Project

Design feature to surface default content in search screen of HBO GO and HBO NOW on all streaming platforms

My Role

Design Lead

Users

Millions of HBO customers who view HBO content via HBO GO and HBO NOW streaming on desktop, mobile, tablet, and CTV devices

Collaborators

Product Owner, 4 Engineers, Project Manager, Researcher

Situation

The search screens of HBO GO and HBO NOW on all platforms were blank. My goal was to help users to find content that might interest them by adding default content to the search screens. I owned the UX design on this project and collaborated with Engineers, Product Owner, Project Manager, and Research.

Previous Search Screens

Previously, the search screens on all platforms were blank. I designed a way to provide a content sampling to help users decide what to watch.

Goals

• Aid in the discoverability to help users find new content
• Help users to get into content more quickly
• Minimize impact to development

Approach

• Identify MVP solution.
• The default search project will use existing elements found elsewhere on each platform. The types of elements are: content format, category labeling, metadata.
• Surface content from our existing queries.
• Keep content consistent across all platforms.
• Perform analysis of GO to identify what queries are available to use for default search content.
• Perform competitive analysis to identify the following: types of content, show/hide behavior, and amount of content displayed.
• Seek feedback and iterate.

Activities

• Wireframe prototyping in Sketch
• Design for desktop, mobile, and television product platforms
• User flows
• Interaction design
• Redlines
• Competitive analysis
• Research data analysis

Result

By default, displayed default search content before search text is entered

Used preexisting content

Limited the amount of content displayed so as not to overwhelm the user

Hid default search content when user enters search text

Displayed default search content if all search text is deleted

Avoided introducing new elements by repurposing existing screen elements: framework, search results content trays, labels, metadata

Impact

• Improved user satisfaction of millions of HBO customers
• Reduced user confusion by correcting behavior that was interpreted as a defect
• Increased viewership of featured content by increasing its visibility
• Increased viewership by navigating users into content more quickly

Reflection

What I learned and practiced:

• How to perform user experience design in within the context of a large corporation with offices in multiple locations
• How to apply skills and concepts to live products that affect millions of users
• How to collaborate with stakeholders
• How to articulate and defend design decisions to stakeholders and leadership
• How to design within practical business constraints
• How to negotiate varying priorities across disciplines

Future Considerations

• Replace or augment the content with more targeted content. Possibilities include trending searches, personalized recommendations.
• Explore a different visual treatment of default search content to differentiate it from search results.

Other Considerations

Keyboards

We were in the process of integrating the native keyboards for TV devices into the search screens. I designed additional screens to integrate the default content into the native keyboards for each supported device.

Hiding and Showing Content

Display the default search content before a search is conducted, and then hide it while searching. If the search query is completely deleted, display the default content again. Engineering could decide implement this solution in two different ways: a fresh call or screen refresh.

Voice Search

Since the user enters words and not characters while using voice search and one doesn’t build words incrementally, we should hide the default search content when voice search is invoked. Hiding the default search content when voice search is invoked also gives user visual feedback that the microphone is engaged. If voice search is invoked and no search is entered, it should be treated the same as deleting all search characters and displaying the default search content.

Labeling

The microcopy for the default search content (“Can’t decide what to watch?”, “Looking for something?”, etc.) was generated by another group and handled outside the scope of this project.

Content Rules

Default search content should be treated similarly to the other featured content we provide. For this version, we would only include the type of content that is featured on the home screen. This meant that certain content would be omitted from the default search content.