Part 2 — Bringing the audience into The Circle
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In Part One of this blog, we looked at our work to create the bespoke social media platform that brought the concept of The Circle to life. The other key ingredient to the show’s success was the mobile app.
Alongside the Circle platform, the Circle app played a vital role in involving the audience with the programme. User engagement was key to the success of the show and Channel 4 realised that having an app to enable viewers to vote on the show’s outcome was vital. We were well placed to deliver the app in conjunction with our design and delivery work on the Circle social platform.
The Circle app needed to feel an integral part of the show, allowing users to fully engage with the show and genuinely influence the outcome through a fully compliant viewer vote. It needed to look and feel on a par with the production tool, using the same visuals and incorporating similar social media tropes.
In order to apply this creative concept to the app, as well as considering the different user needs, we developed a set of user stories to define our users and their expectations for the app. Our users included not just the audience, but also the editors who would be creating content for the app, and Channel 4.
These user stories were then broken down into different features, which we used as the basis for developing a full, coherent user experience (UX) across the app and its content management system (CMS). We then applied the design approach — developed as part of the production tool — to the app.
The most challenging part of this process was timescales. As this was a new show in development, the Circle was still refining its concept and mood at a time when, usually, the designs would be complete. To accommodate this, we had to pin down the user experience in isolation from the designs and apply the designs at a later date. Although this proved challenging from a build and scheduling perspective, the result was something that felt in keeping with the look and feel of the Circle and its bespoke social media system.
With a high profile show and an immovable deadline, it was essential that we got the app delivered on time, complete with a fully compliant vote. We partnered with an industry leading company who brought with them specialist knowledge and underpinning technology for global TV voting systems, ensuring that the app could deliver.
We designed and built the app in React Native for Android and iOS, launching alongside the first episode of the show. In addition to voting, we enabled viewers to get closer to The Circle with a news feed, videos and a player profile page. We integrated with third party technologies to deliver a fully compliant vote (Tectonic), video (Brightcove), push notifications (Urban Airship) and analytics (Firebase).
Our app was critical to the show’s outcome — an additional £25,000 prize was awarded to one of the players as the result of a public vote via the app.
Consequently, the app was extremely popular, hitting the top of the iOS App Store free apps chart on the day of the live final, and consistently close to the top of the entertainment charts throughout the show’s run.
Data from the app store showed that a very high proportion of people who downloaded the app also registered to use it to vote on the programme.
The Circle TV show itself was a critical success and Netflix has now bought the rights to the format. It’s been extremely exciting to be involved with something so culturally unique, and to cotribute towards its success.
