Spotify
Encouraging social connection through music.
Industry
Music
Team
Self-directed
Role
UX Researcher
UX/UI Designer
Duration
8 weeks
Project Brief
Spotify is a leading music streaming service with a mission to help people listen to whatever music they want, whenever they want, and wherever they want. Spotify currently offers limited opportunities for interaction between users. To improve engagement and retention, Spotify wants to expand its social capabilities within the mobile app.
Feedback
For this project, I had to continuously communicate with my peers at DesignLab and be proactive in seeking out feedback. I checked in with my mentor for guidance, ensuring I didn't overlook crucial aspects or limitations, and participated in weekly design critiques with fellow students, where I received creative feedback.
Research
Audit
People are unaware of Spotify's social features
As I delved into Spotify's design and its social capabilities, I couldn't help but notice the vast collection of curated playlists it offered, tailored to users' musical interests. However, the social aspects seemed to be nested within the app, almost like secondary features.
1/2
7/8
1/2
Key Design Insights
Make social features more prominent and accessible
The social features of Spotify, although present within the app, often go unnoticed by users. To enhance the social aspect of Spotify, it's important to create obvious entry points to improve visibility of these features.
Secondary Research
Music is a form of self-expression and a profound medium for connection
To lay a solid foundation for my project, I began by exploring various sources to gather information on demographics, behaviors, and attitudes related to music. By understanding these trends, I aimed to have a better context for formulating meaningful questions during user interviews later on. I discovered that:
80%
of Gen Zs say audio allows them to explore different sides of their personalities.
— 2022 Culture Report by Spotify
74%
of users would “like” someone if they saw they had similar music tastes.
— Survey from OKCupid
64%
of 13-39-year-olds say most of the new music they hear from social media.
— Report from YPulse
81%
of Gen Z say Instagram and YouTube are their preferred social networks of choice.
— Findings from Sproutsocial
Key Design Insights
Unveiling undiscovered facets of identity
Gen Zs, in their pursuit of self-expression, crave fresh avenues to showcase their individuality. Through the powerful integration of data analytics, there is opportunity to offer users transformative musical insights that can serve as a catalyst for their personal journey of self-discovery.
User Interviews
Revealing one's musical preferences can be akin to revealing a part of oneself to others
I conducted five interviews with frequent users of the platform. With over half of Spotify's user base being under 35 years old, I tailored my interviews to cater to this demographic. I learned that:
People perceive the songs they listened to as intimate reflections of their true selves
Interviewees expressed a deep connection to their chosen music choices. Many expressed how the music they listened to was deeply personal and uniquely representative of their innermost thoughts, emotions, experiences, and identities.
“Music is really personal and it’s like a time capsule that transports my mind to certain times in my life and reminds me of certain people."
People feel self-conscious sharing their music with others
Opening up about one's musical identity means exposing a part of oneself that feels intimate and personal. Many participants expressed a fear of potential judgment or criticism based on their music choices, highlighting the vulnerability that accompanies sharing something so personal.
“Sometimes when I’m playing music for others I wonder if it’s cheesy or if I’m the only one who likes it.”
Key Design Insights
Find a common ground
Sharing music can be personal yet intimidating, often due to fears of judgment. To tackle this, we need a feature that makes users feel confident in sharing their music preferences. Emphasizing musical similarities can mitigate fear of judgment, fostering a sense of connection among users.
Archetypes
I broke down the users into two archetypes
From my findings, I discovered that individuals have varying perspectives and levels of comfort when it comes to opening up. By developing archetypes, I am able to identify pain points for both scenarios.
The Lone Listener
The Lone Listener prefers to keep their playlist private for the fear of being judged or rejected based on the type of music they listen to.
The Collaborative Curator
The Collaborative Curator likes getting recommendations and sharing songs to friends to bond over shared experiences and preferences.
How Might We
After getting a better understanding of who I was designing for, I needed to develop ideas on what to design. By determining users' wants, behaviors, likes, and dislikes, I prioritized certain needs that I would later design for. I narrowed down the focus problem through a series of HMW statements.
Designing the Platform
Initial Concepts
I explored different concepts
From my findings, I discovered that individuals have varying perspectives and levels of comfort when it comes to opening up. By developing archetypes, I am able to identify pain points for both scenarios.
Concept #1: Community Tab
The first concept was a Community Tab. For the MVP, I focused only on group and private messaging, where users could share songs and collaborate on playlists. Other features like public forums, DJ sets, and karaoke reels would be planned for future iterations.
The goal was to provide Collaborative Curators a platform to share music and engage Lone Listeners with enjoyable content. However, I later discovered that Spotify had a messaging feature that was discontinued in 2018 due to low user engagement compared to the maintenance efforts.
Considering this, I realized that my design needed adjustments to ensure feasibility without compromising on user value. So, I went back to the drawing board, taking into account the developer workload and making adjustments accordingly.
Concept #2: Milestone Badges
The second concept was milestone badges. Milestone badges give users an opportunity to achieve a sense status and accomplishment among friends. This gives them the opportunity to differentiate themselves, encourage more streaming, and gamify the streaming experience within a community.
On top of that, these badges would be easily sharable and bring attention to this feature that would otherwise go unnoticed.
However, the drawback is that it's difficult to monitor when people manipulate the system which can decrease the validity of these achievements.
Concept #3: Bio Prompts
Bio prompts are personalized musical prompts that users can choose to answer with songs, allowing them to express their personality and identity through music. Imagine them as a blend of dating app bio prompts and the nostalgic MySpace profile song feature.
The drawback is that there is limited opportunities for deeper interactions beyond this feature.
Final Design
Revealing one's musical preferences can be akin to revealing a part of oneself to others
I decided to focus solely on the Taste-matching, which aims to benefit both of our archetypes while also utilizing the existing data analytics within Spotify to minimize backend demands. This approach strikes a balance between being valuable to our target user groups and making effective use of the existing resources within the platform.
Reflection
What I learned
Research a lot early on
Throughout this project, I have come to appreciate the importance of conducting comprehensive research during the early stages. Recognizing the potential it holds, I now understand that investing time and effort in research from the outset has the power to mitigate the need for numerous iterations, revisions, and redesigns.
Fall in love with the problem, not the solution
In the beginning stages, I explored multiple approaches and underwent various research rounds, and I ended up restarting my project 3 times. However, this experience imparted a valuable lesson: the importance of remaining adaptable and open to pivoting. It reminded me to fall in love with the problem at hand, rather than becoming overly attached to a particular solution.