Overview
Many Twitch streamers host special events unique from their typical daily streams.
What are special events? These include celebratory birthday parties, subathons, donathons, milestones, and more streamers make into an interactive virtual party.
Did you know? Twitch has 140 million active visitors each month.
Many Twitch streamers try to make these special events enjoyable and interactive so their audience can celebrate and have fun with them.
As a UX UI designer, my role in this project was interviewing Twitch streamers and viewers who have hosted and watched special events on stream to understand how to improve their success and shortcomings.
The Problem
The Twitch Special Events category includes a wide array of diverse streams that are unrelated to one another, making standing out and promoting streams in this category challenging.
• The absence of specific categories in special events poses a challengingin locating desired special events on Twitch, making it confusing and cumbersome for viewers to find events tailored to their preferences.
• Lack of promotion and awareness of special events can make hosting these unique streams challenging, especially when participation is key to their success..
• Building a supportive community and raising event awareness hinges on overcoming these hurdles and ensuring active viewer participation.
User Research
I interviewed streamers who hosted special events and viewers who have been in special event streams to understand challenges and preferences of these events.
- Understand the most challenging parts of running a special event: Many livestreamers have struggled to attract an audience and interact with them.
- To understand motivation and strategies: What motivates a Twitch streamer to organize live-stream special events, and what strategies have you employed to achieve your goals?
- Discover challenges of running and viewing special events: What issues have livestreamers had running events and what issues have viewers experienced?
Competitive Analysis
How Twitch can improve its position?
- Focus on users goals to solve specific problems with awareness and visibility.
- Twitch could compete better by niching down event categories further by providing subcategories.
- Twitch could compete better by improving live streaming tools for special events.
Why doesn't Twitchs' current way work?
- Variety of live streams that have unrelated content but all labeled "special events".
- Random amount of sorted categories for special events.
- Lack of awareness of what the special event is about.
Key Research Questions
- What proves to be the most challenging aspect when it comes to raising awareness and promoting a special live stream event?
- What drives your motivation behind organizing live stream special events, and what strategies have you employed to achieve your goals in this regard?
- What specific challenges or issues have you faced during your live stream special events?
What makes it challenging to promote and host a special event on Twitch?
A large amount of special events happening at once
Many streamers do unique event streams that are very different and share no overlapping similar audiences.
Poor categorization
Whether you are streaming a birthday stream, a live concert, a TED talk, or another special event, they will all be listed together under one category.
No good discovery for special events
If you enjoy karaoke special events but are not interested in the newest technology showcase, you will need the option to discover the specific events you want.
Ideation
Main Pages of the Product
- I discovered the four essential categories the special events application would need to help find and raise awareness of Twitch special events.
The library and main goal of Gateway Gamers to have a library and list of all the games that you own.
The homepage which lists new and popular games along with information and reviews on them.
The search page which includes the ability to discover and find all of the games that you own to review or add to your library.
Game information page that has all the information about the genre and style of game along with reviews.
From my research and the invaluable feedback from my audience, I've uncovered a treasure trove of tools. These include concepts that put you, the user, at the heart of the app, shaping it to deliver the events you want.
Twitch SE Branding
The Logo
- The logo is reminiscent of the Twitch purple.
- Reminiscent of a television set with the logo letters inside of it.
- Design is fun and quirky.
Style and Icons
- Twitch special events is geared towards gamers and a younger audience who like poppy and bright colors.
- Bright pinks and greens make it pop while the purple keeps it reminiscent of the original Twitch website and application.
Solution
Customize the sign-up experience for the users preferences
Users will be able to get recommended specific types of special events based on their event preferences.
- Users can choose when signing up what kind of events that interest them.
- Users can filter events even further in the settings menu to decide what events they would like to see.
Event Categories
Unlike Twitch that lists all special events as one section even categories will help users find the kind of events they want to view.
- Users can pick from specific special events that they are curious about.
- They can easily discover special events that they would enjoy by clicking on a particular event section
Following
Users can see special events hosted by users that they are currently already following.
- This makes it easier than twitch to know when your favorite viewers are running a special event.
- The subtext hashtags for events give the users an ideas of what kind of events are being run.
Discovery
Based on the algorithm of streams you have watched and what kind of events you like the discovery section will help you find currently live special events.
- The discovery section is based on understanding the viewers specific viewing habits.
- Users can quickly scroll through live streams based on popular, and what kind of events the viewer would most likely to want to watch.
Special Event Creation
- Live streamers will have the option to customize and create special events in ways that help with discovery.
- Streamers will be ablet to notify viewers in advance of upcoming special event streams that will be happening in the future.
- Live streamers will have a special create an event button at the top of their mobile app.
Testing and Iterations
Users enjoyed the application and thought it was useful for both viewing and creating special events on the Twich platform.
- Participants found the design of the special events app to be useful and closely aligned with the original Twitch app.
- Users felt that the special events page was beneficial in creating upcoming events and notifying viewers of said events.
Interviews/Questionnaires
I conducted interviews before creating any designs to understand the challenges and goals of running special event streams on Twitch.
- All users desired an improved experience in discovering and hosting special events.
- Users said they struggled to promote events that they were hosting.
- Users desired a better way to notify viewers of when an events was happening.
- Users’ wanted to be able to grow their audience while running special events and wanted a better way to viewers to find their event streams.
Improvements
- Thanks to user feedback I added several suggested features including a watch party, a messaging system, event filters, and notifications.
- The overall design was improved to more closely align with the design of the Twitch mobile app.
- Warnings were added based on feedback that some nefarious people would come in and try to mess up live stream events.
Final Product
Next Steps
Have live streamers review their viewers' interactions after using the Twitch special events app to create their next stream event.
Gather viewers' feedback on their experience viewing and communicating with live streamers in the app is crucial.
Use feedback to not only helps us understand their needs better but also guides us in making the app more user-friendly and engaging.
Lessons Learned
Understand Challenges Users Face
I learned essential lessons from understanding viewers' and live streamers' biggest pain points when creating and watching special events on Twitch.
Listen To Feedback
I learned many new things from users' feedback using the application and what improvements could be made to make it more useful for streamers and viewers alike.
