During my recent trip to the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, I had the oportunity to meet with some senior executives from Netflix to talk about their growth since launching in the Middle East, and get a hands-on preview of what the future holds from the streaming giant, particularly in terms of their platform development.
Up in the hills of a very upscale area of Barcelona, Netflix had taken a house and converted it into what they called the “Netflix House”. There, we had to opportunity to meet with Joris Evers, Vice President and Head of Communications for EMEA, Yann Lafargue, Corporate Communications Manager for EMEA, and Chris Jaffe, Vice President of Product Innovation.
As soon as you walk through the doors, you get a sense of what Netflix really wants to do here – the house is covered from top to bottom with posters and photos of past, present, and future Netflix shows. It’s really an immersive experience that puts you in the mood to just sit back on a couch and binge watch your favorite shows.
The team started by telling us about how they are making the internet experiene better, and building a better network through product innovation. Headquartered in Silicone Valley, Chris Jaffe is the man behind everything in the user experience, down to the “Play” button.
Focusing on the three “wants” of users: what users want to watch, when they want to watch it and how they want to watch it
Netflix is now available in more than 190 countries, working to develop a global TV network for more than 75 milion users, moving away from a linear TV watching experience and focusing on developing internet-driven TV by focusing on the three “wants” of users: what users want to watch, when they want to watch it and how they want to watch it.
This year, Netflix is investing up to $5bn in developing original content – that translates to 30 new series – split between new seasons and completely new series. This means one new show every ten days! More than that, there will be ten original feature films, as well as numerous documentaries and kids’ shows to look forward to.
All of these shows are available across more than 1500 devices, ranging from smartphones to tablets, TVs and STBs, game consoles and PCs/laptops. This makes the entertainment experience available on the user’s terms – whenever and wherever they want. Netflix is basically architected to be personalized to each and every user.
Netflix is investing up to $5bn in developing original content – that translates to 30 new series
Most Netflix users are familiar with profiles. Chris kicked off by showing us the core differences between regular profiles and kids’ profiles, which are unique in the way they cater to their particular audience. The really powerful thing is that the experience is dynamic, which means kids can take a more proactive approach in their viewing using Netflix’s character-based approach rather than title-based approach, making certain show more attractive to kids based on characters they are familiar with. Netflix also makes suggestions based on what children like to watch the most.
Switching to an adult profile, the Netflix algorithm works around categories or subjects, and suggests personalized shows. Each and every single recommendation is based on shows the user has watched or is watching, and will develop with time as the user spends more time watching. This changes every 24 hour and in effect there are 75 million different Netflix out there, with each one personalized to its user – no two are the same.
The Netflix team wanted to highlight that all of the user interface changes are driven by how customers watch their shows, how they look and search and their viewing habits. Every minor change is based on how to make the customer’s viewing experience better and more enjoyable.
A quick trip down memory lane showed us just how different the first Netflix user experience is from the Netflix we know today. With every new iteration being tested, a couple of hundred thousand new subscribers are given a new interface while others remain on the old one. Netflix is looking for increased engagement rates, increased watching time or subscriptions rates; all of this data is then studied and the team looks for positive changes. If all goes according to plan, changes are then rolled out to consumers to make their experience better.
The goal is to help consumers find shows they want to watch within 90 seconds
The goal is to help consumers find shows they want to watch within 90 seconds. Last summer, Netflix launched a feature that gets users one click closer to watching shows on their TV, one which plays the show automatically during the browsing process, fading the metadata away and letting the user enjoy the show directly. The reason this was launched on a TV is because most Netflix shows are watched on a TV.
Netflix is currently testing a feature that will play video snippets while browsing for shows – whether they be clips, trailers, etc… There are various versions of this being tested right now with several hundred thousand users, while Netflix looks for changing metrics to make the UX even more engaging. Unfortunately, given this is still in testing, video recording was not allowed.
To give you an idea of how hard this undertaking is, the Netflix team had to edit each an every video in the Netflix catalogue to create spoiler-free snippets for users to see during this test period. And this is just the testing phase! The plan is to roll this out by the end of the year, if all the testing goes according to plan.
For UAE users specifically, Netflix is currently working with local providers to make Netflix available directly onto the set-top-box
For UAE users specifically, Netflix is currently working with local providers to make Netflix available directly onto the set-top-box, which means the service may be available in the near future via Etisalat and du. More so, Netflix is working with television manufacturers to add a Netflix button onto remote controls, making the service even easier to access as an application built into the smart TV.
Moving onto 4K content, Netflix as you may know launched this content two years ago. By the end of this year, Netflix plans on having more than 600 hours available in 4K for users. Netflix also sees HDR (High Dynamic Range) as the future of high-definition content. HDR provides a much wider color gamut instead of packing more pixels per inch – the result is more photorealistic imagery on your TV, especially when married to a 4K TV. Later on this year, Netflix will support HDR content, starting with Season 1 episodes of Marco Polo, in addition to Daredevil Season 2. Having seen HDR in action, this is one of the best viewing experiences available in a home, although you will need an HDR TV.
Netflix will support HDR content, starting with Season 1 episodes of Marco Polo, in addition to Daredevil Season 2
Other innovations revolve around encoding, making content transmissible onto devices. Recently, Netflix tuned their algorithms to compress content by up to an extra 20%, which means users needs 20% less bandwidth to get the same viewing experience onto their devices. This feature was rolled out in January, and Netflix is in the middle of re-encoding their whole library to make this feature available across the board.
On mobile, users can look forward to modulating their data usage via the app, basically being able to select whether or not they stream HD content using their data package. This will be available on Android and iOS later this year so mobile users can look forward to saving their data for other things!
One of the most exciting feature Netflix showed off what it dubbed ‘Actor level meta data in the second screen experience’. This feature basically allows you to browse for content on your phone, play it on the TV via Chromecast, and still be able to access show information on your smartphone, including actor biographies, related titles, and more. If you’re like me and want to Wikipedia movie information in the middle of action, this is a godsend. This will launch later on this year on Android and iOS.
There are plenty of things to look forward to in the future with Netflix, so I suggest you keep an eye out and see if anything takes your fancy. If you’re a current user, you’re likely to see some great changes soon, including a ‘global catalogue’ that will host each and every Netflix Originals show. If you’re not, you might want to consider that landline TV subscription…
