After a little while Joris aka Reggie opens the door and invites me in. I’ve arrived at a good time as the Brain Fried show is on air and resident Father Futureback is playing his mix of punk, metal, noise, weirdo-records and sound bites recorded from Dutch television.

He plays all his music exclusively on vinyl which made me a little envious as I’ve moved over to digital for convenience. As I’ve got older its more difficult for me to spend time in record shops but for these guys they put in the hours to find the best music and for Reggie he has the benefit of actually working in one. Both Reggie and Futureback are great characters who have some amusing stories to tell and an expansive taste in music that they share with whoever cares to listen.

Eventually I catch up with Hugo van Heijningen the co-founder of the station. Currently he’s preparing for his first trip to SXSW where they’ve decided to invite some special guests such as Traumahelikopter to play in a clone of Red Light Radio at Fader Fort in Austin. Theres a good chance the Red Light concept will work quite well as its a similar kind of dazed crowd that you get on the streets of Austin during the festival as you do in De Wallen most nights of the week.

Hugo describes the early days in 2010 as being a communal effort with friends lending their equipment and their talents to help set up the station. What started out as a 3 month experiment has now grown into something of an institution for both the local music scene and international artists visiting the area on tour. Although he’s understated about the 10,000 plays the station gets a week via the website he asserts that there are enough loyal fans to make it worth putting in the time and the effort.

The programming of the station is taken care of by Hugo and his fellow co-founder Orpheu de Jong and its a varied mix of content and music that gets played out on the station. It’s not really down to a specific strategy but more about getting diverse and passionate people into the studio and letting them do their thing, as Hugo says ‘from hip hop to heavy metal everyone comes together in this building and everyone goes to each others gigs’.

The attitude, edginess and credibility of the output is getting noticed commercially which the 6 month old partnership with Converse highlights. With little money to be made by internet radio Hugo was pretty happy that the company showed an interest in them as its led to their trip to SXSW and they know do the live sessions together. Its clear that this partnership can help him realise some of the more ambitious ideas he might have for the station as well as attracting a larger audience.

Unlike London where dubstep, grime and indie has defined the sound of the city in recent times, Amsterdam doesn’t really have a style of music that it can call its own, but its probably only a matter of time before it does. What is coming out of the city is a lot of innovation, particularly in the start up scene with names like 22tracks and Shuffler.fm (Hugo happens to be their landlord) who are making a name for themselves internationally. The close proximity of all these people helps to fuel the creativity in the city, “everybody knows each other and really respects what each other is doing and we don’t see each other as competitors. Everyone really enjoys seeing people putting a lot of love and effort into something new in music”.

Hugo passionately tells me that Red Light Radio ‘fills the gap of all the bullshit stations in the air who have a lot of money but play the same music’. Although I’m not an expert on Dutch radio I’m not really that surprised, mainstream radio anywhere in the world generally plays the usual chart music on heavy rotation. Its interesting to note how Veronica, one of the biggest mainstream stations in the Netherlands, started life as an alternative radio station being broadcast offshore from a boat. But it wasn’t a group of passionate music lovers who set it up. It was a group electrical retailers instead who wanted to encourage people to buy radio sets!

What makes RLR compelling is that its not just a station but a concept that you want to be part of. It’s different and exciting and much like that cool upcoming band that only you and your friends know about, you want everyone to know about them but at the same time you never want them to get too mainstream just in case they lose their edge.

The other aspect of RLR is that it reflects both the character of Dutch culture and Amsterdam itself. There is an openness and passion to try something different and an attitude to embrace the diversity of their city and the many influences within it. At the same time this isn’t just a niche station that only locals are going to know about. With international artists making the effort to stop by, and SXSW around the corner both Hugo and Orpheu are looking to take Red Light Radio further afield to make its mark.

Salar talked about his motivation to create a platform that will hopefully be an integral part of the web that many millions of people will use around the world. Reaching this goal is a huge challenge, particularly when what Silk provide is a solution to a problem that people didn’t know they had in the first place.

Information is a valuable commodity but many people are not aware just how important it is to their lives and how companies like Facebook rely on our personal data to make money. Making sense of the vast amount of data that is out there on the web in meaningful ways can reveal important insights about our lives and society.

