Role
User Research
Product Strategy
UI Design
Interaction Design
Usability Testing
Tools
Figjam
Notion
Maze
Figma
Dovetail
Timeline
5 weeks
The Problem
Currently searching for available intimate concerts is very limited with a single dropdown menu. Sofar does not allow users to explore available concerts based on anything other than location.
The Solution
Our solution was to design a search function that contains three search criteria (location, dates, number of tickets) and create an icon filtering experience for those search results, empowering users to make more informed decisions about which events they might want to attend. We also altered the display of the product to dark mode for greater accessibility.
Usability Review
To better understand the product and empathize with users, we conducted a usability review and highlighted pain points and wow moments in the existing experience. To get a comprehensive view of this segment we tackled it from two perspectives:
Business & User frustrations
Following our usability review we defined the primary and secondary business and user frustrations.
Primary Frustration
When booking a concert users are unable to search for shows by anything other than location which results in less confidence that an event is worth their time, especially given the face that there is already a degree of mystery to who is playing at said shows.
Secondary Frustration
When looking for clear and concise visual communication users are left in the dark by confusing and har to read color themes.
Competitor Benchmarking
Summarise the competitor benchmarking…
Problem Space
Combining our initial usability review and competitor benchmarking helped us identify the problem space and outline our research goals to prepare a script for our upcoming interviews.
Summary of Problem Space: Users are weary to book a concert for an artist that is a mystery until they get to the event. The further lack of details provided by Sofar about their concerts do little to assure users that they are guaranteed a positive experience
Summary of Research Goals: Identifying ways to make users feel more secure and empowered when they book a concert.
How might we provide more information and better communication of that information?
User Interviews
In order to gather qualitative data and empathize more deeply with users needs and frustrations we embraced user interviews as another research method. We began by creating a research interview script that aligned with our primary research goal. We prioritized objectivity by asking open-ended questions and clarifying follow-up questions.
Affinity Map
With the recordings from those interviews, we leveraged Otter.ai to transcribe multiple 20 minute sessions of audio/video to visually organize our conversations in a way that could be parsed and annotated. To validate the initial observations made from our usability review and competitor benchmarking we synthesized the data using Dovetail. By incorporating tag taxonomy to highlight nuggets of information within the interviews, we were able to identify the key problems they experienced.
Ideation
Once we identified our problem - a limited search experience - we began to ideate solutions with a few different techniques.
Crazy Eights:
We got our initial ideas flowing by sketching out 8 ideas for 1 minute each. This technique allowed us to come up with ideas that we could build upon and discuss together through more open discussion and less constrained brainstorming.
Information Architecture:
By mapping out the current content of the site, we identified where valuable information was missing in the search experience, and what priority that information should take in the hierarchy of the site for users.
What can we add
Filter icons
Dark mode display
What can we improve
Three-sectioned search bar
Cleaner event cards
User Flows
After mapping the existing information architecture, we moved to mapping the current user flow to empathize with users on the existing journey and highlight any areas of friction they might encounter within the flow. From there, we created an improved user flow focused on eliminating those friction areas.
Rapid Prototyping
We started the prototyping phase by sketching collaboratively in Figjam, and then moved into Figma to generate mid-fidelity frames that helped us quickly iterate on our original ideas and visualize a solution without sinking time into hi-fidelity screens prematurely.
Styles & Components
Before creating the hi-fidelity prototype we established the product styles and created interactive components in Figma to ensure an efficient and consistent design as we moved forward.
High Fidelity Prototype
Our hi-fi prototype consists of a dark mode display, three-tiered search bar, updated event cards, and icon filters. While designing we felt challenged to create new components without over-stepping the Sofar Sounds design system set in place. The dark mode was a powerful solution to this because it captures the intimacy of the product’s purpose to create unique musical experiences, while also improving the accessibility of the brand colors.
Three key learnings
1. Design thinking is not always linear. It requires the ability to pivot as the problem becomes more focused and revisit previous stages to clarify that focus.
2. It’s important to stay obsessed with the problem, not my design solution. The solutions will always be iterative and adapting to user needs and business goals.
3. Businesses won’t always have a clearly defined problem in their brief. Be ready to ask clarifying questions and don’t be afraid to push back on ambiguity to get a deeper understanding.
Next steps
The next step in this case study is to test the final prototype. I would do this utilizing the platform Maze to collect key information about the product's learnability, efficiency, memorability, errors and satisfaction users have with the final design. It's important to test the product to create components and a user flow that aligns with the user needs - versus what I as a designer think is best. Analyzing those test results will provide a clear path to deliverables.