Archive for the ‘netflix’ tag
Netflix and Qwikster: What Am I Missing?
I was a $9.99 streaming and 1-DVD member of Netflix for about a year. I enjoyed the DVDs, but it usually takes me a few weeks to watch them, so they sit there unwatched for a while, but I figured for $2 more, why not. In July, Netflix announced that they would be changing their pricing structure so that my plan would now cost me $15.98. Well, bah humbug!
Just a few weeks ago (on Sept 1) the new pricing went into effect. I wasn’t sure if I was going to drop the DVD, I figured I would try it out and see if I can increase my DVD consumption (while simultaneously vowing to watch less TV in general).
Last week, Netflix announced that it was cutting the customer forecast as they were losing a ton of customers over the price hike (DUH!).
Well, this morning I awoke to find that Netflix has apologized and decided to make up for their mistakes by splitting the DVD service and streaming service onto two different websites. UH, WHAT? Is it just me? This doesn’t make sense to me. I like to be able to search all movies and see if one is streaming or DVD and to move things between queues if it becomes streaming. Why split them into two websites? What is the business plan behind it?
According to the Netflix CEO: “So we realized that streaming and DVD by mail are becoming two quite different businesses, with very different cost structures, different benefits that need to be marketed differently, and we need to let each grow and operate independently.”
Now that’s all fine and dandy, you probably should have two different teams working on things to make each one the best it can be, but does that mean you have to push that split onto consumers? Just because your internal team is structured that way doesn’t mean that’s how the customers want to interact with your product.
After checking out the comments on the announcement, I can see that I am not the only one who feels this way! You’re splitting up a single experience (I want to watch a movie, preferably by streaming, but if it’s not available yet, send me the DVD).
This has pushed me over the edge, and I will be canceling my DVD subscription (just as soon as I watch Schindler’s List).
UPDATE 9:45AM: I just came across this blog post by Joshua Porter about how Netflix in Danger of Ruining their User Experience (via @ryaninteractive).