How would you improve KukuTV?
Product Improvement Question - You are a PM at KukuTV. How would you improve KukuTV?
How to Answer Product Improvement Questions?
Here is a step-by-step framework, you should follow while answering product improvement interview questions during your interview:
1. Describe the Product.
2. Ask clarifying Questions to trim down the scope of the question.
3. Define the Goal you want to achieve.
4. List the User Segments and select one segment to focus on.
5. List and prioritize the Pain Points for that segment.
6. List out your Solutions to solve those pain points.
7. Evaluate all the solutions and prioritize them.
8. Define Metrics to measure the performance of the solutions.
9. At the end, Summarize your answer.
Let’s get started with the solution (remember to follow the framework),
1. Describe the Product
Kuku TV is an Indian mobile-first OTT app specializing in vertical, short-form “micro-dramas” — serialized stories where each episode is 1–2 minutes long and optimized for swipe-based mobile viewing.
It targets audiences in regional languages (Hindi, Telugu, Kannada, Bengali, Tamil etc.) and primarily uses a freemium subscription model (free episodes + paid access for full seasons).
The content resembles TikTok-style short entertainment, but with a narrative arc — 50 + episodes forming a full story. Kuku TV aims to be the “Netflix of 2-minute stories” for Bharat’s next billion users who prefer quick, emotional entertainment in their own language.
Before improving it, it’s important to clarify which problem we want to solve — whether the focus is growth (acquiring users), engagement (increasing time spent), or monetization (subscriptions and ads).
2. Ask Clarifying Questions
You: “Before we proceed, I have a few clarifying questions about the scope of this app.”
Q) What goal of improvement are we focusing on here?
Improve user acquisition? Increase engagement? Boost retention? Grow subscription revenue? Improve creator ecosystem?
A) It’s up to you. You can choose the focus area.
Q) What is the target audience for these improvements?
Are we designing primarily for new users discovering Kuku TV, existing free users, paid subscribers, or content creators?
A) It’s up to you to decide which user segment to prioritize.
Q) Are we focusing on a particular platform — mobile app (Android/iOS), web, or smart TV integrations?
A) Primarily mobile (Android and iOS), since Kuku TV is a mobile-first product, but your solution can consider scalability to other platforms.
Q) Are we targeting a specific geography or demographic?
For instance, should we focus on Tier-2/3 Indian users consuming vernacular content, or also urban/global users who enjoy snackable entertainment?
A) You can assume India-first, especially Tier-2 and Tier-3 markets, but open to global scalability.
Q) What is the current business model focus?
Is Kuku TV aiming to grow paid subscriptions, add ad-supported tiers, or test micro-transaction models?
A) Assume a freemium model (free with ads + paid subscription) and explore monetization innovations within that structure.
Q) What is prompting the need for improvement right now?
Is this due to rising competition, stagnating user growth, or low retention rates?
A) Kuku TV has seen good initial downloads but high churn after the first few sessions and weak paid conversion compared to competitors.
Q) Should we focus on the content experience (personalization, storytelling, engagement) or the platform experience (UI/UX, performance, community)?
A) You can combine both — but emphasize product-side improvements that don’t require massive new content investment.
Q) Are there any constraints or dependencies (e.g., limited engineering bandwidth, licensing, creator onboarding challenges)?
A) Assume moderate engineering capacity — improvements should be feasible within 1–2 quarters and not depend on heavy new content deals.
Q) Are we free to introduce new revenue streams such as brand collaborations, rewarded ads, or gamified micro-transactions?
A) Yes — as long as they align with Kuku TV’s short-form storytelling and mobile consumption model.
Q) Should we assume the improvements apply to both free and premium users, or focus on one user journey?
A) Focus on free users transitioning to paid, since that’s the biggest opportunity for engagement and monetization growth.
3. Define the Goal
Kuku TV’s mission is to democratize entertainment for India’s next billion digital users by delivering short, high-quality, mobile-first stories in their preferred regional languages.
The platform enables creators and studios to produce micro-dramas that fit modern attention spans while giving audiences quick, emotional stories they can enjoy anytime, anywhere.
One of the key metrics that determines the success of this mission is user engagement — measured by the average number of episodes watched per session and the 30-day retention rate.
Higher engagement ensures that users don’t treat Kuku TV as a one-time novelty app but as a daily entertainment destination.
Kuku TV faces rising competition from global and regional short-video entertainment platforms such as ReelShort, DramaBox, Amazon miniTV, Moj, and Josh, all of which are aggressively expanding into micro-drama formats.
To remain differentiated, Kuku TV must deliver an experience that not only entertains but builds emotional connection, personalization, and habit.
