Research highlights that informed the solution.
In order to understand the where VNYL currently stands…
we conducted a heuristic evaluation based on: Jakob Nielsen's 10 general principles for interaction design.
Constraint: Without a paid subscription, we couldn't access the full site.
The recommendations we found are:
• Consistent Nav bar
• Add back buttons
• Add breadcrumbs
• Consistent headings, same color and size
I created a service blueprint based on a walkthrough with a current member of VNYL. This also helped us understand the user journey and identify touch points and areas of opportunities.
View Service BluePrint↗Some Areas of Opportunity:
• Embed a Spotify player on the page so it doesn’t navigate out of the site.
• Make yearly plan different or standout from the monthly plans to prevent confusion.
• Could a music database be leveraged when creating a profile?
• Evaluate the language used on the site like: "Get VNYL" as a login.
I did a feature analysis to better understand the subscription space through competitor research. This helped us identify any opportunities that VNYL is not currently leveraging.
Strengths:
A strength that made them stand out from the other companies was their connection to the music app, Spotify.
And being able to sign up with an existing account through Google.
Weaknesses:
We learned that VNYL could be more clear in terms of navigation, like how to log in and what the steps are.
Vnyl could be more clear on their curation process and gifting it to someone, and there is also no clear way to contact them.
To learn more about people who listen to records and potential users of VNYL.
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5 User Interviews
Objective: To understand the user journey and pain points of discovering and purchasing albums on a vinyl website.
Criteria:
• Collects vinyl records
• Recently or in the past has shopped for records
• Buys vinyl records online
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50 Survey Participants
Objective: To collect more information about users and vinyl at a higher scale we employed a questionairre.
How and Where?:
• We employed Google forms.
• All participants were from Reddit,
we posted in several vinyl specific and focused communities.
To synthesize our User Research, we affinity mapped our findings.
• Users want to discover new music.
• Users need clear expectations when purchasing a product.
• Users wants some control over the records that enter their collection.
We identified some key insights:
From our survey we found:
• 31% of the participants would choose a curated service to be surprised by new music.
• 85% of the participants want to purchase from vinyl companies that seem trustworthy.
Based on the insights provided by the research,
we created Jamie, our persona, to ground our decisions.
This lead to our Problem Statement:
The user wants transparency in the curation process when it comes to vinyl subscriptions,
so they know exactly what they are getting.
Vynl's current model requires an employee to select curated albums for the customers upon request.
We considered how parts of this process could be automated.
Could they leverage a music database when users are filling out their profiles
and use machine learning to give record suggestions based on feedback?
Consideration: How would this affect the jobs of the employees that currently curate the albums?
How might we make the user more involved in the curation process?
How can the user help VNYL with the curation process?
In our Design Studio,
we decided focus on how the user could provide feedback on their last order. Currently, there is no way to tell VNYL which records they enjoyed.
Our hypothesis was that by getting the user involved
in the curation process through feedback, they would have a better understanding of how the records are personally curated for them.
This would also help build trust in VYNL.
Based on our persona, Jamie, the user wants:
• Clear expectations of the product.
• Some degree of control over the curation process.
Based on our survey, users want:
• To purchase from vinyl companies that seem trustworthy.
We conducted 3 usability tests using a mid-fi desktop prototype, through Maze,
to find out how the users would navigate the VNYL website.
The 3 task the users were asked to do were:
• To Login.
• To save 2 albums they liked from their previous order.
• To select their next 3 albums and check out .
From our usability test, we needed to evaluate the use of certain icons, their placement, and possibly contrast.
All the users were able to complete the task successfully, but…
• 2/3 user didn’t initially click on the “+” icon to select their record.
• 1 user didn’t click on the heart as their first option to favorite an album.
Building trust through collaboration.
(a) From our heuristic evaluation, we discovered that Vnyl could benefit from a consistent nav bar, and by introducing additional navigation on the profile page when logged-in allows the main nav to remain unchanged.
(b) A current member of Vynl stated they didn't understand the curation process, and users from our interviews needed clear expectations. By providing the ability to give feedback, it builds trust that the albums are curated just for them.
(c) From the Service Blueprint, we identified that in order to preview an album for the user's next selection, it navigates out of the Vynl site and takes the user to Spotify's website, but by embedding a Spotify player into Vynl's website when selecting a record, it makes for a more seamless process.
Video walk-through of the prototype: Coming Soon!
(a) Evaluate Icons → From our usability study, we found that either the icons we used were unclear or not evident, possibly in terms of contrast. We could conduct a moderated usability study to further understand the issue.
(b) Vinyl Education → Another goal, that wasn't touched on, was how to educate users about vinyl. We hinted at this with the addition of a blog on the home page, so this is an area we could explore.
(c) Onboarding → Our current MVP was about new features that could be added to make the experience better, but we could evaluate the onboarding to process to help users understand how the data they are providing, like linking their Spotify account, helps in the curation process.
If you like what you see and want to work together, get in touch!
