Rochelle King is the Global VP of Design and User Experience at Spotify and spoke about her experience and knowledge on this issue, which I was keen to hear about. She outlines that data can engage us and refine the design/user experience as a result.. data is ultimately a measurement of what the users are doing to connect with the software in the real world. Transferring the current idea into that of one with with a wider social scale (being distributed to universities and online globally as a tool for creatives) we can see how the data the website collects needs to be stored and used responsibly to benefit the user. King also spoke about how designers need to ask the right questions and measure the data correctly.
"We need to bring more human behaviour into UI"
She outlines that when designing an digital application of any kind, we need to ask ourselves two questions:
- What do people want to accomplish by using our products?
- How well are we doing at delivering that experience to them?
- Does anything get in their way on the interface?
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Answering this, what people want to accomplish from using the interface is a tool for finding good collaborative partners and creating a wider network, as well as having an easy place to facilitate collaboration to occur. To deliver this to them, I plan to make the experience as easy as possible for the user, with timetable views, abilities to personalise content and colour code people/projects. Easily send files and work collaboratively on work in WorkSpace, instantly communicating and setting group alerts for things.
Data allows us to see how often people engage with the interface- can send specific alerts or feature relevant adverts/opportunities from others posting. (Could keep the aspect of posting requests, just have it contained to one aspect so not to clog up the system like before. This could be a sidebar option or dedicated page structure).
The experience has currently not yet been delivered, yet during trial runs and persona testings I will try to answer these questions again.
Working at Spotify, one of the most popular interfaces for my target audience (students and young professionals aged 18-26 for now) with a high proportion of creatives also loving music and engaging in local music related events and culture. Spotify also offer a student 50% off rate and act as a service to simply bring music to the people, appealing to everyone but is also heavily geared towards my target audience.
When experimenting with two interface styles, one white, one black, it was the data that led to the design being altered to the current darker style. In surveys they found the lighter interface was referred to as 'headache inducing', and the darker 'like Darth vador'. To solve this they modified the darker style, but drew more attention to the information which was proven to be successful from the white design.
Spotify then ran an AB test where they test 5% of the user basis with the new design, asking for feedback. They found out that those trialled on the new style interface listened to more music, and when surveyed found that people thought the information was clearer- and that there was even more music on the website! Nothing had changed, except the colour ways. The data provided from the digital element is beneficial as this minimised the risk, as a successful trail suggests it will have positive feedback overall. For a large company this is something which needs to be highly considered, and when considering my issue the aesthetic of any interface is vital to induce creative, productive practice.
When considering the button element of Spotify, the design team asked the question if there is a need for an explicit call to action? or, if the button is redundant and disrupts the simplicity. By removing the button featuring and showcasing more of the artwork, the clicks increased and pre-existing users knew what to do anyway. This relates to the layer systems discussed by other UX researchers.
The digital data is much more accurate to personalise an experience to so many people, but King says it's essential to not control- only suggest. It's important to let the user feel some form of control over the experience (and interface), as this is the only way people will re-engage with the experience again in the future.
When experimenting with two interface styles, one white, one black, it was the data that led to the design being altered to the current darker style. In surveys they found the lighter interface was referred to as 'headache inducing', and the darker 'like Darth vador'. To solve this they modified the darker style, but drew more attention to the information which was proven to be successful from the white design.
Spotify then ran an AB test where they test 5% of the user basis with the new design, asking for feedback. They found out that those trialled on the new style interface listened to more music, and when surveyed found that people thought the information was clearer- and that there was even more music on the website! Nothing had changed, except the colour ways. The data provided from the digital element is beneficial as this minimised the risk, as a successful trail suggests it will have positive feedback overall. For a large company this is something which needs to be highly considered, and when considering my issue the aesthetic of any interface is vital to induce creative, productive practice.
When considering the button element of Spotify, the design team asked the question if there is a need for an explicit call to action? or, if the button is redundant and disrupts the simplicity. By removing the button featuring and showcasing more of the artwork, the clicks increased and pre-existing users knew what to do anyway. This relates to the layer systems discussed by other UX researchers.
The digital data is much more accurate to personalise an experience to so many people, but King says it's essential to not control- only suggest. It's important to let the user feel some form of control over the experience (and interface), as this is the only way people will re-engage with the experience again in the future.
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