Overview
Gigabit is led by 2 co-founders who are musicians in the local Boston music scene. They're looking to build a brand new digital product to promote the live music industry. Their goal is to connect musicians and music venues for performance opportunities. My role as a UX/UI designer is to help strengthen the product experience via user research and design.
The Challenge
Venues staff members need a way to easily book artists and communicate internally within the team of bookers, venue managers, and stage personnel. How might we help venue staff members work together efficiently to put on a great show?
The Solution
A 2-sided platform connecting venues and artists. Venues are able to set up shows details and invite artists to fill in each slot of the show. All the details including show times, band members, and instrument set-ups can be shared between venue staff members and artists in the show.
My Contributions
- Led user interviews with venue bookers
- Collaborated with founders to synthesize findings and use them to back design decisions
- Created a user flow chart, wireframes, and an interactive prototype
- Collaborated with developers to support development efforts
- Prepared design screens for the App store submission
User Research
Venues vary from large music halls to local bars. I began setting up interviews with bookers, one of which was from the Boston House of Blues. She coordinates various music events at the venue whether it be large concerts, open mic nights, or game nights. Not knowing much about organizing live music, I was deeply curious as to what would be involved and what bookers look for. There was a lot to learn and here are some of the major takeaways:
1. Some venues (smaller restaurants/bars) are moving towards residency, meaning the same artists will perform each week. This simplifies booking for the venues that don’t have the resources and time to find fresh talents.
2. Some venues do themed shows such as “Thursday Jazz Nights” or “Free Form Fridays” that reoccur on a weekly basis.
3. It can be risky to book a new band that has never played at the venue before. Some bands may have poor communication and/or are not professional in their performance while others put out great shows.
4. Bookers have a network of people that recommend up-and-coming artists. Referrals are often a trusted source of finding new talents. If a band has played at a well-known venue, that can build credibility as well.
5. Internal communication is tough. Organizing a show involves anyone from venue managers to bookers to stage personnel. Staff members need easy access to the show information for various reasons including replacing cancelled bands and setting up sound equipment.
"For booking, I have my booking calendar [pulls out notebook showing detailed list of upcoming shows]. I really want to have it on Google Docs because if I'm not here, I guarantee someone else wants to look at it. Concierge wants to know what's going on so they can put it on the website. The sound engineers want to see who's playing so they can set up properly. If it's on Google Docs, anyone can view it and I can even work on it at home."
- Booker from House of Blues
Defining the Focus
Since we're designing the very first version of this product, it's crucial to have a well-defined focus that guides our research and design efforts. The initial product idea was a platform where venues could post available show slots and search for new talents. However, our interview participants told us this wasn't a universal problem. Some venues have residence artists who perform on a regular basis, thus eliminating the need to find new artists. After reviewing the findings, we discussed each pain point and how impactful it would be to solve them. We came to a conclusion of focusing on organizing shows and internal communication. This could potentially save time and communication efforts, thus facilitating a smoother show experience.
Flowchart
Translating Findings into Features
We saw booking and internal communication as the largest pain points for venues. From that, we broke them down into smaller sub-tasks that are needed in order to organize a full show.
One major point of friction is the lack of shared information about the bands playing in upcoming shows. Venues vary in their team sizes but it takes anywhere from a few individuals to a hundred people to manage a show. With so many active hands, it's difficult to be in sync. We designed a show organizer that allows the booker to invite artists and bands to be in the show. It dynamically updates as it gathers responses through the artist-facing application. Each gig shows a clear status whether it is confirmed, pending response, or has been declined. Other staff members are easily able to access the show details.
The other challenge is preparing the sound equipment and stage set-up. Each band's set-up is different depending on the number of band members and the instruments on stage. One band may have 2 electric guitarist whereas another one may have a keyboard player and a vocalist. On a night where multiple artists are performing back to back, the sound engineers need to know who's on stage next and what needs to be prepared between the sets. We built a way to easily access a Press Kit that shows each band member and their instrument. Also included is a stage plot of where each person stands on stage. This gives anyone an informative overview of the band's composition.
Lastly, we know that bookers have artists they've enjoyed working with and want to continue the partnership for future gigs. We designed a "Talent Roster", a collection of artists that a booker can pull from when organizing a show. The bookers are able to explore the entire database of Gigabit artists, looking at various music samples, and add the artists they'd like to work with to their own Talent Roster. This feature gives bookers the ability to expand their network and bring in fresh talents. We hope the Talent Roster can be used to promote existing partnerships and also encourage rising artists to gain more exposure in the music scene.
Visual Design
Reflection
It was an awesome experience to work on this project. There is so much potential for Gigabit to grow in this music space that has been largely unexplored. I'm proud to contribute to this project and business direction through UX methodologies. I learned that as a business, there isn't always a straight route from where you are to where you want to be. A rising business needs to prove trust and reliability so it's crucial to build a strong foundation before moving forward.
It's always tough to ask a whole organization to change their process and try a new piece of tech-- that's the challenge of an early-stage startup. However, I do believe that if we produce a well-built product that solves the problem at its core, we'd be able to gain traction with music venues that are experiencing these challenges.
As the first launch, we wanted to tackle the core functionality and ensure that it provides a frictionless experience. If given more time and resources, I believe we could further build on our research findings. For example, if bookers are organizing certain shows on a weekly basis such as "Jazz Thursdays", we could explore the idea of template shows that the booker can create on a week interval, much like the Google Calendar functionality. It would also be interesting to show where an artist has performed before so the booker has a sense of the artist's track. I've learned a lot and there's definitely room to grow!
