Netflix CTO Elizabeth Stone announced at TechCrunch Disrupt that the streaming service is branching out into immersive and interactive experiences, starting with real-time voting. The move marks a new way for the streamer to boost engagement by allowing live broadcast audiences to interact in real time.
Viewers will be able to vote while watching live content to directly influence the outcome of what they are watching on their TV or mobile device.
The streamer began testing real-time voting for the live cooking show “Dinner Time with David Chang” in August and will provide functionality to the reboot of “Star Search,” a talent competition series that has been off the air for 20 years and will be brought back by Netflix next year.
“If you’re sitting at home watching ‘Star Search’ on your TV, you’ll be able to vote on either your TV or your mobile phone to promote or not promote some of the contestants on the show,” Stone said on the TechCrunch Disrupt main stage on Tuesday. “It’s just a very early example of the ways we think content can be more interactive over time, across devices, across TV and mobile, where a Netflix subscriber can really feel like they’re part of the story, they can affect the story and feel immersed in it.”
Viewers will be notified on screen and have a limited time to rate the odds. If you reset or are not interested in the live stream, you may miss the voting window.
On “Dinner Time with David Chang,” viewers were asked to vote on whether they preferred tuna or grilled cheese. On another occasion, they were asked if they thought soups were better than salads. Viewers can see the voting results displayed on the screen.
Netflix says it saw solid episode-to-episode engagement in early real-time voting tests, which it believes signals strong potential for more interactive entertainment in the future.
The streaming service says it’s focused on developing more ways for viewers to feel involved in what they’re watching, so it’s working to enable real-time response to content. At a time when Netflix is facing increasing competition from other streaming services, the company is likely hoping that its new interactive functionality will create a shared, community-driven viewing experience for its members.
It’s worth noting that this isn’t the first time Netflix has explored real-time voting with its content, as the streaming service has previously tested interactive viewer polls during the reality TV shows, “Too Hot to Handle” and “Love is Blind.”
In addition to Live, Netflix is focusing on real-time response for formats like the new Party Games for TV and eventually podcasts so users can engage with what’s happening right now.
“There’s also a lot of exciting stuff happening with cloud gaming, which introduces another similar kind of interaction pattern,” Stone said. “So we’ve got some fun living room party games coming in Q4 this year, more next year, for example Boggle. So it’s on your living room TV screen. You can do it with your friends and family locally using your mobile phone. It’s another way to think about more immersive entertainment in the content of the moment, in addition to more traditional movies and TV, which, of course, we’ll continue to knock out of the park.”
Also on Tuesday, Stone announced that Netflix is launching immersive experiences on its homepage that the company says will bring its content to life through animation and dynamic special effects. To kick things off, Netflix has launched a new immersive Halloween Collection experience. Going forward, the company will debut a Holiday Collection in December and more IP-based collections in the future, such as a “Bridgerton.”
