Shazam UX Redesign
Team:
3 UX Teammates
Role:
Research Lead
Time:
3 weeks
Project Overview
Shazam is known as a music search engine. Research indicates that the most common use case of Shazam lasts less than half a minute. Most users use the app to identify a song, then immediately bounce to a different app to collect or listen to the song. Shazam wants to increase time in their app by providing services to help connect users and their music.
Project Goal
Shazam users stay less than half a minute with the app once they identify a song
The project goal was to increase the amount of time a user spends in the Shazam app by creating new and unique ways to connect users to their music
Explore the prototype
This prototype demonstrates Amanda's process of discovering a new song and curating a playlist for her dance class. The steps involved include:
Discovering a new song using Shazam
Saving the new song to existing playlists
Creating a new playlist and adding songs for sharing
Rearranging the order of songs within the playlist
Selecting a group and sharing the new playlist with the chosen group
Heuristic Evaluation
Limited Capabilities
In order to understand the app in its current state. We conducted the heuristic evaluation. Below are the three main items that we took a deep dive into.
Competitive Analysis
What do the competitors do?
We identified 4 main competitors. All these competitors have mobile apps that allow users to curate their music selection, recommend new songs and share a playlist.
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Apple Music
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Spotify
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YouTube Music
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iHeartRadio
Pros
Audio Fingerprint Technology
Access to date stamp
Shows upcoming concerts
Both Android and Apple
Sample snippets of songs
Cons
Strong preference for Apple Music
Limited function for interaction / value for the user
Used as a tool, not a destination
Not able to listen to the whole song
Feature Inventory
Attract users to interact with Shazam for a longer time
This is what we learned from the Competitive & Comparator Analysis:
All 4 competitors have options to share and customize a playlist except Shazam
3 out of 4 competitors allow interaction with other users, but Shazam does not
Shazam has its strength such as Audio fingerprint (voice recognition) technology
Lack of interaction, customized song preference, sharing playlist option could be a good approach to attract users to interact with Shazam for a longer time
User interview Quotes
Here are some of the noteworthy quotes we found
We wanted to gather as much research as possible, so we conducted 12 user interviews of people who use Shazam and listen to music frequently. Our goal was to ask open-ended questions so that we could get a deeper understanding of our user’s needs, wants, frustrations and pain points.
Key Finding
Based on the Competitive & Comparator Analysis we found out: Audio fingerprint (voice recognition) technology
None of the competitors has Audio fingerprint function
Shazam is lack of interaction customized song preference, sharing playlist options
Needs a way to connect with others
Needs an efficient way to organize playlists
Options to adjust playlists
A way to share between other streaming platforms
Primary Persona
“I view music as my inspiration and a way to connect with others.”
Amanda Jones
Age 27 / Dance teacher - rhythm and motion class / San Francisco
Amanda is very social and views music as a huge part of every aspect of her life
Uses Shazam to identify new songs
Switches to Apple Music to sort the new songs into playlists
Wants to share music with her students
Needs
Needs to be able to categorize her Shazams
Needs to be able to share multiple songs at once through Shazam
Behaviors
Switches to Apple Music to sorts music into playlist
Creates a playlist through Apple Music to share multiple songs at the same time
Frustrations
Creates a playlist through Apple Music to share multiple songs at the same time
Shazam only allows sharing
of one song at a time
Secondary Persona
“I’m overwhelmed with the thought of organizing my musical library.”
Michael Smith
Age 44 / Business analyst (side guitar musician) / Boston
Michael is a lead guitarist and creates his band’s setlist
Overwhelmed with thought of categorizing his music library
Michael is constantly inspired by the background music wherever he goes
Previously used Shazam but now types lyrics into Google
Needs
Needs an easier way to categorize songs to create his band’s setlists
Needs an easier way to be able to add new songs into his Liked Songs Playlist
Behaviors
Has one “liked songs” playlist that he shuffles through
Manually adds to his Liked Song playlist in Spotify
Frustrations
Too time consuming to organize his music library
Additional steps required to complete this task through another app
Common
They both are looking for easier categorization
Frequently shares music with the same group of people
Differences
Methods of categorizing songs
Use Frequency of Shazam
Amanda is in a rush to organize, Michael has time to do it but doesn’t want to
User Journey Map
Scenario:
. Amanda uses Shazam to identify the new song
. She can’t find a way to add a playlist, or customize the playlist.
. Switches platforms to access her Apple Music playlists to categorize the song.
. Amanda can only share to students with Apple Music, and becomes frustrated when sharing with non-Apple users.
This journey map helps us identify Amanda’s two biggest frustrations.
. No customization in Shazam
. Difficulty sharing with non-Apple listeners
Amanda, a private dance instructor, needs an efficient way to sort a song she just discovered because she wants to curate and share new music with her students to keep her classes interesting.
— Problem Statement
Exploration
How might we make Shazam more interactive and bring more fun rather than just song recognition?
How might we let users access their current playlists from other platforms and allow them to customize their playlists?
User Flow 1
Connecting with other apps
Amanda is typically on-the-go when she discovers new music, so we focused on a Mobile App.
This flow is for discovering a song and categorizing it into a synced Apple Music playlist.
By syncing, Amanda can customize playlists within Shazam and access the changes in Shazam or in her Apple Music.
User Flow 2
Create and Share Playlists
Share music with others
Choose the number of songs to share
Select a group of people or a single person to share
Wireframe
We sketched designs and created wire flows to visualize what a user might see as they walk through these steps.
Usability Test Plan & Finding
Goals
Our solution was to create two features:
Improved connectivity between Apple Music/Spotify to Shazam to work both ways.
Create a community feature for easy sharing of music.
We conducted a moderated usability test to learn more about the thought process behind our users and identify any potential difficulties navigating these new features.
3 out of 4 users clicked on “Add to Playlist” section as a button and were confused when it did not work
3 out of 4 users required multiple attempts to find the “Edit Playlist” function in the kebab menu, saying it “Kind of seems like there’s extra clicks.”
Next Steps
With the time constraints we had on this project, our scope was limited. If we had more time, we would dive deeper into researching a few topics such as music & memory. Once the initial Community is active, we would look into further gamifying the process of discovering and sharing music to keep Shazam interactive.
We also ran into technical constraints and made the decision to focus primarily on iPhone users with Apple Music. However, this does not account for the Shazam’s entire user base. With more time, we would develop an Android friendly version of this app to be more inclusive
Summary
We discovered that Shazam has limited capabilities and currently acts as just a song recognition app. By going through the research we found out what users want:
interactions with others when engaging with their music
categorize new songs into playlists
share with others from different streaming platforms
We created two solutions:
Improved Connectivity to Streaming Platforms
Sharing Songs & Playlists through an online Shazam Community
The benefits of our solution include increased user engagement and time spent on the app. These new features will help the business by attracting more users.