I want to share my experience so far working with music, design and technology. I was impressed by the lack of information and enterprise solutions available for the industry — this showed an area for design impact — and motivated me to join a multidisciplinary team building an ecosystem for the music space.
My role — with an analytics app — focused on contributing with human-centered methods & design thinking as to bring the users needs to the core of the creation and development process, while using new technologies to enable access, consumption tracking, transparency and more.
The music industry landscape has been slowly shifting towards new technologies like deep data analysis, Ai, decentralized databases and machine learning with the vision of improving an industry - that has largely been unchanged in the bigger picture.
“If I’m going to pay one tech company to make sense of the mess created by another tech company, I need real results.”
— Jeff Bacon. Artist, Manager & Industry Expert
Each social media platform and DSP has unique features, methods of measurement, interaction and data collection. For instance, Facebook and Youtube are completely different platforms with different features and purposes. However studying the possibilities of the data collected from each platform, and showing cause and effect between platforms could draw new and valuable insights for users and also businesses.
With the right information and know-how’s, these tools can be very powerful and used in synergy to maximize efforts and resource allocation for touring, merchandise, marketing and many other possibilities. Visualizing an artist performance in a central hub is needed in order to guide users through complex systems and information overload.
Currently artist are in the position to spend valuable time learning how each one of these tools work and how their music is being consumed and tracked - all while losing time for what they do best, creating music.
Streaming services are increasingly generating more revenue and relevance in the music industry, so how does this change the economical landscape for musicians? What if some users are less tech-savvy than others? How does social media impact DSP performance, and ultimately revenue streams?
Each DSP has its own measurement methods and ways of operations that impact creators and artists. Having access is vital for success. -Information Is Beautiful
“There’s a learning curve with each major DSP’s “artist marketing” platform and their individual features are continually evolving. So if you’re an artist managing your own digital marketing and fan engagement campaigns and strategy, you will be spending a lot of time teaching yourself how each artist platform works. These are basically the back end of a consumer facing DSP.”
-chuckdafonk
Machine intelligence and artificial intelligence can gather large amounts of data and interpret crucial data points to draw conclusions; considering specific roles(composer, songwriter, performer, manager, etc); royalty splits; inform touring; licenses; brand association and more. Most importantly though, open channels for artist-to-fan communication, enabling end to end benefits from artists and creators to fans and everyone else involved in the value chain.
From a designer’s point of view this represents a huge opportunity to have an impact applying design thinking methods and user centric design to humanize new technologies and new products.
Having A Point Of Reference
During extended hours of user research phases and experimental research gathering, we identified patterns in user needs across the different user journeys - including fans.
Based on the data collected and analyzed from social media and DSP accounts, our task was to help users answer questions regarding their digital footprint across multiple platforms. Including consumption tracking; licensing; fan segmentation; royalty distribution; and insights, while also guide users through a complex environment. As a result artist and creators could free time for valuable and enjoyable tasks like music creation and creative problem solving.
By cross-referencing different key data points, analyzing social media sentiment, interpreting comments and mentions we can get closer to powerful insights. Which hopefully can have a positive impact on an artist career and empower them to get the most out of their digital services. While at the same time forming human relationships with fans, enhancing live performances, tracking their digital presence and revenues
Design thinking and human-centre methods provide holistic frameworks that allows us to focus on user needs, user pain points and business solutions - rather than only on technological details.
When design thinking is paired with data intelligence, raw data can be transformed into insightful information that gives context and insights to users and business; according to their needs and problems at a given point.
“That synergy between data and design and its output, we call design intelligence.”
— Randall Elliott
Design Intelligence Enablers & Framework
With this framework as inspiration we are able to transform raw data into tangible insights enabling a better user experience by giving access, knowledge, empowerment and guidance through complex systems and extensive amounts of information to end users.
Humanise: Personalisation of user experiences tailored to needs and goals driven by data insights, machine intelligence and anticipation.
Expedite: Streamline repetitive tasks to free up time for artists to deliver their best possible value and build relationships with fans.
Transform: Based on data intelligence and design thinking generate actionable insights - and a possible course of action that better informs the artist next steps and interests.
Discover: By creating patterns from data new opportunities and leads are generated that can guide artists into visiting new locations and tapping into unique fan connections and more.
As the technology continues to grow and change, the more is required from users to learn and dedicate time to these digital platforms - as they have a direct impact on their career and overall business. To gain adoption, these products need to be accessible and accommodate for wide range of user journeys and changing needs across a complicated music industry.
The future is here. It’s happening now. Designers are expected to create not just an app or a tool but ecosystems of intelligent multi-surface apps, data services, and cloud-enabled platforms. Artificial intelligence and access to big data are changing the work of designers faster than ever before.
Human-centered design must remain at the core.
— Sara Ortloff Khoury
I believe that a suite of connected apps - that can visualize an artist’s ecosystem across multiple channels and empower them through the different stages while informing the decision making process - can be incredibly useful for the future of a changing industry, for fans and also innovation in live performances.
Design thinking and emerging technologies should intertwine in the development of future ecosystems that enable new, human driven experiences powered by new technologies. The future of design is exciting and is in constant evolution, and I look forward to continue to contribute to the development of new products and tools that enables us to be more efficient and creative.