Salar used the example of how in 1854 Jon Snow discovered contaminated water in London by plotting deaths from cholera on a map (it’s an example used on their blog). Silk, he believes, can have the same impact. By enabling people to upload their content, structuring and visualising it they can start to see patterns and connections in a meaningful way. What makes this exciting for Salar is that by building a platform and infrastructure that is constantly evolving, its impossible to predict how people will use it in the future. If Silk succeeds then he hopes that one day people can build their own companies on that infrastructure.

So far Silk has only existed for three years and has been successful in receiving seed funding of $1.6 million. But it still needs to grow its user base and monetize the concept.

There was a funny moment when someone in the audience directed a question to the person sitting next to him, who earlier mentioned he was a fan of Silk. He asked, “I’m wondering what a fan of Silk uses it for”. The reply he got was “I don’t use it, I’m more of a browser and interested in its potential”.

Salar didn’t really elaborate too much on how Silk intends to reach or convert people who are just browsing into active users. But its interesting to note that obvious partnerships with media companies (such as the Guardian) are not really a good fit because its hard to deal with publishers as they don’t have a lot of money and resources. Instead the company are focusing on a freemium type service. This would mean access to certain features such as being able to host a Silk app on your own domain, displaying a logo or if you wanted to make your data private then that would cost money to.

Salar did reveal that an interesting trend they are seeing is that companies are using Silk internally to share data such as reports rather than use software that has cost hundreds and thousands of pounds/dollars/euros. It’s probably why they have a demo of a fictitious company on the site to illustrate this.

My first Creative Morning session gave me an insight into a local start up that’s attracting attention. Hopefully future Creative Mornings will focus on creativity and the challenges of bringing to life ideas. For me the morning was a useful way to meet a few locals working in the area. I got the impression that there’s lots of activity and energy in Amsterdam with many popular start ups such as 22tracks, Shuffler.fm, Layar and WeTransfer being based here.

The brief for the event was focused around One Service. We want to create experiences and connections across the BBC portfolio so that whichever of the ten BBC products you are using it’s possible to move between them seamlessly through features and interactions.

It’s a brief that conveys the role of User Experience and Design at the BBC. The team work right across the BBC portfolio ensuring that whatever product we are working in we are reflecting the Global Experience Language (GEL) which informs the way our products look and behave.

But GEL is something that is continually evolving and it’s important for us to look to the future. Multi-platform, personal, participatory and live experiences are all things that are influencing the future outlook of our products and the challenge is how we integrate all these things into one coherent experience across the BBC that we call One Service.

The UX&D Connected Studio highlighted how complex meeting this challenge is but it also brought some fresh perspective on how we might begin introducing some great new features that could make a really distinctive digital BBC service.

Six teams were shortlisted for the build studio on October 30 and 31. The outcome of those two days varied between the teams but the most successful projects did three things really well:

1. They had insight that illustrated that their idea was meeting a real audience need.

2. A clear articulation of why the project would help to achieve the One Service ambition.

3. A demo or prototype to bring the idea to life.

At the end of the second day all six teams presented 12 minute pitches with a Q&A afterwards from the judges. Here is an overview of each of the ideas.

383 Project showing a demo of their project BBC Highlights.

383 Project created a prototype called BBC Highlights. It’s a feature that enables the audience to create and share their own personal highlights. Using Top Gear as an example they illustrated how their feature could work in the context of the current BBC video player that exists across bbc.co.uk.

When the team pitched the project they did some research using Twitter and found that lot’s of people refer to particular moments within programmes, sharing timecodes or references. This sparked their motivation behind the project and it was great to see how they pursued and developed their idea from the pitch to a working demo.

The pitch was a good example of how the team took on board the brief and thought about how their concept addresses the BBC’s four screen strategy.

In contrast the project Crowd Surf evolved quite a bit from the original idea that was pitched during the Creative Studio. The core idea of reflecting moments of popularity across content remained. However, the method of navigation and discovery moved away from the idea of zooming in and out of popular content and seeing the number of people watching/listening.

