Your favorite artists and their newest music and BTS content — all before release day.

Project: Adding a feature to an existing Mobile App + Design System

Contribution: UX/UI Design, UX Research, Branding, Prototyping, Usability Testing

Tools Used: Figma, Adobe Illustrator

Duration: 4 weeks

The Solution

Spotify Auditorium presents premium users with early access to new releases and BTS content, hand-picked and curated by your favorite artists. Auditorium will allow users to one full-preview of new studio albums before release day, giving your favorite artists some extra buzz before release day and your friends something to talk about.

Research & User Interviews

Secondary Research

My secondary research showed that most music streaming services offer a ‘freemium’ business model. This allows users to get familiar with a product’s base features before committing to a higher tier of subscription with on-demand accessibility. Across all competitors, there is still a lack of extra-exclusive content within the subscription tiers. What do users really want access to?

User Interviews

To get better insight on what our users are really thinking, I knew I had to sit down with a few to learn more about the subject exclusive content within music streaming services. Before diving in, what was I going to ask them?

• What do you normally do when someone sends/shares music with you?

• What do you know about listening parties? Ever been to one?

• What motivates you to listen to an old album?

• If your favorite artist releases an album, when do you listen to the album? How do you choose to experience this?

• When listening to an album, what are you looking for?

• Do you prefer older albums or new albums? What expectations do you normally have for both before listening?

• Have you ever previewed an unreleased product? What was it like? How did that make you feel?

• Fill in the blank -- “Albums should be ________”

• If a streaming service offered exclusive content from your favorite artists, what kind of content would you expect?

• What could an artist do for you that would improve your listening experience?

Format:
1:1 interview via Zoom call
All Ages
Have used any paid-tier of Spotify or any other music streaming service

Behind-the-scenes? Pre-released music? Collaborations? Context?

You got it!

But first, let’s make sense of this mess.

Based on interview data, users seemed to be very casual with their use of Spotify in their daily lives. Users expressed consuming their content the most while on-the-go. Knowing that most users were already familiar with the current Spotify UI, Auditorium had to fit nicely within the family. Data gathered through user interviews showed that users trust their intuition most when navigating through Spotify. Users must be able to access Auditorium with a minimal learning process. We’re aiming for Auditorium to be a familiar feeling, much like that classic jam that’s been stuck in our heads since ‘08.

In my findings, users have expressed the following common user goals:

• UI must stay familiar to current flows

• Users must be able to access Auditorium feature from mobile phone

Our users have also shared their user pains on the subject:

• Waiting for new content to be released

• Sometimes current content gets old quickly

• Poor structure/flow within UI

 Task Flow

Spotify was established in 2006, which gives users plenty of time to learn the UI. At this point in time, we can expect users to be very comfortable with the current UI and flow of Spotify. We had to find a way to squeeze Auditorium into the band while not disturbing it’s current flow.

 Wireframing + Prototyping

This project headlined with the thought that most users may be familiar with the current Spotify UI. The process did not need to be reinvented. Rather, the process was eased into the band while having all other user controls available without changing composition.

 Usability Testing

Once the 1st prototype was finished, a Usability Test was conducted with our users. To avoid any guessing, we needed a plan. What are our objectives? What type of evaluative research will we be doing? Who will we be asking?

Objectives:

• Test user intuition for task completion

• Identify problem areas with current UI Kit

• Identify any unnecessary steps within task flow

• Record user questions during task flow

• Methodology:

  • Evaluative Research:

    • Think-Aloud usability test -- requires users to verbalize their thoughts as they proceed through a process

    • Remote Usability testing via Zoom call

Participants:

• 6 users

• All Ages

• Has used any paid-tier subscription for any music streaming service

 The band had a solid first show! A few UI tweaks were called upon as users expressed a few buttons not working -- this broke user focus and some became hesitant with what step to take next. As all shows must go on, 6/6 users were able to successfully complete both tasks, justifying that the original Spotify flow was familiar enough to troubleshoot if any buttons didn’t work.

UI Components

Being the new member of the band means carrying all of your gear into the studio for move-in day. Luckily, Auditorium has an aesthetic that was built using pieces of Spotify’s original design system, Encore. The UI Components shown below are 1:1 scaled for mobile devices.