BRANDS & SERVICES

Client

CNN International, London & Singapore, 2008-2009

Role

As the Business & Design lead, I conducted Competitive Analysis, created the Product Design, led the Monetization Strategy & Implementation, & oversaw Product Management

CNN Mobile

Overview

CNN Mobile was the first of its kind direct-to-consumer news and information service on mobile. With breaking news, alerts, video, weather, and top stories, users were able to consume news directly from the source: CNN.

Important Context

Prior to 2008, mobile users worldwide could only access the Internet through a walled garden within the mobile operator’s content deck. This meant that for users to see CNN content, they had to have the content approved by operators that are currently known as AT&T, Verizon, & T-Mobile. This effort was groundbreaking as it allowed a content owner, CNN, to directly publish content and market it to users.

Product Goals

A comparative analysis of similar news services in CNN International’s target distribution markets uncovered a number of services that did not have the breadth or depth of content available from CNN. Research into why competitors did not present a lot of content unveiled some interesting findings. For example, organizing a lot of content in WAP (Wireless Access Protocol, a precursor to mobile html) was difficult, by and large mobile usability was limited, & it seemed that the other brands were not getting enough traffic to yield the attention necessary for a broad offering.

Easy to reach & easy to use

– Available Anywhere: CNNmobile.com resolved to our on-device portal framework that could be easily bookmarked, easily shared, sent via blue-casting (bluetooth beacons), SMS or on-air prompts
– Simple Design + High Performance: By utilizing low-bandwidth designs colour instead of images was a low-bandwidth way to emphasize content and reduces the kilobyte load on the service.
– Usability best practices: Implement a number of usability best practices i.e. consistent navigation and footers, quick ways back to home to keep users oriented, reduce cognitive load by making advanced features optional.

Monetization Matters

To bring the traffic to the site & provide incentives for advertising spend in mobile with CNN, the mobile opportunity needed to take advantage of the unique capabilities of the mobile network and provide advertisers and consumers specific calls to action and advanced metrics.

Results

We built flexible front- and back-end products to support new content types, promotions, and new devices. We were then able to experiment with products like In the Field and iReport. In the Field allowed journalists to blog directly from their phones with video. iReport allowed citizen journalists to send tips on breaking news directly from mobile. We created this before Twitter existed.

CNN Politics

Overview

Once we built CNN Mobile a direct-to-consumer mobile site for CNN, on our proprietary On-Device Portal technology, we were able to quickly spin up microsite, like CNN Politics, and purpose built breaking news sites that allowed CNN to promote compelling content to user and to monetize these new experiences.

Important Context

CNN Politics 2008 coverage of the Elections in 2008 was one of the most visited sites on mobile in 2008. With over a million unique impressions worldwide from launch to the election of Barack Obama, it also brought awareness to CNNmobile.com and laid the groundwork for many unique follow-on sites such as PGA and NASCAR. We learned a lot about how user consumption habits and predictions about what would become the future of browsing and consuming content on mobile devices.

Results

Because we laid the groundwork for for CNNMobile to ensure subsequent efforts were low effort, we were able to quickly spin up new sites and test on all available devices, create content feeds and breaking news alerts in under than 30 days. It was the most visited mobile site in 2008 worldwide (where statistics were made available) and became the flagship service to build additional purpose-built sites for CNN to continue to serve the public and monetize.