Instead the team chose to develop a multi direction nav that delivered onward journey’s deemed most popular by other users.

BBC and System Concepts demo Crowdsurf

The most radical idea during the connected studio was Face Value by Soda and Nottingham University’s Mixed Reality Lab. The team developed facial recognition software that could respond to audience reaction. So it could tell you whether or not the person sat in front of their laptop with a webcam switched on was happy or sad watching something on BBC iPlayer for example.

For me the idea was reminiscent of the Meet the Listeners project by Radio 1 back in 2010 but that relied on people taking photos of themselves and sending them to the station.

This idea sounds fairly novel but it’s an interesting concept to consider when many devices that people buy now have built in cameras. It’s a method of input that is rarely considered when designing experiences for content, but as the recent version of iPlayer for Xbox (that uses kinect for gestural navigation) illustrates maybe that could change in the future.

Soda and Mixed Reality Lab showing a demo of their face recognition software

The agency TorchBox teamed up with BBC to explore an idea called the Live Companion. It’s an app that enriches a live event by collating relevant information from around the BBC and enables the audience to add their voice creating a mix of social and BBC content. The team put together a simple prototype using Javascript and CSS to present the idea.

Sarah Plant from TorchBox has written a good overview of her experience of the Connected Studio which is worth a read.

Torchbox presenting their mobile app prototype Live Companion

I’ve always been interested in how you can use time as a method of navigation through content so it was great to see one team try and tackle this concept.

Mudlark and the BBC teamed up for the project Time Machine – an interactive timeline of BBC content that lets you explore the threads of a story. The used BBC News as their starting point. So, if I’m reading a story about the Leveson enquiry for example, Time Machine would enable me to go back in time and explore all the events leading up to the most recent event.

We Are Mudlark presenting their Time Machine concept

BBC People is a really compelling concept that explores the idea of using BBC talent, historical figures, contributors or subjects as a way to navigate content across products.

Professor Brian Cox was their example of choice and although the team didn’t have a working demo to show they were able to tell a good story with some nice illustrations of user journeys that conveyed how their idea would meet the audience need they had identified during the creative studio.

BBC People presented by Faith Mowbray at the BBC Connected Studio

It was a tough couple of days for the teams but as a judge I found it really inspiring. It was interesting for me to see the range of approaches that the teams took to convey their ideas and also the fidelity of their visualisations and prototypes.

Hopefully the UX&D Connected Studio provided the teams taking part with an insight into the BBC, not only its complexities but also the opportunities that exist to create new kinds of experiences.

It was good to have people from my team at the BBC working together with external companies as it gave them an insight into how other teams work and think. This kind of collaboration is important to encourage innovation.

Although we only selected a couple of projects for the pilot stage each project that was presented during the build studio offered lots of food for thought in terms of how we might approach creating a One Service BBC.

Around 800,000 people visit the the BBC TV homepage every week and before the update it was a very basic experience. There wasn’t much in the way of content to browse and it didn’t provide a consistent experience across any other pages within the TV portfolio.

Old BBC TV homepage

Now there is a simplified version of the carousel that we designed for the TV channel pages containing 3 sections: ‘On Now’, ‘On Tonight’ and ‘Previews’. These three sections reflect what we felt to be the main user needs of people visiting the page enabling you to see what is live, plan your TV viewing for the evening and get access to clips from anticipated shows. And there is an updated toolbar that offers a variety of ways to access and navigate content via Channels, Categories, A-Z or the TV Guide.

New BBC TV homepage

The most significant change is the live video player. You might remember that during the Olympics one of the key features of the interactive video player was the ability to jump straight to key moments you may have missed using chapter markers. We’ve brought this functionality into the design of the new live TV video player so that you can switch between programmes broadcast during the last two hours. Coupled with the ability to rewind live TV it enables the audience to be really in control of what they watch and creates a rich experience that you don’t get via linear TV.

Live video player

Although figures for watching live tv online are still fairly small (only 15% of TV requests on iPlayer were for live programmes compared with 85% for on demand content in November), this could quickly change.

