Today's TV is hard to grasp and involves several different types of technical devices and solutions. It offers little differentiation; Price can drive subscription, but otherwise, the offers are very similar. Customers often feel cheated because they pay for many channels they do not want.
On the other hand, offers within streaming services are more flexible; It feels better to choose a service based on your interest and time you want to use it (source: Augur, 2021). In May 2021, the data at Tele2.se/tv depicted the customers' shift of interest:
By studying the data provided to us by Augur, I realised that, when it comes to watching TV, we had three target audiences with different behaviours, goals, and pain points.
Digital natives
They watch TV only via streaming and Play services and almost never on live TV.
Hybrids
They use both Netflix and SVT Play but also like to sit down and watch a specific channel at a specific time.
Traditionalists
They watch almost exclusively TV and follow the TV guide. They record programs sometimes.
I continued with online research on other well established Swedish Telecom companies. My focus was on how they were solving a similar problem for their users; How are they presenting regular TV and streaming subscriptions? What language are they using and is it aligned with clients' mental models?
As the two brands - Tele2 and Tele2 Play (formerly "Comhem Play") - needed to come together to introduce the new streaming subscription, my first step was to define the flow. Our focus was on one primary use case - select and purchase the new streaming subscription.
Based on our previous data on the TV start page and findings from the competitive benchmarking, we proceeded to note our hypotheses. To validate our assumptions, we decided to set up usability tests with five actual Tele2 customers. I created a prototype that included the complete flow - from selecting a package to purchase.
“ I think it is good that you do not need extra equipment because you have so many devices and boxes and so on. It is so complicated when you buy a new TV.”
As the research phase came to an end, it was now time to analyse all the data we had gathered from our business intelligence consultants, our competitive benchmarking, and usability tests. We organised it by creating an affinity diagram.
With our research findings in mind, I iterated on the best way to introduce the new streaming subscription on Tele.se.
This project offered me both challenges and learnings; It was interesting for me as a designer to research the best way of visualizing subscription offers and TV subscription offers, in particular, to give customers a clear solution. At the same time, it required the collaboration of two teams; The Tele2 and Comhem Play teams. This fact was both rewarding and demanding for me since I had to ensure all parties were kept in the loop and agreed on the proposed solutions.