17 August 2002
Netflix, Part 2
by Brian L. Dear
Part Two of an Ongoing Series
[Read Part One]
Last time, we looked at the Netflix homepage. This time, we'll look at quite a few other aspects of the
service.
By the way, I heard from Neil Hunt, VP of Ecommerce at Netflix, who read Part One and informed me that the happy puppy has a better
conversion rate than the happy woman. But only "by a whisker," he says. Neil also says that of course they have data for all of the things I asked 'em about. He also says that "testing reveals that browsing before signing up for the service is very negative; potential customers apparently browse until their 10-minute time slot is up, and fail to sign up. There's a bunch more work for us to do here, of course." He adds that the "featured null" is "an exclusive for viewers from Nettle :-)". Such a kidder. Hope to hear back
from Netflix after you've read Part Two below!
If you're looking at the picture and wondering, yes, you guessed right. My first three Netflix DVDs arrived, each in a separate red envelope (they're not quite exactly the same as pictured in the mouth of the puppy, but that's ok :-).
Took only one day for the discs to arrive -- thanks
no doubt to there being a Santa Ana fulfillment center and me being in Southern California. Netflix had
estimated the discs would arrive today, so it was nice to see that they were early.
A quick note on trying to open these envelopes -- you have to be careful or you'll rip 'em. There's a little instructional blurb inside a white oval at the lower-left-hand corner of the front envelope that tells you to "Open Here" (see picture above). A potential usability issue is the fact that the arrow to the left of "Open Here" points directly left, when in fact you have to insert a finger directly under the "Open Here" oval blurb, get between the two pages, then
motion left and upwards, tearing along the perforation.
- [Recommendation]: Consider changing the arrow next to "Open Here" so it points to the bottom or to the corner.
There's also a sticker at the top center that you have to carefully split in two. If you do all that, then the envelope opens like a book to reveal
the DVD disc hidden in a sleeve inside.
The DVD is enclosed in a small Tyvek sleeve. On one side of the sleeve is a bar-code and the DVD title, running time, and a mini description.
In all three of my rentals, the Tyvek sleeves were well-worn from their travels around the country (I'm suddenly reminded of Indiana Jones: It's not the years, it's the mileage..) It's amazing this flimsy packaging survives the United States Postal System. One wonders how many "cycles" (pick-and-pack, ship-to-customer, customer-uses, customer-reseals-envelope, customer-drops-in-the-mail, USPS-ships-to-fulfillment-center) these discs can go through before wearing out or being crushed, cracked, or scratched.
Another data point -- these things are easy to lose track of (read: throw away) once they're inside one's house. It'd be interesting to find out what percentage of customers returns discs in non-Netflix envelopes.
One other thing --- in a way I was disappointed but not surprised that for each DVD I rented, I got no DVD box, with a 4-color printed front and back cover, the back cover detailing all the goodies inside. The kind of packaging you get when you buy a DVD. I can understand why Netflix doesn't make that part of the equation -- the service would cost way more than $20/mo that's for sure. But still.
So now let's continue recording observations of the Netflix website experience:
1. The Login Sequence
- [Good]: The login page is clean and to the point. And Netflix smartly adds a padlock icon and
the label "Secure Server" to give the necessary warm fuzzies to those users hesitant to proceed otherwise.
- [Weird]: Sometimes when I log in, I get a message saying something like "it looks like you're
already registered!" Huh? Of course I'm already registered, that's why I can log in. Duh. I wish I could reproduce this anomaly, but, naturally, now I can't figure out how to reproduce it and I neglected to screen-grab an instance of it so the whole world (and most importantly, Netflix staffers) could see. If it happens again I'll add a note and picture here.
2. Search
- [Good]: The Search box and button are prominently and consistently located across the site. So far so good.
- [Great]: I'm happy to report that Netflix passed what I call The Z Test, where I
simply type in the letter "Z" to see if they have Costa-Gavras' famous 1969 political film. And guess what,
Netflix has it! (It was the first thing I rented.)
- [Really Bad]: Netflix is not forgiving of user typos. Or it makes mistakes when users make mistakes. (And remember the first rule of nettle design: The User Is Always Right, which in a Search experience translates to "Do what the user means, not what the user says.") If I type in "The Stinge" or "The Stang" instead of "The Sting", I don't get "The Sting", the Redford-Newman movie. Indeed, if by accident I type "The Stinge" I get a search results page with the banner "Available Titles for The Rolling Stones" with a list of four Rolling Stones titles! Um, dudes, this is not good. Successful searches are critical to customer success (read: Netflix long-term success) so spend the R&D money and fix this, huh? Think SOUNDEX at the very least.
