Case study: Making music streaming more social
By: Lia Chandra
Tags: UX Design, Spotify, Case Study, Product Design, Digital Product Design

Like most college students, much of my life is accompanied by a soundtrack: whether that’s hanging out with friends, traveling, or even walking to class. With music playing 24/7, it’s easy to get tired of certain songs and playlists. That’s when the quest to find new music begins: while Spotify’s algorithm generates personalized playlists, I rarely add these songs to my playlist. Texting my friends, although requiring the most effort, always yields the best results — new music that I actually like.

Talking about music is more than simply a way to find new jams — it’s a continuous conversation point that makes me feel intimately connected with my friends even when we aren’t together, because of how personal songs can be. For Gen Z, who grew up using music streaming services, music is heartbeat of our lives — certain songs remind us of glimmering memories, and most importantly, the people who make those memories shine so bright.

STEP 1: Diagnosing the Problem

Music is a method of connection, and while apps like Spotify allow you to follow friends on the app, passively sorting through their playlists is our only way to interact with their account. When listening to music, people want to be able to connect with their close friends, so that they can find new music through them and interact with them digitally in a very personal manner. People currently can’t do that well because

They can’t see when their friends are listening to music on the app. It requires a lot of effort to access their friends’ accounts on the mobile app (they either have to look them up by name or press 5 buttons to navigate to their profile). They cannot communicate with their friends through the app (they have to leave the app which requires much more effort and can seem unnatural).

STEP 2: Researching the Problem

To pinpoint the exact issue users face when it comes to interacting with friends on Spotify, I interviewed several Spotify users — namely, Abigail Boatmun, Nicole Silberberg, Vanessa Rivera, and Neha Blair. I chose each user for their different use of and level of experience with the app to bring diverse perspectives to my research. After interviewing my users, I discovered the following:

Users love finding new music is through friends, but find it difficult to do so because it is an effortful and unnatural process. Users usually have to switch apps to text their friends, sometimes use Shazam, and then type in song names one by one. Users want music sharing to be more casual. Many users are self-conscious about sharing their favorite songs because music can be very personal. Currently, sharing music only feels natural to users when it comes up in person, which is usually not when users are looking for new music. We love talking music with our friends — most users indicated that they talk to someone about music at least once, daily.

Market Research

Currently, the primary way in which people suggest songs to their friends is by sharing the songs one by one, through text messages (either through buttons on Spotify or through the Spotify widget on iMessage).