Preferred Video Service
The 'Preferred Video Service' (PVS) project is part of the syndication projects focused on supporting US customers in setting up their TV providers as they go through the TV onboarding journey.
Client
Collaboration
2 Product Manager (UK&US)
1 Developer Team
1 UI Designer
1 Copy writer
My Role
UX Researcher
UX Designer
Conducted A/B Testing
Time
Feb.2023 - Apr.2023
9 weeks
Context
Bought by US giant Comcast in 2018, Sky now brings its vast TV products expertise to a whole host of TV syndication partners, expanding the reach of its TV Operating System (TVOS) on a global scale.
Brief
Final Design Overview
Debrief
What is PVS?
Preferred video service (PVS) is not a customer-facing term, preferred TV provider is the more commonly used. A TV service provider is the company you pay for your television service.
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Differences:
Unlike in the UK, US users can subscribe to one or more "linear TV channel services" from different TV companies.
What can PVS affect?
I met the Product manager from the US to understand the scope of this new feature.
Key findings:
• Selecting a PVS can affect linear TV channels, and TV guides (how they’re ordered in the UI)
Business requirements?
At the initial launch, the choices of TV providers include Spectrum, Xfinity Stream, and Xumo TV (default, always included), with more partners to come.
Key requirements:
• A global UX template that can be applied to other countries.
• Design voice guidance scripts for accessibility.
• Scalability for the future, eg. muti-selection feature.
Spectrum & Xfinity Steam
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Paid for by the user​
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Purchased from partners
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Login credentials will be checked at the back office.
Xumo (Default)
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Free (ad revenue)​
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Default, always be included
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No manual login required
​ Future TV providers​
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YouTube TV​
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Sling TV​
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Pluto​
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Tubi​
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Freevee​
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Hulu (?)​
Ideation
Where should the PVS step sit in the TV onboarding flow?
I collaborated with the legal team, developers and PM to determine where the PVS steps should sit in the TV onboarding journey,
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Design rationale:
• To ensure the onboarding journey is seamless, I categorized different steps based on their properties and sequenced them progressively, starting from setting up the device, then linking an account, and finally personalizing the account.
• As PVS is an account-level feature, I put the PVS step after the account activation step.
PVS screen
I compared different UX options to choose the best one for customers and decided to go with the rail selection option with a 1:1 tile.
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Design rationale:
• ​Visual images make it easier for people to recognize the brand directly.
• ​The rail layout allows the user to reach skip at the touch of a button on the remote control.
User flow
I iterated on user flows by collaborating with stakeholders from different departments, and lots of design review sessions.
Challenge
A/B Testing
UserZoomTesting
To align with senior stakeholders’ opinions, I did an A/B testing with 26 US customers using UserZoom.
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Goals:
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To measure people’s understanding of the default PVS and how it works
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To compare the two design solutions and understand which one performs better
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​To validate that users understand which TV provider they selected
Testing Result
I did a test report by analyzing 52 test videos and reported the results to senior stakeholders and received support.
Key findings:
• For study 1 (Hide the default provider), most participants understood to press select and then continue
• For study 2 (Show the default provider), 10 of 13 participants didn't know what to do when there was a pre-selected tile.
• Most participants in both studies didn't expect to land on the home page after selecting confirm and expect a confirmation step.
Usability Testing Report (Click to view full report)
Testing video clips
Iterations
I iterated the flow based on the testing results.
Key iterations:
• Go with the "hidden default provider" solution and only show the default provider in the copy.
• Improve copy to avoid confusion, replace the word 'default' with the actual name.
• Add a loading screen before landing on home to set expectations for users.
Iterated User Flow
Accessibility Design
Voice Guidance Scripts
In terms of accessibility, I also drafted voice-guided scripts from the beginning of the design process.
Part of the voice guidance scrips
Technical Constrains,
Testings,
Iterations
I went through the scrips with developers and was told that from a technical point of view, voice guidance can't detect the status changes, which means that voice guidance can't read 'selected' or 'unselected' when the user focuses on the tile.
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I iterated the Voice Guidance Scripts by testing with a blind accessibility tester. During the test, I read the scripts to him and asked what he thought. He liked the conclusion and suggested prompting the rail direction when the user firstly lands on this screen.
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Key iterations:
• Remove all the status hints and add a conclusion that tells the user what they selected when they clicked "Continue" before they go to the next screen.
• Add a rail direction hint.
Iterated voice guidance scrips
Evaluation
Result
The objective of this project is to enable customers to set up their preferred video service without effort and to be scaleable for future use. I gathered the necessary data to validate the design approach.
Final Design
What I learned
I've been thinking about what makes a good project for my portfolio. A project with a very fancy layout? Or one that has a very complicated flow?
No, not those ones.
I want to choose this 'small' project. It may seem like a small project, but it contains a lot of food for thought. Throughout the whole process, I had to balance business needs and user experience. I've learned a lot about how to communicate with product managers to understand business needs, how to explore design solutions from different perspectives, how to get the copywriting team on board with a new project, how to plan research and conduct tests to validate the design, think about accessibility from the very beginning, and so on.
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Thank you for reading all the way to this point and I hope you enjoyed it. Last but not least, I would like to say a big thank you to the people who've helped with this project.