What's Up Next?

A good salesman is selling, not a product, but a solution.

Why?

Because the secret to choice is value.

When I cuddle up with my hot chocolate and a fuzzy blanket on a rainy day, what do I value? When I’ve been stuck in my home for a year trying not to infect my community with covid, what am I craving?

When I am tired after a long day of work, how will I relax?

Understand that, and you understand how to make me, the viewer, click play.

Genre, rating, writing, directing, language, actors, era: all of these factors largely determine what I’m going to click and when. Hence, the best way to recommend movies to any audience is to find out ahead of time what they want, like, and need. What are their values?

The key is a Viewer Profile that can be set up once and edited if needed: A quick and easy selection of preferences that will allow the AI side of the streaming service to better predict what the viewer will like to watch next.

Step 1: General Preferences

Perhaps this viewer has children. They may not want Rated-R Horror movies popping up on their suggested items list for their 8-year old to click on. They’d prefer family friendly- or at least no f-bombs, please and thank you. Or perhaps this viewer is craving adventure and excitement and has a weakness for spies in suits and fast cars or escape through travel. Whatever they want- that is what we want to present them with. So how do we find out what to offer?

Give the viewer the chance to choose their preferences in rating, language, and genre.

Step 2: Let’s Get More Specific

Even though one person might like movies in every genre, that obviously doesn’t mean they will like every movie. And I might love to listen to the eloquent dialogue of a classic or the amazing historical facts in a documentary when I’m well-rested, but can I please just laugh at some nonsense when I get off my 12-hour shift?

Giving the viewer personalized settings for different moods means that “That looks good, but I’m not in the mood for it,” won’t be the only thing they say while scrolling through titles for thirty minutes before giving up and going to sleep.

How would it work?

The streaming service could create a few preference settings that could be selected based off of mood: happy, tired, sad, romantic, studious, for example. Perhaps when I’m sad I like other sad movies, so I could add a few favorites that help me cry out my tears I’ve been bottling up all day. Phew, what a relief! Or maybe I’m the kind of person who got my crying done on the clock and now it’s time to relax with something happy-go-lucky to get my mind off of things. I could add a few of my favorite feel-good movies into this category. Then these moods could all correspond to tags on all the movies in the streaming service, helping to accumulate a “similar movie” section that corresponds with those pre-selected favorites.

Step 3: Rounding Out the Info

Special effects are great, but how about some strongly written and eloquent dialogue? And sometimes those 80’s rom-coms hit different than the modern ones, am I right? Also, are you a DC or Marvel fan? Spielberg or Hitchcock? Both? Round out the preferences by giving the viewer a chance to select directors, actors, and characters that they already like, as well as a choice in era. (I’m a sucker for classic movies myself: think 1935-1965) Beyond that, let’s play would you rather for a minute. Would you rather have big drama or big explosions? Relaxing views or adrenaline? Dinosaurs or fast cars? Superheros or spies?

Three easy steps and an in-depth profile can be quickly created. Giving the viewer a chance to choose these preferences or rate them on a scale will give the streaming service the best opportunity to successfully recommend new titles in a way that gives the viewer all the control without any of the work.