2024
Fan Experience
Fan Hubs
Context
Paramount has a global portfolio of multimedia entertainment brands– some examples being BET+, MTV, and Nickelodeon. Each of these brands have dedicated websites and apps, and as product designer at Paramount I worked on all of them.
I led the design for our fan hub experience, and worked closely with our Director of Product, engineering leads, and marketing teams to fulfill and exceed expectectations.
Goals
The objective of the Fan Hubs project was to enhance the promotion of key IP properties by providing an enriched experience for our front-end users. This was achieved by:
Enabling users to discover detailed information about the content.
Directing users to products and platforms, including Paramount+ and linear channels, where they can watch the content.
Providing information about related content available on third-party sites.
With the push to simplify our brand sites, this meant less short and long form videos were available. Along with a limited timeline, we wanted to ensure users were still able to access the video content they wanted, as well as increase awareness of linear TV and Paramount+ availability.
About Section
Our existing about section would not suffice for fan hubs. We needed to account for multiple series, seasons, and rotating casts. Below you'll find the evolution of the about section. This fulfilled our goal of providing detailed information to users.
What's On Next?
Another goal was increasing awareness of our linear TV offerings. We had previously explored an EPG (Electronic Program Guide) design, and wanted to see if we could reuse it for this project. It was very barebones however, and there were concerns users would not understand what it meant.
User Testing for 'On Next'
We wanted to make sure users understood the intent of the 'On Next' component, as well as get their initial impressions, as this was a feature not seen on competitors. We conducted a split test of the the two options shown above with 20 participants.
Results
The majority of people understood what the next on feature's purpose was
Only 1 person thought the next on feature was clickable, showing that the design was successful in not showing affordance
Overall, users understood the intent of both options, but gravitated towards option 2 due to additional information and ability to see which channel the next episode was airing on
Final 'On Next' Component
Fan Funnel
Context
Shortly after we launched fan hubs, the design team met to workshop some ideas on how we might improve from the fan hub MVP experience we had ran with. This ignited an exciting journey that myself and the design lead for BET+ took on, where we overhauled how simplifying our brand sites might operate in terms of servicing an overall fan experience.
Strategy
We found ourselves referring back to the fan hub experience often in initial conversations. We became trapped by the term, and as we talked further, we began to formulate a strategy that, although broad, allowed us to more freely explore the problem space.
Based on our initial strategy, we identified four key focus areas that guided us through our discovery process: Transparency, Discoverability, Conversion, and Simplicity.
Transparency
We want to be open and clear with our users about what we offer. This builds trust and helps users feel confident in exploring our platform.
Discoverability
We aim to make content easily discoverable so users can effortlessly find what they are looking for, enhancing their overall experience
Conversion
Our goal is to convert casual viewers and unconvinced fans into loyal subscribers by showcasing the value and breadth of our content
Simplicity
A simple, intuitive interface ensures that users can navigate the platform with ease, reducing frustration and increasing satisfaction.
In tandem with identifying our focus areas, we also looked into the different levels of fandom. You can see our persona matrix to the right.
We then created journey maps of every fan persona, seeing how they would navigate through the Paramount ecosystem to achieve their goals.
From there, we identified common pain points across the various user journeys and mapped them to our focus areas.
Problem Statement
People struggle to find and interact with desired streaming content, and being pushed to subscribe too early lowers conversion rates.
For instance, a casual viewer who just wants to watch a specific episode of a show they've heard their friend hyping up might leave the platform if they can't find it quickly - and / or they're prompted to subscribe too many times before they've even began their search within our ecosystem
This issue is not unique to us; it's a common challenge in the streaming industry where balancing content discovery and monetization is critical.
This is a broad problem statement, which we feel allows us to explore solutions without restricting ourselves and going with the status quo.
Hypothesis
Simplifying and being transparent in how people find content will build trust in the product and increase conversion rates.
Trust is a crucial factor in user retention and conversion. By making the process simpler and more transparent, we believe users will feel more confident in exploring our content without feeling pressured and dropping off.
As a next step, we met with the VP of Product to combine our findings. We collaborated in presenting to the EVP, and have gotten buy in for next steps.