By improving user engagement and retention, Kuku TV can strengthen the flywheel of growth:
more active users → higher subscription conversions → greater revenue → more investment in creator partnerships and content → richer user experience → and back again.
4. List User Segments
Kuku TV’s core user segments are:
New Visitors (First-Time Users):
People discovering Kuku TV through ads, social media, or referrals who have not yet built a habit.
They care about instant gratification—quick onboarding, minimal signup steps, and an engaging first impression. A slow app load, irrelevant feed, or confusing UI can cause immediate churn.Free Viewers (Non-Subscribers):
Users who download Kuku TV and watch a few free episodes before hitting the paywall.
They care about discovering entertaining, short, and emotionally engaging content without friction. Their main motivations are free entertainment, regional language preference, and quick dopamine hits, while their frustrations include repetitive feeds, abrupt paywalls, and unclear subscription value.Paid Subscribers:
Loyal users who pay for the premium plan (₹399 quarterly / ₹899 yearly) to access full seasons ad-free.
They care about freshness of content, early access to new shows, and a smooth, ad-free experience. Their continued engagement depends on perceived content variety, recommendations, and retention hooks such as rewards or fandom experiences.Content Creators and Studios:
Independent creators, small studios, and production partners who supply short-format stories.
They care about reach, visibility, monetization, and performance insights for their shows. They want simple upload workflows, audience analytics, and transparent revenue sharing to justify ongoing content production.Dormant or Lapsed Users:
Users who previously engaged but stopped using the app after a few days or weeks.
They care about fresh, relevant content and personalized re-entry points (like AI recaps or comeback offers). Without proactive nudges or rewards, they tend to drift to alternatives like YouTube Shorts, ReelShort, or DramaBox.
Segment Focus for Improvement:
For this product exercise, we’ll focus on Free Viewers, since they represent the largest user base and the highest opportunity to boost engagement, retention, and free-to-paid conversion — directly impacting both growth and revenue.
5. List down the Pain Points
Now we will identify the key pain points experienced by Free Viewers on KukuTV,
Users lose interest after the first few episodes because of an abrupt paywall.
Viewers get hooked on a new show and suddenly encounter a hard stop after 5–6 episodes. There is no preview of what’s next or any small reward to continue. This sudden friction makes them feel forced rather than rewarded, leading to instant drop-off.Feed feels repetitive and poorly personalized.
All users see the same home page regardless of language preference, mood, or watch history. A Telugu-speaking viewer might see Hindi thumbnails or unrelated genres, breaking immersion and lowering relevance. There is no adaptive recommendation loop that learns from behavior.No habit-forming mechanism exists.
Users come, binge a few episodes once, and never return. There’s no streak counter, reminder, or visible progress bar to motivate daily engagement. Without reward feedback, Kuku TV feels transactional rather than entertainingly addictive.Subscription pricing feels too high for perceived value.
₹899/year seems expensive for 1–2-minute videos. Free users cannot visualize what extra value premium gives—there’s no exclusive preview, ad-free demo, or smaller entry-level plan to reduce friction. The gap between free and paid feels too wide.Experience lacks social energy and emotional belonging.
Unlike TikTok or YouTube Shorts, Kuku TV is a solo experience. There are no reactions, comments, or ways to share cliffhangers with friends. Users don’t feel part of a fandom or conversation, which weakens both retention and virality.Discovery fatigue sets in quickly.
Thumbnails and titles look similar, and there’s no clear signal of trending or quality. Users often spend more time scrolling than watching. With hundreds of short dramas, they lack filters or themes (e.g., “office romance,” “crime in 60 seconds”) to guide exploration.Slow load times and data consumption hurt first-time users.
In tier-2/3 regions, where Kuku TV’s audience lives, bandwidth is limited. Episodes sometimes buffer or fail to load, breaking the instant-gratification promise. The app isn’t optimized for low-network conditions, leading to uninstall within the first session.No visibility into story progress or completion.
Viewers can’t see how far they are into a series (e.g., “Episode 12 of 50”) or how close they are to a finale. This makes it difficult to track progress and robs them of completion satisfaction, an important retention trigger.Lack of tangible rewards or recognition for engagement.
Watching dozens of episodes feels the same as watching one. Users don’t unlock anything, earn badges, or feel acknowledged for loyalty. This absence of gamified rewards reduces daily motivation.No emotional recall or recap for long-running micro-series.
Since each episode is 1–2 minutes, users forget characters or storylines when returning later. Without quick “Previously On…” recaps, resuming a story feels confusing, pushing users to drop the show entirely.