A look at the objectives, process, features and results of working on the X Factor Romania smartphone app in 2015 for iOS and Android as well as a few thoughts on second screen experiences and the opportunities they provide for mobile businesses.

1. Second Screen Experiences
Creating the Romanian X Factor 2015 Smartphone App
Madalin Craciun, Lead UX Designer www.mready.net

2. We’ll cover
X Factor App
a. Objectives
b. Overview
c. Process
d. Features
e. Spinoff Apps
f. What Went Right
g. What Went Wrong
h. Results
i. Potential Improvements
1.mReady Apps
2.Let’s Talk About the Telly
3.X Factor App
4. Why Care About Second Screen
Experiences
5. Q&A

3. mReady Apps
Small, Agile Team
2 Business & Support
6 App Development
2 App Design
Varied Projects
60+ Different Projects
130+ apps if counting iOS, Android,
Smartphones & Tablets
Stuff Like GDF / Engie, KPMG,
Fashion Days, Romanian Design
Week, How to Web, UX
Bucharest, Coca-Cola, KFC, Paul,
Antena Play… X Factor RO (and
many more)

4. Let’s Talk About the Telly
Sources
Accenture - Digital Video and the Connected Consumer
Accenture - Digital Consumer Survey
www.youtube.com/yt/press/en-GB/statistics.html

5. Let’s Talk About the Telly
Sources
Accenture - Digital Video and the Connected Consumer
Accenture - Digital Consumer Survey
www.youtube.com/yt/press/en-GB/statistics.html

6. Let’s Talk About the Telly
Sources
Accenture - Everyone’s a screenager. Now What?
Accenture - Engaging the digital consumer in the new connected world
87%
of TV viewers
use a second screen device
such as a smartphone, tablet or
laptop simultaneously
83%
of customers
read news online
daily and weekly

7. X Factor - App Objectives & KPI
Get people to download the app - not really an objective for the app alone ;)
min 10k downloads
got over 140k downloads (local star + TV + prime time)
Get people to vote
got over 330k votes
Get people to share their votes
got over 24k shares on Facebook alone
Get people to talk about the show & contestants

8. X Factor App
Overview
OS: iOS & Android
Platform: Smartphones
Region: Romania
Category: Entertainment
Key Features
voting
sharing
live streaming
in app messaging

9. X Factor App
Key Selling Point
You are the 4th Juror (alongside 3
Romanian stars - Stefan Banica
Jr., Delia Matache, Horia Brenciu)

10. Process

11. Process

12. Process

13. Process

14. Process

15. Process

16. Process

17. Main Features
Voting
cast your vote each week
vote for multiple contestants

18. Main Features
Sharing & Deep Linking
Branch.io
share your vote
each share link has a little info (who
voted, who they voted for)
share is a direct link to voted
contestant page
additional voting reinforced with
reminder that a friend also voted

19. Main Features
Twitch-Like Player & Live Stream
watch the show live
keep watching while browsing the
app

20. Main Features
In-App Messaging (Chat Wannabe)
for each contestant
for each juror
general chat
Moderate your message boards!
:):):)
O.o

21. Main Features
Web-Same features
articles
videos
pictures
did not get approved on the appstore
because of some pictures :)
Double check your content before
release!

22. Spinoff Apps
Chefi la Cutite (Game of Chefs)
quiz based on video
competition (lottery style)
weekly recipe

23. Spinoff Apps
iUmor
users would grade contestants
instead of voting for them

24. What Went Right?
felt more like “our product” so we were more motivated to get it right
the feeling of ownership as motivation
bugfixing was quick because of Crashlytics
custom events for when people would crash the app, what they were doing…
emails with crashes as they happened
very clear when the app would be used
very good promotion during the show
deployable a little ahead of time

25. What Went Wrong?
random server crashes
were not so random, a placeholder image was not cached and would overload the system
we did not push for final visual direction and copy early enough
we did not remove test comments on release
e.g. test, hei, 1234, ce faci ba?
underestimated how much messages would be used
we thought of it as more of a forum, users thought of it more as a chat system
got duplicate entries because of waiting times / lack of confirmation states
not nearly enough QA

26. Overall Results
much higher number of users than expected
high number of shares on Facebook
we’re still recommending Branch.io :)
and Crashlytics :)
contestants would promote themselves (and the app)
high review score (4.7 with 5200+ reviews)

27. Future Thoughts & Improvements
make time for more testing
moderate messaging!!!
work even closer with clients
get content sooner
if it looks like a chat system, it better be a chat system
play more on the chat system
vote through chat
article recommendations via chat
maybe look at what bots can do
gamify voting (reward voting & sharing)

28. Why Should I Care About Second Screen Experiences?
TV’s problem is a mobile opportunity
engagement when combined with social media skyrockets
e.g. The Walking Dead got 150k more tweets (40% increase)
so does awareness because of the additional chatter
very popular with sponsors
promoting related content (other shows, books, songs etc.)
gets more people to stick around during TV commercials
TV networks get a great way to collect more data about clients

29. Thank You!

30. Questions?
Madalin Craciun
Lead UX Designer at mReady
+40 722 397 716
madalin@mready.net
www.mready.net