PokerStars TV App

High Level Overview

The PokerStars TV app was built with the objective of distributing the PokerStars poker content to users on their mobile devices.

End to end Management

I took responsibility for building this app from conception to delivery, and subsequently managed distribution and maintained the app in close cooperation with the TV and Content Teams. 

Player Engagement

I led and refined player communication strategies in order to increase engagement during events, and surrounding popular show releases. This tied into cross-sell to the gaming app.

Content Promotion

I created a dedicated player which allowed the user to manage how they consumed content. This allowed users to skip backwards and forwards and watch content picture in picture.

Data Driven

I used data to determine the order and prominence in which content should be presented, the frequency or player comms and identify when to surface promotional cross-sell banners.

1800 Daily Active Users

Usage depended on content. At its peak the app enjoyed 65,000  concurrent users.

Playlists

Users could add content to their playlist to watch later, and manage said content. 

Offline Viewing

The app included the ability to download content for offline viewing.

Advanced Filters

Users could filter content by category, content type, player and format, among others…

Dynamic Homescreen

The top three feed entries would dynamically show content relevant to the user.

Cross-Sell Focus

Strategic animated banners and dedicated menus would incentivise poker cross-sell. 

Some more information…

I took full responsibility for all areas of the PokerStars TV app, including driving the development, marketing and distribution. 

Background How it was Built My Scope

How do we allow our users to watch the poker content they love on the go?

The way consumers consumed content was changing, and the business could no longer expect it’s loyal patrons to navigate to pokerstars.tv every time they wanted to watch that week’s Sunday Million, the latest episode of The Big Game, or that month’s EPT Main Event…

The business needed a solution which allowed users to consume the poker content they knew and loved, without being tethered to their laptop, or having to awkwardly zoom in and out using the teeny weeny browser on their mobile phones. We’d already developed the PokerStars Clock, and launched the gaming apps, so, building a PokerStars TV app for the thousands of visitors to the website became the logical thing to do.

Where do we begin creating the TV app without losing focus on the gaming apps?

We outsourced the work to the same third party development consultancy who had assisted us in making the PokerStars Clock app: SIS based, who were based out of Crimea.

We built out the roadmap with the Content team, identifying what our minimum requirements for launch would be, both frontend in terms of features, as well as the backend requirements in terms of how the CDN would feed the data through to the app, catering for new filtration, a dedicated feed and exclusive content.

What were my main areas of focus?

Strategic

  • Working closely with the Director of TV in defining the strategy for building the iOS and Android apps across all regions in which PokerStars was present.
  • Attended poker events to discuss the end product with representatives of the poker community (clubs, associations and forums) in order to better understand user requirements ahead of building the apps.
  • Translating the user experience and content from the pokerstars.tv website into a product vision and strategy.
  • Defining the full feature set for the apps, and transforming this into a phased and iterative development plan.
  • Working with the internal ASO teams in optimising the apps’ presence on the app stores and defining the app release schedule.
  • Leveraging push notification to increase engagement and session times and briefing the TV Teams on how to  manage this themselves.
  • Leading the cross-sell strategy and related feature development with the objective of driving users to the gaming products.


Product

  • Owning the entirety of the product and acting as chief stakeholder.
  • Defining and owning the product roadmap and prioritising features.
  • Writing well-defined product requirements from scratch, for features and NFRs, as well as defining metrics, in close contact with design and engineering teams to build the apps.
  • Turning self-managed Flurry data insights into product features with actionable outcomes to the customer.
  • Prioritising and refining the feature backlog for assigned products, balancing the requirements of stakeholders and customers.
  • Translating product roadmap features into well-defined product requirements including features, user stories, and acceptance test criteria.
  • Taking responsibility for the distribution of the apps, including store entries on the Apple AppStore, Google Play and Yandex.
  • Undertaking ASO and reputation management.
  • Working closely with Development Teams to understand challenges on the go, and seeking to resolve these as quickly and efficiently as possible.
  • Creating submission material for app store reviews for Google and Apple.


Testing

  • Working closely with in-house testers in ensuring features were developed according to product requirements.


Reporting

  • Reporting on monthly app performance, including MAUs, MoM MAU’s, average session length, feature updates, and live stream viewers as well as the impact of CRM efforts and marketing campaigns.


Academic

  • Ongoing research into best practices surrounding push notification strategies.
  • Ongoing efforts to optimise push notification strategies by analysing engagement form previous campaigns and refining this in order to optimise tap-throughs and session times during live streams.
  • Investigation into CDM systems and understanding any limitations relating to mobile apps vs web.