arrange the content rows that are displayed and at what levels.

-- Don’t want to see the Recommended Rom-Com row, just because you watched that one Hugh Grant movie six months ago? -- Let users easily remove certain categories or micro-genres from the display to create a more focused, less cluttered screen.

Ramp Up the Filters & Sorting Capabilities – Think about how much time could be saved if you were able to punch in multiple criteria to surface exactly what you were in the mood to watch. Then sort the results by various components. And those controls were front and center (or at least easy to find).  For instance:

-- Want to see Comedies made in the 90’s? And drill down to those starring Sandra Bullock. Then sort by director? -- Those options should be a few clicks away.

Some services have attempted to address this with predictive or related search functionality, which I’ve found to be middling at best, and way off-base, at worst. Amazon borrows from their e-commerce roots to allow for multi-layer filtering of video on their desktop and mobile experiences, but they haven’t carried it over to their TV app.

Features Checklists - Giving people the ability to turn certain features on or off within an app should be as easy as subscribing or unsubscribing to an e-newsletter. For instance:

-- Want to disable auto-play trailers (or at least have the option to mute their volume), stop next episode auto-plays completely, turn on credits-skipping and closed captions for all titles in one fell swoop? -- Imagine if each streaming service had an easy-to-use personalization screen or module that allowed you to check or uncheck a few boxes to enable or disable these options, just like you would with parental controls.

Some services do allow for a degree of feature control on an asset basis. For example, on Netflix you can skip credits and intros while you’re binging an individual show. Others have enabled very lightweight customization buried deep within the user profile sections on their websites or mobile apps. But so much more could be done.

Emerging platform aggregators (like Apple and Roku) may have plans to enable some feature control on a platform level, which could be helpful. However, most subscribers watch streaming services across multiple platforms and devices, so giving users more control on a service level is a better solution.

Of course, a major counter-argument to user-empowered streaming UX is that streaming services need to promote and curate their best titles. They’ve invested millions (even billions) into original titles and high-stakes libraries to drive awareness, trial, retention and increasingly important brand equity. I totally get it and I believe that they absolutely should (and must) highlight their best wares.

But the right to showcase top content and the option of user personalization are not necessarily mutually exclusive. There is enough screen real estate to go around, if smartly engineered and cleverly carved up. I’m sure that there are ways to solve for it, given all the smart technical, product and creative talent there is in the industry.

And let’s not forget that this type of customer-centric thinking will actually help the streaming services in the long run. Personalization contributes to customer stickiness and higher retention rates, which will become increasingly important as new high-profile players enter the space and the streaming wars begin in earnest.

Nothing But Choice

OTT is on its way to becoming the dominant way of watching video, and the last thing we need is to stall or jeopardize its progress by not helping users get a handle on, what is essentially, too much of a good thing – content.

At core, OTT streaming is about customer choice and empowerment. It’s about options and personalization. It’s about transparency and control. What it’s definitely NOT about is expecting newly liberated consumers to go back to the type of one-way relationship that Traditional Pay TV Providers forced on them for many years, when there were no other choices.

Now, for better or worse, there is nothing but choice (I, for one, think it’s for better). Services that focus on giving users the tools to navigate this newfound choice will be the ones that have an advantage that will translate into streamers’ hearts and minds. And most importantly, into happy, loyal subscribers.

By: Virginia Juliano

Virginia Juliano is the Founder & CEO of CobbleCord (www.CobbleCord.com), a disruptive startup that helps people cobble together personalized bundles of both free and paid streaming services. Its patented process uses customer content, device, internet and price preferences to craft a custom list of services for each user, empowering them to find the best streaming solution to fit their needs and get the most from streaming.

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