YouTube Creator Studio
Partnership with University Of Michigan and YouTube
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Overview
Role
UX Researcher
Timeline
01/2018 – 4/2019
Type
Web
This project was a partnership between YouTube and a UX Research Methodology course at the University of Michigan. I collaborated with with 4 others.
My goal was to investigate the user experience of Creator Studio. This is a tool that is utilized by YouTube content creators to manage, create, edit, and share their videos on YouTube.com.
The Process
Architecture Map
We began by conducting background research to develop an understanding of our product and users. This led us to create an interaction map.
Interviews and Personas
We then ran a round of interviews with 5 content creators to understand their unique experience with Creator Studio. Two of them used competitor products(e.g. Instagram & Twitch)
This led us to create characteristic personas. I was responsible for 2 of the 5 content creator interviews.
Ahmed
-Content creator that focused on creating gaming videos.
-Only has a few subscribers as he is a new YouTube creator.
-He wishes to grow his YouTube subscriber count by uploading more often.
-He has trouble deciding how to title, tag and edit his video descriptions in order to grow an audience.
Casey
-Content Creator that focuses on karaoke, dance and make-up videos.
- -Over 7000 subscribers right now but is looking to grow to 10,000.
- -Although she knows analytics are useful, she is intimidated from using new software she doesn’t have training in.
- -She looks up to other successful creators for aspiration but she is appreciative of how successful she has become.
Comparative Analysis
We then performed a comparative analysis of 9 of YouTube’s industry competitors to look at the innovations, trends, and successes in online content creation.
I lead the design and organization of the analysis.
Survey
Next, we conducted an online survey for both YouTube content creators and YouTube viewers to gather quantitative data we could perform substantive analyses with.
Heuristic Analysis
Then we tested a set of heuristics of the current website. The
portion I was responsible for was to develop the heuristics to test the Creator Studio. I based my heuristics on the Nielsen heuristics for user interface design to find rapid and easy fixes for the Beta.
Usability Test
Next, we conducted an online survey for both YouTube content creators and YouTube viewers to gather quantitative data we could perform substantive analyses with.
Finding #1 –
Analytics, Searching, and Filtering
We had found that currently, new creators have a hard time using and understanding how analytics in Creator Studio works and its benefits. We also learned through our usability study that users had a hard time discovering features like the filter function and searching for a specific video.
Recommendations
1st Priority– Pop-Ups
Use ‘pop-ups’ to notify users of new features available in Creator Studio. This could help users by providing tips and tricks to familiarize themselves with new ways to use analytics.
2nd – Personalize
It would be useful to let creators personalize their overview tab to choose what shows up there. This will only show content that is of interest to the creator.
3rd – Improve Search
Add the ability to improve the search feature by allowing the user to not only search for keywords in the title and description but also to search for features of creator studio.
Finding #2 –
Tagging and Sharing
During our usability tests, it showed that sharing videos from
Creator Studio was difficult for our users. Many were familiar with the
main YouTube website to share but it was dissimilar from the Creator
Studio version.
Recommendations
1st priority –Share Button
Add the ability to improve the search feature by allowing the user to not only search for keywords in the title and description but also to search for features of creator studio.
2nd – Mass Share
Ability to automate sharing a video to multiple platforms, directly from the dashboard of YouTube Creator’s Studio. This is similar to what other social media platforms currently do. This would save substantial time for creators because the alternatives have been to manually post on each website.
3rd – Trending Tags
Add the ability to see “current popular tags” when uploading a video. This could help spread the video around and reach broader audiences. This feature was inspired by Twitter’s trending hashtags.
Project Reflection
Research Limitations
Our investigations, while they produced interesting results, had a few limitations. For our interviews, survey, and usability tests, we had hoped to recruit more users than we ended up working with. Another issue was the difficulty in recruiting content creators. We overcame this by also recruiting viewers to supplement the smaller pool of creators we were able to reach.
Next Steps
Although working with both viewers and creators is beneficial, we had wished to recruit more creators. One of our recommended next steps is to increase the sample size by recruiting more people for our tests to reach a better level of
saturation.
Additionally, we recommend doing A/B testing with certain aesthetic and placement design considerations, such as choosing to display filter and search bar as two separate fields or combining them.
Another consideration is to test the discrepancy between which areas in analytics creators fixate on longer, and adding those options to the overview tab in analytics.
Lesson #1
I found the most valuable part to me was the ability to practice what I’ve been learning, since this is my style of learning. Essentially, practice makes perfect.
Lesson #2
One of the biggest lessons I’ve learned during this process was to be more empathic with other’s work habits and the speed that they work. Its a key ingredient of it what it means to be a part of a team.
Lesson #3
The last lesson I learned was that I should not be afraid to fail. Early on in the course, we had to demo a usability test in class as a way to practice conducting them. Although I was initially afraid to make a mistake, I went through the demo without a hitch. I realized it was an opportunity to practice what I’ve learned thus far but in a controlled environment.
I’m greatly appreciative of that opportunity. One of the biggest lessons I’ve learned during this process was to be more empathic with other’s work habits and the speed that they work. Its a key ingredient of it what it means to be a part of a team.