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YOUTUBE CASE STUDY

PURPOSE

This is a personal project to explore YouTube’s current interface and ease of use.

REASON

I use YouTube every day, but there are some interactions with the interface that bother me personally. I wanted to explore if others felt the same.  

KEY QUESTIONS (GOALS)

  • How usable is the interface described by users?

  • How can we improve on the interface design?


UNDERSTANDING USERS

SURVEYS

Google Form Survey
To learn more about where people stand with YouTube’s current interface, I surveyed 10 college undergraduate students. I gave them all a survey made with Google forms (Click here for the PDF version).

Participants
Here are the profiles for the recruited 10 undergraduates.

 

AFFINITY DIAGRAM

Main Findings

I starred the second and third findings because I will be focusing on making improvements on the capabilities of the suggested videos sidebar.

 

PERSONA


DESIGNING THE SOLUTION

CURRENT INTERFACE ANALYSIS

After analyzing YouTube’s current interface, here’s some points I’ve notice.

At a glance, the user (specifically the content viewer) has access to a multitude of videos.

  • Users may also search, subscribe, and watch favored channels.

  • Even if users run out of content they regularly watch, YouTube recommends videos to the user.

  • Users can also easily share videos to other people and share links on other platforms, such as Facebook or Twitter.

Constraint
When the user selects a video from their homepage or subscriptions, subscribed videos are not visible anymore. Instead, the platform only introduces suggested videos based off of videos the user has watched before or based off of what the user was currently watching.

Problem
In order to select another subscribed video, the user must either click the back button on their browser or select the subscription page again. This might disrupt the flow of watching videos.

Suggestion
Making the subscribed videos more accessible on the video page.

IDEA GENERATION

I will be focusing on finding a solution and improvement on this constraint.

Solution (Overview)
One way to resolve this constraint is to add a list of subscribed videos under the suggested videos.

  • Makes it easier for the user to access their subscriptions

  • Allows for the minimal amount of clicks to get to another subscription

Therefore, this new function would satisfy the user’s goal of watching videos, while doing so efficiently.

Sketches

I came up with 3 designs of this solution:

 

DESIGN CONCEPT

Ideation Goal
To increase the efficiency* of flow in watching videos on YouTube.
*By “Increasing the efficiency”, I mean “using fewer clicks”.

All of these sketches focus on having the user’s subscriptions on the side bar with the recommended videos, but they differ in how the subscriptions are presented.

Design Ideas

Idea 1 (Left)

  • Have both recommendations and subscriptions available for the user. Have dropdown options to view more videos.

Idea 2 (Middle)

  • Have dropdown tabs to view either recommendations, subscriptions, or both.

Idea 3 (Right)

  • Have tabs to switch between recommendations and subscriptions.


HIGH FIDELITY PROTOTYPE

INVISION PROTOTYPE

Links to the Prototypes

Check out Design Idea 1 here (Left)
Check out Design Idea 2 here (Middle)
Check out Design Idea 3 here (Right)

 

USER FLOW

Here is an example of a user flow for the first design:

Video Demo


USABILITY TESTING

THE PLAN

What I Had
3 InVision prototypes on different design ideas about incorporating the user’s subscriptions in the sidebar.

Who They Were
A YouTube user (undergraduate), who enjoys watching videos about cats, food, dance and games (the persona).

Tasks
Task 1:

  • In your subscriptions, select a RPG/gaming video.


Task 2:

  • In your recommendations, select a dominos video.

These two tasks were to be done across the 3 prototypes.

Debriefing Questions

  • After testing prototype 1: What are your thoughts about Design Idea 1?

  • After testing prototype 2: What are your thoughts about Design Idea 2?

  • After testing prototype 3: What are your thoughts about Design Idea 3?

    • For each, why?

After testing all 3 prototypes:

  • Which out of the 3 design ideas was most preferred?

  • Which out of the 3 design ideas was the least preferred?

    • For each, why?

  • What are your opinions about having subscriptions in your side bar?

  • Could you see this being implemented on YouTube?

 

USABILITY TESTING

Participants
5 more undergraduate YouTube users

Main Findings


REFLECTIONS

SUMMARY

The goal of this personal project was to assess YouTube’s current usability (flow of watching videos) on its interface.

  • With 10 participants, I assessed their current thoughts about YouTube’s current interface with contextual interviews

  • Using those results, I created a persona and also picked a potential area on YouTube to improve on: The suggestion sidebar

  • I sketched three design ideas and made high fidelity prototypes of the sketches with InVision

  • With the prototypes, I had five participants test the prototypes and asked for feedback on the three designs

  • Final verdict: Users would like their subscriptions implemented into the video page’s sidebar


FINAL THOUGHTS

YouTube is already a very well established platform and users appreciate the format to mostly be as it already is. With this project, I found that it was difficult to improve on the existing platform, especially while keeping the interface relatively the same. However, I believe improvements can be made if we can notice the little details. It shouldn’t be the case that designs will cause the users to habituate and just get used to it. I also found that users like to be in control of their actions. Allowing them the flexibility to cater to each of their own preferences is important to users.

THANK YOU FOR READING! 😊