The Olympics was a great example of how people could really see the benefits of going online to watch content because of the rich experience they were offered. The key of course is offering this functionality on a TV itself and hopefully, with more internet connected TV’s in homes, this is what we will start to see in the near future.

In this video Nick Ritchie a designer on my team demonstrates how we prototyped the iPlayer Radio navigation.

The app is part of the wider iPlayer Radio product launch, a new brand that brings together all of BBC Radio and Music. Designing iPlayer Radio has been more than just a redesign as it’s a complete rethink of the BBC Radio & Music digital experience. Previously all of the BBC Radio websites were very separate and lacked consistency but now they share a common user experience and visual language. Part of this rethink has been our multi platform approach and the app is one example that demonstrates this.

It was a fairly unique project in that we were starting from scratch so we had the opportunity at the beginning to be quite exploratory in our thinking and try a range of different ideas. At the beginning we thought about who the app would appeal to and sketched ideas. Many of our visitors to BBC Radio are typically task orientated in that they know exactly what they are looking for whether its a station or a programme. So we thought a simple entry point would be to select a station and start listening live. Beyond this idea we also considered how a user could personalise the interface. We initially thought this could be interesting as mobile phones are inherently very personal devices and the idea of creating an interface that a user could customise with their favourite stations and programmes could be a good way into content.

After the home screen we then shifted attention to the playback page which is the most important area of the app. We really liked the idea of creating a dynamic experience, much like what you get on the Radio 1 website, where you can see which tracks are being played, messages from the audience and studio but also have the ability to interact with the show you are listening to using the built in functions of the phone such as the camera, location and messaging. The thinking was that this could potentially open up the opportunity for presenters to talk about this feature on air to encourage audience participation.

During this sketching phase we also payed a lot of attention to how a user would navigate the app using gestures and touch. We spent a lot of time looking at other apps and taking note of what works and doesn’t. Our main aim was to create a simple and intuitive interface and to achieve this we sketched a rough architecture of the app so we had an idea of how it might hang together and then considered the user journeys between sections. At a granular level we then considered which touch controls or gestures would be appropriate to use in each section.

It was really important to me that the app had an element of playfulness. Tai and I spent time discussing transitions, movements, sound and elements of the interface that would make the app a joy to use and have what I called a ‘signature’ element of its experience which would make it stand out from other apps.

To encourage regular use we also thought about how we might give the app some kind of utility which led us to think about the alarm clock feature. It started life in these early sketches.

The sketching phase was really helpful to explore a range of ideas and then start forming some decisions around what we thought could make a compelling app. Moving on we then decided to prototype to bring our ideas to life. For this phase of the project we partnered with Kent Lyons who provided both visual and technical expertise to translate the ideas we wanted to explore in the prototype.

Working on the prototype helped to challenge some of the ideas we had during the sketching phase as seeing things working in front of you is very different from what you have on paper. The team at Kent Lyons initially built some simple wireframe prototypes based on our sketches which helped to rationalise which sections we needed to get designed and built. Then the visual design was applied, this was an iterative process as we had the general look and feel to consider and specific interface elements such as icons.

It was while we working on the visual design that we started exploring how we might use the radio station logos in the interface. The logos are really well suited to a touch interface because their shape and size are finger and thumb friendly and because of this they have an inherent playful quality about them. Initially we thought they would work well in the EPG as a way of ‘tuning’ into different stations. As a concept it was well received by the wider team internally at the BBC. So we began to iterate on it and it evolved like this (click on the numbers or the image to see them):

The playback page went through a number of iterations to. We mainly focused on music programmes as they have richer info we can play with. We prototyped how dynamic data such as tracks being played would animate in and work as a timeline in the interface. This is an example of the Annie Mac playback page that enables a user to swipe the track left and right and its also possible to tap on each track to favourite and reveal more info.

One aspect of the app that was particularly difficult to get right was the EPG. Perhaps not the most exciting aspect of any design process, its important in this app because it gives the user an overview of all the radio stations and quick access to on demand programmes. We struggled with how a user would navigate to it. Initially we considered a button in the interface, but after designing the EPG in portrait it clearly wasn’t practical. Changing orientation was the answer as it provides a lot more space, it also means that a user can access the EPG at any point in the app if they feel like browsing and listening to something else.