Netflix, let me put it to you another way. Go to Amazon. Go ahead, fire up a browser window and open on Amazon's homepage. Select "DVD" in the Search pulldown, then type in "The Stinge" and click "GO!". Guess what. Amazon does it right. You guys need to as well. I rest my case.
- [Bad]: If you type in a movie which doesn't exist in DVD form and Netflix doesn't recognize it, say, a title like "Billion Dollar Brain," Netflix comes back with either empty results or bogus results for "matching" actor/director names (Ok, so I'd never heard of actor Brain Davies or director David Brain -- the things one learns...). This is where I have to question Netflix's strategy:
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Netflix should be the All-Knowing Oracle of Movies, period. No ifs, ands, or buts.
No excuses. Netflix should know everything there is to know about all movies ever
made by anyone anywhere in the world.. It should be the Ultimate Movie Authority.
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Hold on... now I'm on a roll.... Netflix should be built upon a database no less comprehensive than IMDB, with every movie ever made in the history of movies. Yes, yes, Netflix, I understand that there are only roughly 12,000 DVD titles in existence, in a world with well over 100,000 (way more, probably) movies ever made. But guess what: I don't particularly care that there are only roughly twelve-thousand DVD titles in existence. And yes, yes, I understand that the user experience might not be so hot if only 12% of the searches (worst case, say) were successful and the rest unsuccessful.
Why am I not that concerned? Because you know and I know that it would never be that bad. Those 12,000 titles are the most well-known, in-demand, and frequently-requested titles, so the average user wouldn't have a "sorry we don't have that title" search results experience very often.
See, I view Netflix as my replacement for Blockbuster. I want it to be the replacement for Blockbuser. I hope I never have to go back to Blockbuster again. I've been going there for years, and the experience has never been that great. But one thing I demand of my Blockbuster replacement is an authoritative, albeit virtual, video-rental-store clerk. Someone who knows movies in and out. Netflix's CineMatch(tm) technology is a start, but we're not all the way there yet.
It's encouraging to know that Netflix already knows about some unreleased DVDs.
For example, if I search for the recently-released movie "XXX" (the Vin Diesel vehicle), guess what, Netflix recognizes the title! Just like an all-knowing
virtual rental store clerk should.
Netflix even shows a picture for me on the DVD item detail page. And a description. And, interestingly, I find that the "Rent" button has been replaced with a "Save" button --- it's a title that hasn't been released yet and Netflix knows it. If I click on "Save", Netflix adds the movie to a special third section of my account's Rental Queue, so now, in addition to seeing a list of stuff that's either already
in my possession or in the mail on its way to me, and seeing a list of stuff that will be sent to
me once I return the stuff I have, I can see a list of stuff that is not yet released but when it is,
it'll immediately go into my active queue. Cool!
See, I view everything that's not on DVD as "still to be released in DVD format." So Netflix should know about "Billion Dollar Brain" as readily as it recognizes "XXX". It might be months or years or never that "Billion Dollar Brain" comes out in DVD, but that's ok. I wanna know that you know that it exists. I wanna be able to rate it as well. Repeat: Netflix should let me rate movies even if they're not in DVD format. It can only help make CineMatch smarter, yes?
None of this should come as any surprise. It's what Amazon has done for years -- the database has everything, even if the stuff isn't in the warehouses.
Oh but wait, I'm not done! :-) Let's return to the "Billion Dollar Brain" example for a second. Imagine if Netflix's database had a record for this title. So when you searched for it, you found it, and you could click to see the DVD item detail page for this title. Great. So what it's not out in DVD format. Lots of opportunities here:
- Let users fill out a form to petition the studio or rights-holder to make a DVD version for the title! The studios win, Netflix wins, the customer wins. Everybody's happy!
- Provide a "Save" button or somesuch to indicate that "I'm interested in this flick -- I recognize it isn't in DVD format but notify me when it comes out in the format!"
- Pull an Amazon and let partners and mom-n-pops (read: zShops) sell VHS tapes or laserdiscs -- new or used -- and the customer's happy. It doesn't hurt you -- you'd get a piece of the action -- and the customer would get the movie they're looking for -- only they'd be buying it not renting it. Not a problem in my book.
Okay. Enough about Search, for now anyways. Onwards...
3. Ratings and Rent-buttons
Waitaminnit. Are you exhausted reading this Part Two? I'm exhausted writing it.
Let's call it a day here, and cover Ratings, Rent-buttons and all kinds of other good
stuff in Part Three in a few days.
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Part Three is available.
Let's go read Part Three.
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