Q1 2022
Showpad Video Virtual Backgrounds
This is a project about Showpad Video. Check Showpad Video Trimming and Showpad Video Redesign for more of my work on this product.
Context
Showpad Video was introduced to offer a way for sales people to engage with prospective buyers in a post-COVID world.
With it, Showpad users can record a video clip from anywhere within the Showpad platform, showcase any of the assets provided by their marketing teams, share it via any of the several sharing options, and get analytics on how their video is performing.
Upon joining Showpad, I had the great fortune of joining the Video team — one of the smallest teams in the company, but also one of the most agile and best performing.
Problem
With so many of our users accessing the platform from home, offering the ability to hide or mask the background was critical — people wanted to make sure their message was the focus of their videos, not anything that might be happening in the background.
Using the Jobs to Be Done framework, we arrived at the following goal:
As a sales user, I want to be able to hide the background in my videos in order to protect my privacy and remove potential distractions.
Discovery and ideation
With the proliferation of video conferencing and recording software, we made sure to implement this feature in a way that would feel immediately familiar to our users. After a few rounds of iterations we arrived at a design that proved instantly intuitive during our user testing.
Some technical considerations had to be made, as Showpad Video runs entirely on the browser. In order to make sure the quality is sustained, we made sure to track the framerate to give guidance and, in instances where we can’t assure good enough performance, can suggest the user turn it off or disable the feature altogether.
Outcome
Virtual and blurred backgrounds in Showpad Video was very much welcomed and we saw increased usage inline with our success metrics determined early on in the project.