Amazon Prime Video
Making Prime Video the Destination of Video Streaming Leveraging Users' Short Time Breaks.
OVERVIEW
Prime Video is a video streaming service provided by Amazon. In order to provide different variety of choices for users.
In this project, I led the research and development of a new feature, aiming to make Prime Video the destination video streaming by leveraging users' short time breaks when they originally do not plan to stream.
MY ROLE
Team Lead, Design & Product Strategist
TIMELINE
Fall 2019, 5 weeks
THE TEAM
Developer, Designer, Business Analyst, Researcher
01 The Problem
Users don't actively use Prime Video given their existing membership.
By Q2 2019, there are around 105 million Amazon Prime members across the United States.
However, Prime Video, one of the benefits included with Amazon Prime membership, is not a destination of the majority of users streaming videos. Although all Amazon Prime members have access to stream Prime Video, a lot of them do not use Prime Video actively, and some of them are even paying for subscriptions to other video streaming services, such as Netflix.
In this project, we researched to understand why users are not using their Prime Video given their existing Prime Membership, how and why people are streaming videos, and how to fill in the gap by leveraging user insights, business viability, and technology feasibility.
02 Our Process
Starting from the users.
We started our process from generic research to know what are consumers seeking in their video streaming usage and short time breaks. And then, we ideated solution based on the problem identified from our research. Lastly, we cross-evaluated the feasibility of current technology and the viability of Amazon with the value and delightfulness of users.
The project involved both quantitative and qualitative research. In the first 3 weeks, I led the generic research with various research methods. The various approaches studies shed light on consumer behaviors and attitudes to digital platform and video streaming. In the next 2 weeks, after analyzing the qualitative and quantitative data, I led a team of designers and engineers to ideate and conceptualize ideas. After testing and refining, the final deliverables were interactive prototype of new features along with GTM business plans with metrics for evaluation.
03 Research to Learn from Users
Exploratory research on users, consumers, and the streaming industry.
To empathize with people, we went through the following research processes to understand human intentions, behaviors, and needs.
RESEARCH 1
Digital Ethnography
Research Question:
- What are people talking about in terms of what and where to watch something?
- What are people's attitudes towards video streaming platforms?
- What are people's attitudes towards Amazon Prime memberships and Prime Video?
Research:
Gathered data via social listening tools and social media platforms, including Twitter, Reddit, Facebook, Instagram, and Google search.
RESEARCH 2
Survey
Research Question:
- What are people's digital platform usage status?
- How do people perceive their digital platform usage?
- What are people's Prime membership usage status?
- How Satisfied or dissatisfied are people with video streaming platforms?
- What are the behavior patterns among consumers? How do these patterns fit into the demographic profile?
Research:
N = 1240
Recruited participants through the online network and Amazon lockers/collection locations. Collected consumer responses from surveys.
RESEARCH 3
Fly-on-the-wall Observation
Research Question:
- What are people doing during their short time break?
- What are people doing on their phones?
Research:
N>500
Observed people on multiple leisure occasions, including shopping malls, airport waiting lobbies, coffee lines, etc. Recorded major characteristics of people and what they were doing without interrupting them.
RESEARCH 4
In-depth Interview + Contextual Inquiries
Research Question:
- How do people start their usage of video streaming platforms?
- What do people do when they perceive a longer break? (More than 30 mins)
- How do they feel about the time spent during their long breaks?
- How do people feel about what they do on their digital devices?
- What are people's pain points toward current solutions of video streaming?
Participant Crieteria:
- Amazon Prime members who are currently using Prime Video or had used Prime video before
- Amazon Prime members who have never started using Prime Video
Research:
N = 15
Had people showed and thought aloud their journey from starting video streaming to finding what to watch. Conducted semi-structured interviews to learn from participants regarding the research questions.
04 Research Findings
Commitment is a key. People decide what to use in their short time break based on the perceived commitment required to the platform.
From the secondary research, expert interviews, and digital ethnographic studies, we learned a general sense of the use cases of video streaming platforms among all digital platforms. Given that an average American spend 2 hours using digital platforms outside of work, people are not using video streaming platforms unless they foresee themselves having a longer period of break and being "in the mood". We hypothesized this is because the perceived time and emotional commitment is higher for video streaming platforms than for other digital platforms.
Video streaming is perceived as a high time and emotional commitment digital activity.
In the survey study, we asked participants to rate how much time commitment and how emotionally committed would they expect upon using different digital platforms. The result shows that video streaming platforms, in general, are perceived as high time and emotion committed, while social media platforms are quite the opposite.
N = 124
Q: How emotionally committed would you expect upon using this platform? (likert scale 1-5)
Q: How much time commitment would you expect upon using this platform? (likert scale 1-5)
In a general short time break, people are not "loyal" to a platform, rather, they jump around multiple low commitment platforms.
In order to understand people's behavior in a typical 15 mins short time break, I organized my team to perform fly-on-the-wall observations in several locations where people are in a wait or a break and record what people are doing.
We found out that people do not have a single go-to platform; they split their time even shorter for a few go-tos for different purposes. All the platforms used during short time breaks are perceived as low commitment required.
