Product Design Lead
…C is for Cookie. D is for Deadwood…
HBO Max was known for mature, groundbreaking stories; not your first choice as streaming babysitter. Yet it was loaded with top-tier kids’ content: Cartoon Network, Sesame Workshop, Looney Tunes and Ghibli.
Retention was high on HBO Max accounts with active kid viewers. But the majority of kid profiles had checked out. If content wasn’t the problem, what was?
Gaps are opportunities
I took a step back to find out: What do parents and kids value in a streaming service? This’d make it easier to spot gaps on Max.
I worked with research to execute a plan — a combination of surveys, interviews and 3rd-party digging. I homed in on a handful of wants and expectations. These became the basis for shared understanding (and productive brainstorming) among teams.
Parents want…
Only 24% of subscribers believed that HBO Max was kid-friendly. We couldn’t rely on parents to draw kids in.
❤️ Adults value kid safety. And kids value autonomy. How do we signal that HBO Max has a safe place for kids to stream?
🧪 At the top of the list, we tested a default Kids profile. Seemed like a no-brainer, but it was a shift; HBO Max had significant niche pride. We strived to make Kids feel artful and considered.
We built soft branding to underscore, Kids are expected and served on HBO Max. Later, we swapped in text variants, making it easier to translate Kids into 20+ languages.
Adding a default Kids profile (DKP) certainly boosted engagement. After 1 month (US), DKPs were 11x more active than OKPs (newly created profiles). And DKPs stuck around ~15 minutes more per session than OKPs.
🧪 As a fast follow, we added a feature to allow parents to tweak ratings en route. This snappy detour boosted trust. It made it easy for parents to understand and modify ratings. Parents liked it. Across all app features, subscribers’ were most satisfied with parental controls and profiles (79%).
❤️ Parents want to stream with their kids. How do we make it easy to launch ‘us time’ on HBO Max?
🧪 Here, design championed rebranding the generic Kids & Family page to just Family. We no longer needed a kids sampler (thanks to the default Kids profile). What we did need was a single destination for a family night ticket — content to entertain all ages. With supervision, ratings were less relevant.
Kids want…
Of kids who trickled into HBO Max, repeat viewing was low. Kids had more attractive streaming choices. Bad news for Max, as kids influence subscription selection (50% in US and UK, per SuperAwesome).
❤️ Kids want choice without effort. How do we make Max feel loaded, fresh, and instantly gratifying?
🧪 To boost a perception of freshness, I recast content seasonally. For one, I created a ‘tool’ to generate neon signs from line art. It had impact. Kids streamed content longer through these entry points.
I designed the character row (sampled below) to allow efficient reskins. With 175+ characters, was it worth all the mouse-moves? The reskins almost doubled MoM playback.
I brewed another test to boost perception of choice. HBO Max was designed to float popular shows to kids. So it was possible to exhaust visible content fast.
🧪 By using AI to tag content, we could generate ‘themed mixes’ on the fly. A mix offered a new way to consume content. Unlike episodic content, cartoons could be enjoyed out of order. Or as short clips.
Plus, a mix more closely aligned with kids’ routines:
- 🥣 Short clips in the morning
- 🚌 Background mix when doing homework
- 📺 Lean in mix during playtime
- 🛌🏿 Wind down mix before bed
Although this concept stalled in the lab, it demonstrates how to build conviction by knowing both:
- The value of our ingredients. HBO Max kids’ catalog had major Cheeto dust
- What matters to kids
Within 1 Year
- 15M active accounts with 1+ kid profiles
- 27% of global accounts have at least 1 kid profile
- 9% of kid profiles are active weekly