From convenience to experience – Helsingin Sanomat

HELSINGIN SANOMAT

HELSINGIN SANOMAT

APPROACH

Bridging the gap between the busy lifestyles and quality journalism The lives of 30-45 year olds are often busy with small children, careers really taking off and the free time becoming essentially nonexistent. Despite their busy lifestyles, they have a strong need for information. However, the amount of information available can also feel overwhelming. For them news are essential and quality journalism is both - something that they need and can

afford, - but it’s often seen as a commodity. Our goal is to truly understand the underlying needs of the customers and what does Helsingin Sanomat have to do to satisfy these needs, and to turn the consumption of quality journalism into an enjoyable part of their everyday lives.

D

SANOMATES

Hoai Van Chu

Elias Lehto

Hanne Savolainen

Liliana Zuga-Divre

VN

FI

FI

LV

B.Sc. (Econ.) International Business

B.Sc. (Econ.) International Business

Master of Architecture 2009

B.B.A. Business Information Technology

M.Sc. in Economics and Business Administration (IDBM)

M.Sc. in Economics and Business Administration (IDBM)

M.A. of Arts (IDBM)

M.Sc. in Technology (IDBM)

hoai.chu@aalto.fi

elias.o.lehto@aalto.fi

hanne.savolainen@aalto.fi

liliana.zuga-divre@aalto.fi

uring the project, the team has had weekly workshops at Sanomatalo, where every Monday everyone would gather and work on the most current issues at hand, discuss, analyse, ideate and bond over personal stories. One member of the team would join the official Helsingin Sanomat weekly briefings to keep the client company and the team on track with what each side is currently doing. By having frequent meetings with the representatives of Helsingin Sanomat, the team has been able to have a quick iteration of ideas and focus points.

One of the focal points in the project has been community building through differ-

ent channels. Helsingin Sanomat has to bridge the gap that accommodates the needs of their clients within their busy lifestyle, and to create a routine in which the users feel like they belong to.

By interviewing people, and truly understanding the needs of the target audience, the team has defined four areas of importance that were later prototyped for: Community Building and Engagement Visuals and Storytelling Family Value User Experience

HELSINGIN SANOMAT

Visuals & Storytelling

Community Building & Engagement

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igital news have been around for a very long time now, but they have never been truly distinguished from paper news in terms of layout, presentation or the overall reading experience. Our research has shown that the main difference between paper and digital is the convenience and accessibility of the latter, otherwise paper has tangible value to it that, so far, has not been matched in digital.

A

long with the tangible value of paper news, came emotional brand connection. However, with the vast abundance of digital news media sources, consumption has become fragmented and therefore customer loyalty of brands such as Helsingin Sanomat is not as strong as it used to be, especially among the younger generations.

To combat this, as well as to attract more people into the customer purchase funnel, it is important for Helsingin Sanomat to build a community around the HS brand by engaging people with content outside of the company’s digital platforms and by interacting with their users in a dialogical manner.

Visuals and Storytelling have the potential to transform the digital news media consumption into more than just a facsimile of paper on a screen and, instead, make it a unique experience - a paradigm shift.

Family value

W

User experience

hile not in direct competition, a lot of the subscription-based digital services are essentially vying for people’s time and money. Some of these services are popular because they offer content to the whole family or household.

H

elsingin Sanomat publishes approximately 300 articles everyday, so it can be difficult for users to find the content or articles that they want. Negative or frustrating experiences carry on to discourage further use at the margins, especially when time is scarce and valuable.

Given the target audience of this project, one big area of improvement for Helsingin Sanomat is the offering of family value to their subscribers, thus the team has studied the ways in which Helsingin Sanomat can extend their value propositions in the direction of family value, without compromising the brand and its image.

To ensure that the news media consumption experience on the Helsingin Sanomat website and app are as smooth and accommodating as possible, the team has looked at design enhancements that can be made in labelling, sorting and filtering of the content.

Fail fast

Process

Defining problem

Research

Ideation

Prototyping

Solution Project plan Client workshops Defining goals

Interviews Observations Field trip Benchmarking Analysis

Affinity diagram Evaluation Field trip

Protoyping Testing Refinement