We prototyped many ideas that didn’t make it in the final app but unfortunately I can’t share them just yet as it would spoil the surprise of future features we may want release.

After this prototyping phase we looked ahead and started planning the app for launch. We learnt a lot from the prototype but there were still many improvements we could make. We had suffered from overloading the interface with too many features and sections. So to get the app ready for launch we went back to basics. Kathryn Leach joined the project at this time and she created a flow diagram of the entire app which visualised all the key user journeys. This helped us to get rid of an unnecessary sections and keep track of what we needed to do in order to deliver the final app. This is one example of a flow for live listening.

For the final version of the app we reworked the look and feel and simplified the interface. We set out to achieve a logical flow to the page. The station branding sits at the top so that there is a visual relationship between the schedule button and the station. Reducing the size of the programme image helped to create space and also give us the opportunity to make it a useful part of the interface.

 When you tap it, the page flips around to reveal more info about the programme, onward journeys and the option to set an alert for the next broadcast and share options.

The other key change was the play control panel. The new iPlayer Radio website provides a range of curated content for each station. We wanted to include this content in the interface but not at the expense of cluttering the interface. So we designed the play control panel to be swipeable and reveal the additional content such as video and audio clips. To indicate the hidden content the panel bounces when the user first views the page. This visual cue brings a playfulness and element of discovery into the interface.

We also overhauled the now playing information (data corresponding to what it is on air such as track information). The initial approach was very visual, however using text is a lot more scalable, as the panel has to work across a range of both music and speech programmes.

A useful feature is the ability to save track information to a favourites list to email or tweet. We prototyped lots of ideas around this feature which I haven’t elaborated on as some of them may appear in future updates. The graphic equaliser is a fun addition but also really useful feedback to indicate to the user that the programme is playing and not paused (or buffering).

The final home screen went through a number of iterations to get the animation to have the right amount of responsiveness, friction and easing. We also integrated a new feature which is the ability to add and edit your local radio stations.

While we were working on the iPhone app we were also busy with the Android version. It’s currently being prepared for launch and offers a similar user experience and design to the iPhone app. The key difference is that we have optimised elements of the interface specifically to be consistent with native Android behaviours and interactions.

This is the first version of the app, so expect new features and interface refinements in time.

Credits

This app was the combined effort of some very talented people. Wai Tai Li worked with me in the early stages of the project to brainstorm and sketch ideas. I worked with Paul Sissons to commission the prototyping work and review the work in-progress that Kent Lyons had produced. The team at Kent Lyons were superb, their expertise helped us translate our ideas into a working prototype. James Simcock worked with us during both the prototyping phase and the final implementation of the app. Not only did he provide creative input and also led the project editorially, he ensured the stakeholder process was as smooth as possible. James is a mobile guru, his insights and experience were invaluable.  Mark Timson helped us refine the home screen with his After Effects talents producing many iterations to get the animation just right. Last but not least I worked with Kathryn Leach during the final stages of the app. She created the  flow diagrams, visual design and produced all the assets and worked with our technical partners to ensure they delivered it to our requirements – for both iOS and Android.

Ulrik Hogrebe has written a blog post describing the UX&D Connected Studio and how to get involved and the brief can be downloaded from the website.

One of the themes for the UX&D Connected Studio is Time. I’ve spent many years working across a multitude of different broadcast propositions for the BBC and reflecting time is the thing that always makes taking these broadcast propositions online the most challenging. So I thought I would share some thoughts based on this experience at the BBC.

The most interesting aspect of designing a time based experience is reflecting what is happening live right now because you are creating a system that has to accommodate and adapt to different situations.

One of the best ways to see this in action is on the Radio 1 website which launched last year. The interface constantly updates to display tracks that are currently playing, audience tweets and messages from the studio. Presenters refer to the website frequently during their shows helping to drive people to the website to interact with the content and the show itself.

The homepage stores all the live content so that the audience can go back in time and see what was played or tweeted during the show. This enables the audience to catch up on what they may have missed, particularly fans of music shows that are interested in seeing a history of the tracks played out on a show.

