Personalisation in Video Streaming : Predictions for 2020 and beyond
This is the first of a 3 part series where we look to deep-dive into the world of personalisation; where we are today, what users think of it, and what might be round the corner.
In today’s digital age, users expect services to know them, and to tailor content to their needs. At UIC Digital, we work with global brands to provide memorable multi-platform experiences across a broad range of industries including media and entertainment, broadcast, and sports.
In this article, we will look at what personalisation is, and how in particular it’s shaping the world of digital video streaming and ‘Over the top’ (OTT) video services. We also want to make a few predictions on where we think personalisation is going in the future and the impact it might have.
What is personalisation?
In the digital space, personalisation can be defined as the action of producing or displaying something specifically tailored to meet someone’s individual requirements or tastes.
Everyday, we come across different forms of personalisation in the digital and real world. The wallpaper you might have chosen for your phone, or the wallpaper you chose for your bedroom.
In these examples, it was an explicit choice on your part.
Explicit and implicit personalisation
Explicit Data
Explicit data is what a user might tell, for example, a video streaming service. If a user were to rate the series Stranger Things with a “thumbs up”, the service would gain a clear understanding that this is the sort of content type the user enjoys and that they would want to have similar recommendations.
Implicit Data
Implicit data, on the other hand, refers to data gathered and learned through a user’s behaviour. For example, if a user watches several series of Game of the Thrones, the video streaming service would recommend similar content due to the users’ viewing behaviour, assuming that this is the sort of content the user enjoys.
In short, the user hasn’t explicitly said that they enjoy Game of Thrones, but the service was able to pick that up from their behaviour. The opposite behaviour can be just as beneficial; users would be shown less content that the service knows they never watch.
Within the video streaming space, personalization mainly refers to a 1 to 1 experience, where all the offerings are tailored as per the user’s behaviour and interactions. By delivering a personalized experience, you can make each user feel the service is exclusively designed for them and thus improve organic engagement.
Thanks to advanced technologies like AI-based machine learning and recommendation engines; delivering personalized a streaming experience is now largely automated.
Prediction 1 : the full end-to-end video streaming experience from app launch to playback will be exactly as you like it…
The colossal rise in video streaming has created a shift in paradigm. No longer are consumers concerned with ownership but rather, they’re concerned with access. With Netflix, Amazon Prime, Hulu and other streaming services competing to give users the best service for inexpensive monthly subscriptions, users can now choose what to watch, when they want and how they want.
However, the actual playback of content is just the end game, and that exact content maybe available across different services. Users will come to expect the entire experience to be tailored and customised to their needs.
We believe you’ll start to get more options to control some of the things that you’ve just come to expect as default functionality, i.e. auto-playing of content or trailers, automatically moving onto the next episode, letting credits roll to the end without making recommendations, automatically skipping the introduction. Some of it will be implicitly learned by the platform, some of it will be user controllable.
Prediction 2 : more services will be applying deep personalisation to content discovery…
We’ve all faced the dilemma of being spoiled for choice with what to watch and spending more time choosing that watching.
Presenting content in a way that is meaningful and enticing the user is as important as ever, and will become even more so in the future.
Netflix was one of the first companies that saw the potential of video streaming technology when it launched in 2007. Using a combination of machine learning, algorithms and creativity, Netflix has been able to create hyper-personalised viewing experiences for each of its members. Here’s how:
The Recommendation System
When it comes to personalised recommendations, Netflix is a well-known player. Research shows that more than 80% of the TV shows people watch on Netflix are discovered through the platform’s recommendation system.
The recommendation system pulls together data (ratings, viewing patterns, location, search history etc.) to create the perfect suggestions for users to browse through and enjoy.
Artwork Personalisation
For many years, Netflix’s goal was for the recommendation system to get the right titles in front of each member. But the job of recommendation doesn’t stop there. The homepage should be able to convince a user why a particular show or film has been recommended for them — especially if it’s something new or that the user hasn’t heard of before.
Artwork is the first and most important element in trying to convince a user that a film or series is a good watch. The artwork may highlight a title, a recognisable actor, capture an exciting moment or contain a dramatic scene which conveys the essence of the series or film.
Each member will respond differently to what artwork attracts them but if the presented artwork captures the member’s attention, this increases the probability of play, maximises enjoyment and achieves effective personalisation.
