Shazam — Add a new feature.
My first solo project at Ironhack was to incorporate a new feature into an existing app: Shazam.
Shazam is an American application owned by Apple Inc. that can identify music, movies, advertising, and television shows based on a short sample played to any given device’s microphone.
Indeed, we could say that its slogan is a reflection of its primary purpose: “Just one tap again”.
My goal was to incorporate a new feature that allows people to search for songs previously shazamed by other users.
It has been an exciting UX/UI first project, four-day length, and a challenging design thinking process based on quantitative and qualitative user research, problem defining, ideation, user flow, wireframing, testing, and prototyping.
Shazam says “Our mission is to help people recognise and engage with the world around them”, and also says “Music discovery is just one tap away.”
However, we know that is not true at all. How do we know that? Emphasising with our users through research.
Quantitative and qualitative research
Thanks to the survey and several personal interviews with Shazam’s users, I collected fascinating information that gave me two facts.
Fact 1: users complain about their inability to find a song because of minimal user engagement and external circumstances like noise.
Fact 2: users did not know about Shazam’s Top Songs function, and most of them are not interested in the mainstream.
These are crucial pieces of information to resolve the problem itself and redesign the app, focusing on better usability to create an improved user experience.
At this point, you may wonder: but which is the main problem? How am I going to introduce this new feature?
Problem Statement
Users need to find a second chance to identify a song because they couldn’t do it the first time.
Hypothesis
We believe that creating a function that allows the users to search for songs also after the first try will achieve the app’s purpose. We will know that we have succeeded when the number of people who uninstall Shazam decreases.
Brainstorming
Users love Shazam’s purpose, but they have been using it increasingly until eventually uninstalling the app over time.
Why does this happen?
Finding a song with success — fast and effectively - is very hard. Sometimes it’s not that easy to use the app because of a lack of times or external noises.
At the same time, users don’t know about Top Songs Shazam. The truth is that Shazam’s purpose isn’t to relate to it and so users forget it exists.
Likewise, I decided to focus on Shazam’s purpose while improving the “connecting people through music” feature.
Solution
- Idea: Map.
- Concept: “Travel to Shazam”
- Goal: this feature gives users the chance to shazam whenever they want. It lets them travel to the past anywhere in the world, to connect with other users and find their songs.
- How is it used? Just choose a place, choose a date, connect with other users, check what they shazamed in your decided location and date, and find your song.
User Flow
Task
A user wants to search for a song after trying it in a club during New Year’s Eve without success.
Mid-fi and testing
Possible changes:
- The new feature could be on the home page, so when we scroll down, you see it — better usability.
- More obvious zoom when we are using the map — design a better map.
Hi-fi prototype
You can see the complete prototype on Figma — the experience it better!
I am happy to work for such an app such as Shazam, as music is one of my passions.
Working on such a scale — UX & UI design — and what it entails. I have learnt uncountable things. After struggling myself, I have realised how vital it is to have a good survey and to test the mid-fi and hi-fi prototype.