The homepage also changes to reflect big moments such as a celebrities visiting the studio. When this happens the Radio 1 team can switch the cameras and the homepage adapts to show live video from the studio with additional information about the guest and social media.

This Radio 1 example demonstrates some of the core principles of designing a time based experience:

1. A flexible interface that can accommodate different moments in time from a big event to not much happening at all.
2. An interface that feels ‘alive’ and constantly updating.
3. An interface that provides a mechanism for the audience to interact with the output itself.
4. The ability to join in with the moment but also see what you have just missed.

Using these principles as a starting point its possible to consider how they could evolve into design patterns that could potentially work across BBC Online. Live output for TV and Radio is an established convention whether its news or music events there is a certain aesthetic to live output that differentiates itself from something that is prerecorded. For the digital space we are still exploring how best to reflect liveness through interaction and visual design.

It’s worth noting that my definition of a live experience within an interactive, digital space doesn’t mean just embedding a live news broadcast on a webpage. It means augmenting the live broadcast content with additional data. This could be tracks that are currently being played on the radio or live video with sports statistics overlaid and social media. How we present this real time information in a compelling and accessible way touches on one of the main aspects of the Connected Studio brief, which is to explore how the user experience of BBC online becomes a recognisable part of the BBC brand through features and interactions.

The components that make up a live experience include motion to indicate something is updating to features such as alerts to keep the audience engaged with the content. How we create a common ‘live’ language across the BBC and a set of features that enable rich interactions with live content is an example of how the Global Experience Language (GEL) can expand and evolve to incorporate more than just guidelines and the use of typography.

History also plays an important part of time based experiences. The data that is generated during the live event can be captured to enable us to go back in time and see what we missed and what was said. One of my favourite projects is ‘Meet the Listeners’ where Radio 1 presenters asked the audience to submit pictures of themselves throughout the day. To navigate the content we used time as a filter. Users were able to select a specific time period during the day and then view the show that was on air accompanied by photos of the audience that was listening.

The ability to aggregate content by time across the BBC and infuse it with contributions by the audience would create an interesting historical view of live events. It would also enable rich user journeys when historical moments become timely and resurface because of their relevance to live events.

My colleague Paul Rissen has written a great blog post titled ‘How to Build a Time Machine’ where he suggests that we:

‘Make time addressable – give packets (i.e. spans of time) URIs, and then we can link to them, we can build services, applications, imaginative creations on top. Web Standard Time.’

Again, GEL feels like the place where we can start to introduce these concepts. By making time addressable we can start to introduce time as a key navigational element that could potentially sit across the BBC website and the many platforms we produce content for. This would enable journeys that would create interesting stories in themselves, curating moments that are relevant to key moments in time or to a persons own personal history.

This week we launched new homepages for BBC One, Two, Three and Four. It’s a huge departure from the previous design that was very static in terms of content and didn’t really showcase the breadth of content from the channel.

Last year we identified three key strategic objectives for the TV and iPlayer portfolio:

1. Beyond catch up.

2. Beyond the PC.

3. Beyond the tech savvy.

This relaunch is the first step towards realising these objectives. It provides access to what is currently live on the channel, it’s accessible on tablet and mobile and it’s designed to be simple and accessible.

Design

The new approach enables serendipitous discovery of programmes by using a carousel to display content and it’s been designed responsively so that it scales and presents information appropriately across different screen sizes for mobile, tablet and desktop computers. By creating one website that responds to the device a person is using, eliminates the need for different designs for each specific device on the market.

This was perhaps the toughest challenge as it was the first time that a BBC team had attempted to design and build a responsive website. One of the key challenges from a UX perspective was designing a layout that would scale from a widescreen monitor right down to screens that are only 320×416 pixels while still retaining the integrity and usability of the user experience.

This is an example of the different screen sizes that our design needed to accomodate:

Taking a responsive approach changed the way we typically design and think about our digital products. The layout of content and the interaction design needs to be robust enough to work and make sense to people on a range of devices that include large and small phones/tablets both touch and non-touch. Making one change needs to be considered across different devices.

