On desktop, scan to open concerts in Spotify mobile web, and tap 'open app' to view in Spotify app. Or tap here if on mobile.
Redesigning concerts on Spotify
Spotify has committed to invest in live (concerts) as a new market to explore thus expanding product initiatives and revenue opportunities. Discovering concerts on Spotify is an underserved feature that gives measurable value to listeners as it relates to artist engagement.
My role as the lead designer was to improve the discoverability of the concerts feature, and to create a north star UI redesign that would harmonize with the broader Spotify ecosystem.
In 2016, Spotify engineers developed an API that extracted concert data from Bandsintown, correlated artists with Spotify listeners' preferences, and generated location-based concert suggestions. This functionality remained untouched without corporate backing until 2019, when there was a resurgence of interest in it's potential. The experience was made with legacy UI components, not updated in years, and known by users as an "easter egg" feature–delightful but difficult to find.
Problem
An opportunity reliant on discovery
Our research showed us that the majority of reasons why an individual doesn’t attend more concerts were associated with discoverability. Fittingly similar to the state of the feature, our existing product offering lacked sufficient contextual cues in the app for our users, who feel frustrated when they miss out.
New points of entry
My first priority was to identify areas in the product where concert promotion was most strategic within the broader audio portfolio. I brought together relevant product stakeholders at Spotify who expressed interest in integrating concert discovery as means to bolster their offerings. I hosted a week-long design workshop where we created cohesive user flows that we used to prioritize, research, and test the many opportunities that concert discovery presented to the overall experience on Spotify.
Making discovery contextual
We maintained the belief that our solutions should be contextual to the audio discovery journey, thus complementing the listening experience with more ways to connect with and enjoy your favorite artists.
Examples shown are: viewing concert content on the artist page, home recommendations page, and additional campaigns to the broader Spotify marketing channels (email, push messaging, etc.)
Making discovery personalized
Working along side data analysts and researchers, we also created a data narrative that brought in concerts to the Spotify user/artist matching algorithm–a very complex system that we managed to evolve with our concerts API.
Solutions
Personalized recommendations on Home
In Q1 of 2022, we successfully added a new concert discovery shelf on home that elevated concert content and measured Home tracked connections and consumption share with audio content.
Contextual recommendations in now playing view
In Q4 of 2022, we created added a component to the now playing view where a user in the middle of listening, can see additional content below the fold to learn more about the artist's tour near by, lyrics, merch, clips, etc.
Personalized recommendation email
On top of product discovery paths, we created a marketing plan that included concert recommendation emails. Sent every 2 weeks featuring 5 upcoming events near each user who opt-ed in.
EOY 2022 Results
With the redesigned of discovery paths in production and subsequent marketing initiatives activated, we saw a dramatic increase in engagement with concert discovery in Spotify.
UI Redesign
Another significant initiative involved the need to revamp and rebrand the UI. Originally developed as a temporary solution, the experience fell short of the functionalities required for a user-friendly and visually appealing concert exploration and ticket buying journey. This meant updating legacy components with the aim of maximizing reuse from the current design system, and develop new components to showcase our distinctive feature.
Inclusive of desktop
The concert discovery UI did not exist on desktop or the web app due to the fact that the components were never updated and were thus filtered out of future updates. I had to translate all the UI elements into their modern forms and push for parity across all platforms.
A content strategy focused on personalization
Through findings in early qualitative research, users expect ways to discover concerts by time, genre, festivals, and more. This required us to expand on how we could leverage our unique data capabilities to illustrate a more complex offering when it came to personalized concert recommendations.
