OVERVIEW

Gig-it is a platform for local artists to find gigs and music related opportunities in the local scene. It provides a platform to congregate events and opportunities


My Role

User Research,

UX Design,

Illustration

Project Type

Personal project

Design Timeline

4 months, Summer 2022

PROBLEM

New artists often experience a hard time finding music related opportunities due to lack of exposure or connections.

Connection is a major way for new and amateur artists to get gigs. However, to form these connections requires a lot of time, effort, and luck. These obstacles can hinder their growth, prevent them from reaching their full potential, and add diversity in the music scene.

SOLUTION PREVIEW

A platform for music opportunity seekers and owners to connect with direct procedures and personalized recommendations.

It provides personalized categorization of gigs and events around users based on their location, availability, and your taste. By building user profile and having a customized search page, users can easily find gigs that suit them. Users then can discuss with the gig owners about the opportunity and get to know each other.

USER RESEARCH

What’s the music scene like? What is it lacking for new artists?

As a student myself, I first started sending out surveys to students who are either music major or music enthusiasts. I want to see their thoughts and pain points, as well as whether an online platform could potentially help them. I received 12 answers and here are some interesting insights:

10 out of 12

Think a platform will help them with connections and opportunities.

8 out of 12

Think there are not enough open opportunities inside and outside of college.

7 out of 12

Do not know where to start on finding music related opportunities.

6 out of 12

Have tried web and mobile apps to assist them finding gigs.

COMPETITIVE ANALYSIS

Some participants said they used apps before, so I want to know what features they need and dislike.

Strength:

  1. includes all types of freelance categories such as graphic design, tutoring, music etc.

  2. security measures to reduce scams.

Weakness:

  1. not targeted, it’s a huge platform targeting all freelance fields

  2. too many irrelevant options can make users feel distant and lost.


Strength:

  1. connects music enthusiasts together through “dating app swiping method

  2. a platform just for music enthusiasts

Weakness:

  1. displays only one musician at a time and requires you to make a decision instantly

  2. narrow scope: more targeted towards finding band members instead of gigs.


Strength:

  1. musicians’ “LinkedIn” with lots of professional musicians and bookers

  2. proper gigs with many networking opportunities

Weakness:

  1. invite only: You need to have an established music profile already

  2. commercialized with only popular artists shown in the recommendation list


💡 I will avoid:

  1. inefficient display of resources

  2. user experience that feels distancing

  3. exclusivity

💡 I will embrace:

  1. personal and detailed recommendations and search method

  2. re-creating a natural way of human interaction

INTERVIEWS

After interviewing 6 new artists and 4 gig owners, I realized the general pain points…

1: Lack of open information

There’s little information regarding bookings, gigs, and venues out there. You can gather information by “hearsay”, but it is time consuming.

— artist

Venues will post opportunities on their websites and social media, but they are difficult to discover since you need to know them first.

artist

Difficult to find information about individual artists. Thus, only invite musicians they know to perform.

– venue owner

2. Music opportunities are scattered and diverse

Music opportunities are very diverse, ranging from venues to private parties. Where do you find all these information? Even if you find it, will it suit your specialty?

artist

Opportunities are posted on many different platforms, making it difficult for us to find them one by one.

artist

“I wanted to find a Latinx, female identifying composer for my animation, but I have to ask one by one because I don’t know that many music people.”

– gig owner (animation project)

3. Exclusivity

Only well-known or well-publicized artists would show up if you conduct a general search on Google.

– artist

We do have “music residence” in our bar since we already built connections with some artists throughout years. However, we always are looking for new musicians.

– bar owner

Some musicians might have the impression that we are being exclusive, but that’s a misunderstanding.

– bar owner

Communication gap discovered! It’s not just artists are experiencing these problems, gig owners too!

TACKLING PAIN POINTS

Competitive analysis and user insights provided me with “do”s and “don’t”s to tackle their pain points.

1: Lack of open information & Exclusivity

It is difficult to find open and congregated information regarding music opportunities. Artists need to spend considerable amount of time and effort going through various platforms and ways to gather information.

Solution:

The platform will congregate all types of gig opportunities and requests that are easily discoverable through personalized categorization.

Without an accessible platform:

With an accessible platform:

There are various kinds of requests, genres, and artists. It is difficult to categorize everything. How do we maximize the inclusivity and allow all users to showcase their works, who they are, requests, as well as making them easily discoverable?

2: Music opportunities are scattered and diverse

Solution:

Along with functions of uploading videos, pictures, the profile should be as easily customizable as possible. Users should be able to customize tags and keywords. Flexibility is key.

3. Creating proximity on an online platform

Since the traditional ways of finding gigs are more connection and communication based. How to make the process more natural, more like human interaction? How to make the user experience not as mechanic and distancing but also ensure the platform feels trustable?

Solution:

Instead of sending a “request” to the gig owner like that of in Airbnb, artists and gig owners should reach out to each other through a chat. Music gigs are flexible and negotiable, thus direct chatting also provides users more opportunities and proximity instead of a mechanic “accept” or “decline”.