Our design needed to capture how the interface itself scales and is optimised for different screens and devices. One example is how our nav bar scales.

A large tablet in portrait will get this. Here the spacing and hit state is quite different from what you would get on the desktop version as its optimised for tablet tapping and browsing.

And a mobile phone in portrait will get this:

The scaling also applies to the content in the carousel. This example gives you an idea of how tweets, blog posts and collection’s scale between mobile and tablet.

Having different content types in the carousel is a challenge as it can be potentially confusing to the user. We’ve applied a distinctive look and feel for each type of content which hopefully makes it clear what is video, a tweet, a blog post etc.

We have already started working on how to improve our approach to responsive design, in particular we are trying to stream line the number of breakpoints. Ste Everington, a designer on my team, will soon be posting his thoughts on this.

Curation and the channel brands

One of the key features of the carousel is that it presents content in a timely way. You can see what is currently being broadcast live as well as what is coming up. The editorial team are able to update the carousel with relevant content from across social networks and also with content that is specific for that channel. We took this approach so that while the design of each channel homepage is the same the personality of the brand is still reflected not only through the branding but also the content such as new comedy in the Feed My Funny section on BBC Three and themed collections from the archive on BBC Four.

I think one of the most profound changes is that we have tried to bring together the four BBC channel brands. Previously it wasn’t possible to easily move between BBC One, Two, Three and Four and now it’s possible to switch channels in the navigation bar. Strategically this will hopefully mean that each of the channel brands will see an increase in traffic as what we’ve found through user testing is that our audience is more likely to explore other channels if its easy for them to do so. The other channels are accessed via our new TV Guide, that enables you to go back and see programmes that you’ve missed and play the content if we have it available in iPlayer.

My colleague Dan Taylor talks more about the editorial perspective over at the BBC Internet blog.

Audience insights

User testing was an important part of designing the new channel homepages. We wanted to make sure our multi platform approach worked. Two key insights gave us confidence with the new design. The first was that participants were able to find content easily and also discovered new programmes that they wouldn’t usually watch. The second was that the consistency between different platforms was appreciated. A couple of things that didn’t work so well included content underneath the carousel being missed and the live call to action was not obvious enough. Subsequent releases will fix these issues (and others such as being able to swipe left and right on tablets) and also improve the interface with iterative features.

User testing forms one part of how we gain insights from our audience. The other is through tracking the usage of our digital products. With this new channels launch we will be able to receive stats on which areas of the page are getting clicked including the buttons and filters on the carousel, helping us to understand how well the user experience is performing.

Final thoughts…

It’s been quite a journey to get this far and I’m glad that we’ve been able to deliver what I think is a really great experience for our TV loving audience. I think what this new launch also signifies is how the BBC Online portfolio is evolving. The Global Experience Language (GEL) ties all the of the BBC’s digital products together and it’s expanding and constantly evolving to encompass more design patterns including those for mobile and tablet. The carousel, iconography and type all stem from GEL and help to create a coherent BBC experience. The responsive design approach is also part of the evolution. Consistency across platforms is important and our audience appreciate it. It also creates a new workflow for our teams and encourages innovation, how we make it part of GEL and integrate a responsive approach to the wider BBC online portfolio still needs to be worked out. It’s new territory but this new release of the channel homepages provides a good foundation for the future.

Recently I sat on a panel titled ‘UX’s role in great branding and how to get it right‘. The panel included Lawerence McCahill from Spook Studio, Jon Darke from Every Interaction, James Bloom a freelance Creative Director and discussion was chaired by Russell Vaught. The audience were a mix of start ups and UX professionals.

In summary we discussed why UX is important in terms of brand strategy, tone of voice, the importance of good UX to build trust and loyalty with an audience, start ups vs big organisations, good and bad examples of UX and branding, user testing, iterating products and where to start with the brand experience.

The evening finished up with pitches from three start ups who talked through their user experience problems. Hidden Little Gems, a facebook app suffered from button language and the limitations of Facebook, Bagservant faced problems with prioritising their brand message and Yoomoot struggled with their complex commenting system.

I thought I’d capture a few notes and key themes from the discussion.