This level of personalisation will only continue to evolve, with for example the possibility to display personalised trailers specifically cut and edited to entice the user into hitting ‘Play’.
Prediction 3 : accessibility will be mainstream and under your control
Today, more than ever, technology companies are pushing to make their services more accessible, not just for those with disabilities and impairments, but for everyone.
We think that this year, users will start seeing a shift in how platforms promote accessibility and it will no longer be a ‘hidden’ or ‘specialist’ feature, tucked away in the settings
Hulu
Streaming services understand (as well as it often being a legal requirement) that providing subtitles, closed captions and audio descriptions in multiple languages broadens their customer base to include the hundreds of millions of people worldwide who may have some form of impairment.
Last year, Hulu held its annual hackathon addressing the topic of accessibility. More than a quarter of the projects addressed the needs of viewers with disabilities and the success of the hackathon led to the development of two new features.
The first feature focused on text legibility. In a recent post, the U.S based service announced that it now uses easier to read text because it enhanced the text opacity as well as a screen reader.
Other features proposed included an ‘eye remote’ to allow users to navigate and controls the application with their eye as well as a colour correction tool allowing users to adjust the UI to accommodate colour blindness.
We predict that this level of accessibility-specific personalisation will become mainstream, and indeed added to the list of legal requirements of any public video streaming platform.
Prediction 4 : you too will be the director at sports events
Viewers will soon start see a wholesale change in the way that they experience live sports events on their devices.
Until recently, you got your sporting fix whenever you could. If the TV schedule said a football game kicked off at 3PM, you dropped everything else to make sure you caught it. But with online video, fans are watching sports on their own terms.
At UI Centric, we believe that the future of sports will be customisable, interactive and will put viewers in the centre of the experience.
Formula 1 & Formula E: Putting fans in the driver’s seat
F1 TV is a digital experience to take you closer to all the action, putting the fans in the driving seat. Fans get access to commercial-free live streams of each race with multi language commentary as well as exclusive access to all 20 driver on-board cameras throughout every race session.
In a similar manner, Formula E, puts fans at the centre of the experience with ‘Fanboost’, a feature that allows fans to vote for their favourite driver and reward them an extra boost of power during the race.
Clippers ‘CourtVision’ App
Envisioned by Steve Ballmer, chairman of the L.A. Clippers, the CourtVision app powered by a blend of artificial intelligence and augmented reality brings fans into the game, letting them customise their own viewing experience.
The augmentation happens inside the app using video from inside the arena. There are three modes which users can experience; ‘coach’, ‘player’ and ‘mascot’.
Each offers a unique perspective on the action, from shooting percentages overlayed over player’s heads, to selecting a courtside viewing angle.
All of the above are just a small selection of the type of personalisation options open to views to sports content today, and we believe this is something that is only going to grow and become more mainstream in the sporting world.
Prediction 5 : the user interface will become a lot more personal
We often take for granted that the user interface (UI) presented to us as fixed and non-negotiable. Increasingly, we feel this will no longer be the case and users will be given far more control over exactly what the UI looks like.
Recently, it’s become more mainstream to be given an option of ‘light’ or ‘dark’ mode, and although useful, this still comes of as very limited and ‘pre-canned’.
Slack recently revealed that 85,000 organisations were paying for its service and it’s easy to understand why. One of the great things Slack has done to create a thoughtful experience is to allow each user to customise the user interface by picking specific themes, or indeed their own colour combinations for different elements of the UI.
Within the video streaming space, we believe that personalisation of the user interface is something that will become common and indeed expected by users; not just from the perspective ‘decorative’ elements but also the layout and positioning of content on the screen. Don’t want the ‘recommended for you’ rail of the videos at the top of your homepage? You have the choice to move it and personalise it to your heart’s content.
Over to You
Above are a few examples of how we believe personalisation is changing the video streaming industry. No doubt more and more that will emerge as time goes by and become ever more important in a market that becoming more and more crowded.
In part 2 of this series, we’ll be sharing the results of the independent research we’ve undertaken into what users think about personalisation and what really matters to them.
Want to discuss or need any help developing a personalised experience? We’d be delighted to chat.
Charlotte Golledge is a User Experience Designer at UIC Digital. UIC Digital have been designing and building OTT and streaming products for over 12 years out of our New York, San Antonio, Austin, London and Budapest offices.