A typical 15 mins short time break look like the following. People jump around several platform and consume content nearly brainlessly, spending little time on each platform.
When it comes to streaming content on Prime Video, people's behaviors differ hugely depending on whether they know what they want to watch.
From the in-depth interview and contextual inquiries, we learned that there are 2 types of behavior when it comes to streaming on Prime Video:
People who do not know what to watch -- this type of people often spend time browsing when they feel like watching something but often ended up not finding what to watch.
Prime Video Usage by Week
People who know what to watch -- this type of people often already know what they want to watch upon opening Prime Video; they either are already watching something or get recommendations from sources*. In addition, they are generally satisfied with the content and tend to binge-watch, ultimately spending way more time in total and in each usage.
Prime Video Usage by Week
05 Key Insights
INSIGHT 1
Usage of Short Time Span
When deciding what to do in a short time break, people tend to perceive content that requires less brainpower and commitment.
In behavior, they mostly browse contents unconsciously and jump around several social platforms, because they seek to fill in the blank of their time spent but avoid things that require high commitments of time and energy.
INSIGHT 2
Prime Video:
High Barrier
High Commitment,
Video streaming platforms, such as Prime Video, are perceived by people as high commitment content platforms.
Regardless of users' evaluation of Prime Video content, people find it difficult in finding what to watch on Prime Video. This happens even when some of them have not yet tried to explore.
INSIGHT 3
Prime Video:
Satisfying Content
As long as the user started watching content on Prime Video, nearly all of them are satisfied with the content of the platform.
INSIGHT 4
Sense of Community
In general, people seek validation and a sense of community.
In video watching behavior, they want to make sure they are not the only ones who think or feel in a certain way. In doing so, people either share their perceiving experience with their friends or view information on anonymous platforms (e.g., Reddit)/from significant influencers.
INSIGHT 5
Prime Video is Important to Amazon Prime Retention
Most customers subscribe for Amazon Prime for the e-commerce shipping service; many of them would stop their subscriptions once they don’t foresee themselves shopping that much on Amazon. However, those members who regularly use other services from the Prime ecosystem, in particular Prime Video, are more motivated to retain their Prime membership.
06 Behavioral Patterns
Behavioral modes of Prime Video users and potential users
In view of the human patterns and research insights, we developed two behavior modes as the personas to represent the interactions among users, potential users, and Prime Video.
07 Design Concepts
Create a cycle that connects the two behavior modes and enables sharing and exploring easier.
We see that in the behavior mode of Jack and Rachel, they have in joint Prime membership and social media. In fact, people in the US spend on average 2.5 hours, over 10% of the day, on social media platforms. To seize the commonality, we figured out a solution that leverages someone like Rachel to engage someone like Jack to explore Prime Video more.
DESIGN GOAL
Create a new format of "less commitment + high sharability" content
Currently, people identify video streaming platform content as high commitment required ones. In a short period of time, people expect to perceive content with less commitment required. Hence, the cycle we developed is creating a new format of content that can make Prime Video to the upper right of the matrix with high shareability and low commitment required.
08 The Solution
Video Mark: Like the Moment + Highlighter + 6-min Free Watch
Since we know that most users like the content of Prime Video after recognition but there are barriers for recognition, we can start from the active users like Rachel who are seeking for validation and sense of community like most human-beings.
01
Like the Moment
Because shows and movies are emotional and complex, they can easily affect people's emotions. When watching their favorite shows or movies on Prime Video, Rachels can seize every moment of resonation by clicking the heart to create the little "heart marks" on the progress bar without having to pause their watching.
02
Highlighter
After watching a resonating content, people like to talk about it with others to seek validation.
The highlighter enables Rachels to clip of their favorite moment of the video by "highlighting" the 15 sec they like on the zoomed-in progress bar, perhaps the part she previously "heart marked".
2.5
Social Network
The highlighter helps Rachels frictionlessly generate high quality and engaging content to share on social media where they bond with their communities.
We utilized social media to connect the 2 user modes and Prime Video. During Jacks' browsing and surfing during his short period breaks, they will see the 15-second clip playing on social media. Interested in the content or what resonated with their friends, Jacks can click on the free watch access and be guided back to Prime Video.
03
6-min Free Watch
After being funnel back to Prime Video, Jacks can continue to watch the video for another 6 minutes starting from the clip. The 6-min Free Watch, after the strong 15 sec clip on social, provides the best use of short break and will potentially get users a strongly resonating starting point to start watching Prime Video when they plan to stream.
THE FINAL KNIT
Watchlist Created
Users are not able to finish the whole content in their short breaks. We created an interface for users to easily add the content to their watchlist after the free watch. This reduces the biggest frictions of users by changing the exploration process. And all these happen in their short time break.
09 Value Proposition
Time and delightful experience.
Time and delight are the biggest value Videomark is providing. We increase the user experience by saving their time from browsing but finding anything. And by adding value to Prime Video, we make them more connected with the overall Prime ecosystem. Therefore, Amazon will be able to provide better services for customers.