INFORMATION ARCHITECTURE

I mapped out a general structure with 5 major pages: discover, upcoming events, saved, chat, profile.

LOW-FIDELITY TESTING

After asking 4 participants to navigate the app and complete 2 tasks, I realized the flows are not straightforward.

I created low-fidelity wireframes to build out the structure and flow of the app. However, there are lots of uncertainties and potential variations I could think of. To make progress, I did usability testing to give me guidance for further improvements.

1: discover more gigs near you

2. Search King’s Burger and put it in your wish list

Overview of other pages

General problems discovered:

Notification icon makes users anxious

Users have reported that seeing a notification icon without knowing the notifications right away can be a bit frustrating.

Browsing format can be more direct

Even though users can view specific information about one gig instantly, they couldn’t see other gigs metadata right away.

Search is not accessible

Only the home page has a search bar; however, search is a crucial function in the platform.

Categorization is not comprehensive

Only the home page has a search bar; however, search is a crucial function in the platform.

FIRST ITERATION

Notification as a section

Considering notifications will be an important part of the app experience, for example reminding users of upcoming gigs, notifications will be included in the home page and directly showing the content. Users no longer need to click on the icon to check for notifications.

Universal search bar

Search is a crucial function in the app, thus, I don’t want users to repetitively go back to the home page to search. To make sure users can reach to “search” in as little clicks as possible, I made it accessible on every page.

HIGH FIDELITY

I conducted another round of usability testing focusing on main page flows as well as onboarding, then drafted high fidelity wireframes based on feedback.

1: Onboarding Flow

Problem

Completing a profile has several steps and I had trouble determining how many steps to include. How to give users flexibility, but at the same time keeping them engaged to fill out important informations?

Solution

Making secondary information “optional” to fill out during onboarding. Users can continue to complete their profile once onboarded. I also included a progress bar to keep users informed about progress. In terms of wording, I made it lighthearted and engaging.

Profile flow:

2: Homepage layout

Problem

My initial attempt of sorting gigs is not comprehensive enough with awkward wordings like “good music fit”. It also does not give user convenient ways to change their preferences.

Solution

I added different ways of categorization like tags. Users can swipe left and right to see more information. Moreover, users can edit the tags to personalize the recommendations.

 

3: Browsing Layout

Problem

My previous design of browsing is not efficient to showcase as much metadata of different gigs as possible, even though users can view details of one gig specifically at one time.

Solution

I chose the more traditional way of display results, which is a list of gig cards with only the important metadata.
 

4: Search Process

Problem

I initially combined “quick search” and “filtered search” together. However, having two CTAs is confusing.

Solution

I separated "quick search" and "filtered search" into two sections. I made the elements of filter search in the accordion form, so the user does not need to see the criteria they don't need. I included "map" in the "keyword search" page for a visual presentation of locations.
 

4: Chat & Accepting Gigs… and Cancelling

Users liked it! 🎉

They enjoy the “chat then decide” mode. When gig owner and artists reach an agreement, the gig owner will send the artist an invitation.

Chat & Accept

View in Calendar

Cancelling a gig

FINAL PRODUCT

Personalized Categorization

Based on your location, availability, and taste, the home page will recommend gigs and opportunities just for you.

Saw a gig that you are interested in? Save it to your “like” list.

Profile that Represents YOU

Upload your pictures, videos that represent your music experience. Add and edit various tags to showcase your skills, style, and equipments for better recognition.

Filtered Search

Filtered search allows you to narrow down the search scope and find the perfect gig matches to you.

Discuss to Decide

Feel feel to reach out to the gig owner and have a chat about the opportunity!

Instead of sending a request like that in Airbnb, direct messages allow you and the gig owner to know each other better and talk about details . Once the deal is set, the gig owner will send you an invitation.

Cancellation…

If last minute change happens, submit a cancellation request to the gig owner.

ILLUSTRATION

Here are all the illustrations I’ve created to enhance the vibrant atmosphere of the app.

NEXT STEP

There are still lots of potential improvements and expansions of Gig-it.

  1. I've only created the prototype for users who want to find gig opportunities, instead of users who host gigs. The procedure of creating a flow for hosts will be similar to this current procedure with a few differences: instead of browsing gigs, they will be browsing musicians etc.

  2. Different types of notifications should be specified, as well as out-of-APP notifications. I will create a series of notification icons such as "special event", "complete your profile", "new gig invitation", "up-coming gig", and general tips in the "notification" area.

  3. Adding a payment method function will be essential to increase the security of this APP. It will prevent hosts refusing to pay musicians or musicians refusing to pay cancellation fee.

  4. Making the on-boarding illustration into an animation with more types of musicians will be more inclusive in the visual sense. It will also show that this gig is not just for musician who play instruments, but also technicians, DJs, sound designers etc.

Additional functions I will add:

  • finding connections: musicians can also discover other musicians, instead of only gig opportunities

  • a section for music events that does not require the approval process (eg. music party)

  • payment function

  • comment section for each profile, eg. a review after a gig performance from the host