Parameters.

Working together as a team of user interface and user experience designers to provide a fresh experience for an established business in a time-critical setting.



Spotify is renowned for giving customers access to millions of artists and songs from across the globe. Now they are seeking a fresh musical and social encounter. Our inquiries: How can Spotify encourage social interaction by letting users share the music that means the most to them? How can they facilitate listeners' development of stronger bonds with friends and artists?



Role:
UX designer, UX researcher, video editor. 

Responsibilities:
Researching spotify, video editor, drawing wireframes, user interviewing, concept, low fidelity prototyping.
Team:
Jack Simpson, Nathanael Sherwood, Najiba Noh.









The challenge.

How can Spotify encourage social interaction by letting users share the music that means the most to them? How can they facilitate listeners' development of stronger bonds with friends and artists?

The solution.

The new social feature, SpotifyLive, allows users to interact, collaborate, and discover. People are able to communicate and respond to songs performed in turns of those in the session by only choosing a tune and joining users who are listening to the comparable sounds.









Client research.

Getting to know the client and the brand.


Utilising Spotify's "Relevant," "Human," and "Unified" design guiding principles. Through the use of features like "Trending albums for you," "Suggested Artists," and "New releases for you," Spotify consistently prioritises the individual user. Spotify wants its users to have a customised music experience, this will essentially be the project's objective. Using this data and early secondary research, we developed a design strategy that enhances their musical experience and includes other music enthusiasts.. 






Sketches and Low fidelity prototype.

Planning a new feature for an already popular mobile application.


Music curators and trendsetters often use Spotify. To add a new feature, we researched the design principles and created a low-fidelity prototype of a function we thought would allow curators and trendsetters to listen to and discover music together. This demo shows a public playlist lobby where users may congregate, suggest new music to listen to, cast votes, and comment on the music that is presently playing.



Prototype feature.








Product flow.

The team’s early concept and feature walkthrough.


The feature's implementation into the product flow came after it had been planned and organised. We began by utilising Spotify's home page as the starting point and added the feature navigation from there.






Sketches and Low fidelity prototype II.

Presenting an idea that fits.


After getting comprehensive input, we chose to approach the UI design differently. We experimented with spatial interaction rather than making a straightforward user interface design. We envisioned how you would engage with that place by turning the concept of a lobby into a bubble. We created an idea where each individual is represented by an avatar after understanding that representation is a component of being unique.






Other ideas.

Explore, test and understand.


We spent our time drawing further concepts for user interfaces for our product. You can see our thoughts and how we pictured consumers interacting with the product in this photo slide. The software allows users to freely navigate around various audio bubbles while refreshing their screen to see new groups.









User testing and feedback.

Finding out what our audience thinks and how we can change things.


Because the success of our application depends on the success of our audience, we spoke with listeners of Spotify who are categorised as social trend-setters and music curators. We questioned them about social interaction and music, such as, "If you heard a stranger listening to a song you currently listen to, would you be open to having a conversation about music with that stranger?" and, "If you could bring back one thing from the days before lockdown into the present, what would it be?" "Your personalized playlists are special; are you willing to share your playlists with others?"

A common theme in the criticism we heard was that people were either too timid or that everything depended on the social context.






Planning the story.

Getting the video ready.


We created a brief, two-minute movie introducing the application as one of the submission criteria. In order to prepare for this, we examined and dissected the movies of previous D&AD winners to figure out how to structure our own. On the basis of common appearances in each video, four divisions were created. Additionally, we discovered Spotify's YouTube channels in order to improve our understanding of what Spotify would want. We produced our film after a few hours of storyboarding.


 

 

SpotifyLive explanation video.