YouTube Case Study

showcase

Notes

Background

To identify pain points in the YouTube app in terms of sharing videos and the functionality of the 5 different pages currently offered (Home, Trending, Subscriptions, Inbox and Library). ‍

Sub Goals:

Find out why and how people use the YouTube app in daily life.
Find out what pages people usually go to in the YouTube app.
Discover how people share videos/interact with others through or on YouTube.

Challenge

When people share videos on YouTube, they want to do so without leaving the app and taking up space in other messaging platforms; but they can't because you can only share video links.

Development

User Interview Script

Background:

1. What grade are you?

2. What apps do you use to watch videos? (Can be any app) Why?

3. Can you explain what you mean by “user friendly”?

4. Walk me through how you use the apps listed above

5. What’s your favorite feature? Why?

YouTube App:

1. In what settings do you use YouTube?

2. When was the last time you used YouTube?

3. What videos do you watch on YouTube?

4. Can you recall a negative experience of using the YouTube app? Why was it bad?

5. What parts of the YouTube app do you use?

6. Anything you don’t like about either of those pages?

7. Can you walk me through your experience?

8. If you were to send videos to your friends how would you go about it?

9. What is your favorite way to get sent a video?

10. Do you use YouTube to learn? Why?

11. What different types of things do you learn?

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Focus Group with Diary Studies + Card Sorting

Users will document their thoughts as they go through an experience on YouTube. They will focus on when and how they use (or not use) each of the five pages and how they share videos with friends. Then, participants will reconvene in a focus group to discuss and compare notes. Even though this method runs the risk of a "group-think" mentality, it will be a method of defining major pain points and gaining insight into how to improve. To sort out “unmet needs” researchers can analyze each user’s diary and the outcome of card sorting. Card sorting will help me understand how each user thinks the YouTube app should be structured for a better experience.

Mental Model Mapping

‍This step would be done after researching. It helps uncover trends in how users interact with each of the tabs in the YouTube app and how videos are shared. By extracting their motivations, it's easier to ideate features that address users’ needs.

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Market Research: Current Solutions

Current solution spaces: Sharing content on Instagram, Facebook, Snapchat

Analysis: Current solutions allow people to send videos without taking up space used to text in Instagram DMs. People can also share videos by tagging friends in the comments which is even more convenient.

Probable solutions

Instagram and Snapchat allow users to share a video in one click

Solution

Moving the inbox feature to the top of each YouTube tab
Allowing people to import contacts from their phone
Allowing people to tag their friends in comments like on Facebook/Instagram
Allowing people to hold down a thumbnail to share

Features

Persona

results

Home Page‍

It has suggestions of videos which some users check out.
YouTubers post status updates which is a good way for users to keep up to date with creators.
Some people don't like how YouTube mixes videos and status updates as it becomes confusing.
Stories are a good way to interact with YouTubers through a mix of short videos or pictures.
The videos on the page are relevant, but it’s not where people go to find new things to watch.
Many users skip the homepage because it doesn’t show relevant videos they want to see.

Trending Page

A good place to view the news because younger generations don't watch news on the TV as much.
Used as a last resort when there is nothing else to watch.
Usually doesn’t have videos I’m looking for.
Too many clickbait videos.
Waste time scrolling through videos that don’t interest me.
Existing categories of music, gaming, news and movies, but some feel that it’s too generalized and needs more personalization.

Subscriptions Page

Most used page because it has all the videos they will watch.
Some users go on YouTube only to watch channels they subscribe to.
Subscriptions can pile up. It’s too time consuming to comb through all of them to find a video to watch.
Some creators post frequently, and it’s difficult to catch up on videos which get lost in the subscription box.
Not every channel is the same genre, which makes the subscription box feel cluttered.
Lose interest in people I follow.
Follow my favorite YouTubers.

Library Page‍