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Reimagining how Spotify users recommend music to each other

Humans have always recommended music to one another, it’s only obvious that they still do it with Spotify, Here’s a take on improving the recommendation flow for any Spotify user.

Show me the end result

2 weeks

Timeline

User Experience designer

Role

Questions first

How do they move around the app?
What are the usual things that bug them?

Keeping the app experience fresh means always asking: What's hot, what's not, and how can we level it up.

I interviewed a homemaker(my mom) who enjoys music for chores and relaxation, a busy professional who uses music while commuting to work & de-stress after, and a student (my classmate) who connects with music for various activities.

By examining their journeys on Spotify, we aim to understand how individuals with different needs and preferences and people with varying routines use the platform to recommend and discover music with others. This will help us identify potential areas for improvement and design features that cater to a wider range of music sharing scenarios.

Keeping the app experience fresh means always asking: What's hot, what's not, and how can we level it up.

Let’s dig into
user scenario

What did we identify?

Copy Hiccup: After copying the URL, the user frequently becomes sidetracked.
App Switching Disruption: Exiting Spotify entirely to share content on other platforms disrupts the user experience and reduces the likelihood of continued engagement within Spotify. It is unclear how long the user will stay on the app.
Friction in Social Sharing: The current method disrupts the inherent social nature of music sharing. It creates a gap between the moment of discovery and the actual sharing, potentially leading to users forgetting the specific recommendation or needing clarification on the wording. Sharing recommendations becomes less meaningful when the user needs to follow up on the wording.

Copy Hiccup: After copying the URL, the user frequently becomes sidetracked.
App Switching Disruption: Exiting Spotify entirely to share content on other platforms disrupts the user experience and reduces the likelihood of continued engagement within Spotify. It is unclear how long the user will stay on the app.
Friction in Social Sharing: The current method disrupts the inherent social nature of music sharing. It creates a gap between the moment of discovery and the actual sharing, potentially leading to users forgetting the specific recommendation or needing clarification on the wording. Sharing recommendations becomes less meaningful when the user needs to follow up on the wording.

Objectives

Friend's Picks

Leverage social connections. Personalized recommendations consider friends' music choices, adding a social dimension to discovery.

Friend's Picks

Leverage social connections. Personalized recommendations consider friends' music choices, adding a social dimension to discovery.

Friend's Picks

Leverage social connections. Personalized recommendations consider friends' music choices, adding a social dimension to discovery.

Social Integration

This will allow users to connect with their friends on Spotify and follow their music activity. This will enable real-time notifications of friends' listening activity and facilitate music sharing if allowed by the person without having to create a jam.

Social Integration

Proposing an in-app music sharing feature that streamlines the process within Spotify, eliminating the need to exit the platform.

The Inspiration : A Shared Experience

Imagine this: you're cruising through your Spotify playlist, completely immersed in the music, when you found an instant "banger," a track so infectious you have to share it with your friends. But then comes the disruption – the need to exit the app, find the song, and fumble with copying a link. This disrupts the flow of the music and creates an unnecessary hurdle.

This frustration, a common experience for many Spotify users, became the spark for this case study. This is how i started with the initial phase to get the idea running.

Let's execute the thought!

Synchronous listening based of real environment.

The concept revolves around enabling synchronized listening, so when your toggle is on for synchronous listening and if your 'Spotify friend' is connected to the same network, it prompts you to join the session.

Enabling such features to build the social aspect of Spotify will make a habit forming product on top of existing mental models

Solving for in-app music sharing without exiting the platform.

The highest traffic for sharing music can be traced back to the "playing now" page within the product, where users are allowed to share music files.

Addressing the primary objective is to resolve the major issue of maintaining a smooth music sharing experience within the app, without disruptions in the existing user flow and is an intervention in the natural flow.

In the other user’s Spotify app, they’ll get a collated recommendations list of all the songs that people what them to listen to on their homepage.

Remember how users had to follow up on the recommendations given?

See how we solved it :)

Ditch the follow-up! When your friend listens to a shared song, it turns green, showing you they enjoyed it. This indicates user satisfaction. No more awkward texts asking if they checked it out. This keeps things clear and keeps the music flowing.

So, the new task flow will look like this.

And we tackled it, in just four steps!

The final prototype

Conclusion

As an avid Spotify user and music lover, I truly enjoyed working on this case study. It provided a valuable opportunity to explore how social interaction can enhance music streaming experiences. By analyzing user behavior and proposing a solution centered around the importance of human connection within digital platforms.

Not only did this project offer me with insights for future designs and similar projects, but also fueled my passion for user-centered design.

Thanks for looking through!
Check out more projects here

At Pharmeasy

Reducing friction at location selection page.

At Pharmeasy

Reducing friction at location selection page.

At Pharmeasy

Reducing friction at location selection page.

At Pharmeasy

Reducing friction at location selection page.

At Pharmeasy

Reimagining how Spotify users recommend music to each other

Reimagining how Spotify users recommend music to each other

Reimagining how Spotify users recommend music to each other

Reimagining how Spotify users recommend music to each other

Reimagining how Spotify users recommend music to each other

Questions first

Questions first

Let’s dig into user scenario

Let’s dig into user scenario

What did we identify?

Objectives

Objectives

Proposing an in-app music sharing feature that streamlines the process within Spotify, eliminating the need to exit the platform.

The Inspiration : A Shared Experience

Let's execute the thought!

Let's execute the thought!

Synchronous listening based of real environment.

Solving for in-app music sharing without exiting the platform.

Solving for in-app music sharing without exiting the platform.

In the other user’s Spotify app, they’ll get a collated recommendations list of all the songs that people what them to listen to on their homepage.

Remember how users had to follow up on the recommendations given?

So, the new task flow will look like this.

So, the new task flow will look like this.

The final prototype

Conclusion

Thanks for looking through! Check out more projects here

Reducing friction at location selection page.

Reducing friction at location selection page.

Reducing friction at location selection page.

Reducing friction at location selection page.

Reducing friction at location selection page.

Let’s dig into
user scenario

Let’s dig into
user scenario

Thanks for looking through!
Check out more projects here