Tone of Voice

Tone of voice is important. Get it right and you can engage and grow your target audience, get it wrong and people will be turned away and may never come back. The UX is can support the tone of voice in many ways. A playful UX can reflect the playful nature of a brand and so on.

For large organisations maintaining a consistent tone of voice can be tricky because of the heritage, legacy and multiple brands an organisation owns.

Radio 1 and Radio 4 are two stations that attract very different audiences and the UX is prioritised to support the two different audience needs. However, despite the diversity of brands the BBC’s tone of voice is maintained through the Global Experience Language (GEL). It’s the common thread that enables everything that the BBC does on digital platforms to hang together in terms of typography, interactions and design patterns.

Start ups have an advantage because they don’t have any legacy. They can evolve the brand and tone of voice over time. Dropbox is a good example. They have done a good job of making the complicated task of sharing files simple and the relationship between the UX and branding is really strong and supports the tone of voice they express through the copy and illustrations on their website and apps. Check out the tour of Dropbox as an example.

Why UX is important to brand strategy?

If I attempted to purchase something through a website and it was complicated, wasn’t secure and didn’t inform me whether or not my purchase had been successful then I wouldn’t trust the brand and I wouldn’t use the website ever again. This is why UX is important to brand strategy. Good UX is pivotal to building trust with audiences. If its a great experience that is engaging and reliable and then people are likely to use the product or service again.

User Experience beyond the website?

We moved into service design territory when we discussed how user experience needs to extend beyond just a website. Amazon was cited as an example of good customer experience not only online but also the service provided when calling them and returning products. Whether a start up is offering digital or physical products how they respond to their customers particularly when things go wrong is crucial to their success. This is something that can’t be automated and a human touch is often the best way to resolve issues.

User testing

Testing was an interesting area of discussion where we talked about how important testing early and iteratively is to refining a user experience. In terms of scale (e.g. number of participants and testing facilities) it depends on the project and the complexity of thing that you want to test. We also touched on the idea of A/B testing (or sometimes termed as split testing) and how that can also to refine different interactive features, layouts and positioning of buttons or calls to action. Stats also play a role in optimising the UX. Being able to track not only user journeys but also interactivity provides a rich insight into who is using what within a product or service.

Simplicity and transparency

It was mentioned a few times but generally a lot of what we were talking about was common sense. Build a brand and create a great experience around it to keep people happy and coming back for more.

Of course this is easier said than done. Many of the examples we cited are the result of refinement over time using a number of different methods including stats and testing.

Keeping a proposition simple is often the best way to launch a product or service. It’s easy to get carried away and try to cram lots of features. Being disciplined with what stays in and what doesn’t means that you can keep your audience engaged over time. Offer them the best possible user experience with a useful but initially minimum feature set and then introduce more features as you iterate and grow your audience.

Transparency is important to. Maintain a dialogue with your audience and keep them up to date. This helps with building anticipation for your next release and also when things go wrong your audience is more likely to bear with you while you get things right because the dialogue and trust has already been established.

The iPhone app contains a number of challenges to build an object within a certain time limit. Once assembled, you place the object on the cardboard and then take a photo to win points and unlock further objects to build. There is also a two player game and an option to create albums of your own objects that you can catalogue and share your creations. To see how it works check out the video on YouTube.

It’s encouraging that a company that has such a heritage and legacy are able to experiment and explore how they can evolve their products and introduce new ways to experience Lego. It feels innovative because it adds a new dynamic but doesn’t change the fundamental aspect of what people enjoy about Lego , that it’s creative, imaginative and tactile.

Life of George get’s the relationship between physical and digital play just right and it feels like Lego are uniquely placed. Their physical products are still in demand and are compelling for kids, they don’t have the same issues as the music or publishing industry where the pendulum has swung strongly in favour of digital products and distribution.  Personally I think that the tactile nature of  toys and books is hugely important for children but it’s inevitable that kids wil get exposed to and be curious about digital tech early on in their lives especially with their mum’s and dad’s using phones and computers in front of them. What Life of George shows is that technology can allow for new physical experiences without getting in the way.