Spotify Sync for Peloton
Helping Peloton users power up their motivation and in-app experience by providing more control over in-class music options.
WHAT I DID
feature concept
user research
user testing
ux/ui
PROJECT CONTEXT
A New Spin
If you’re interested in fitness, you’re likely familiar with Peloton, the at-home fitness platform that creates home-use spin bikes, treadmills and rowing machines, all with touch screens that stream live and on-demand fitness classes. As Peloton shifts away from hardware (e.g. bike) sales and focuses more on growing its subscription base, it is vital that they not only continue to add value and new features for their users to enjoy, but also that their content appeal to the largest amount of potential users.
*Source: Forbes Advisor
Finding a (record) needle in a haystack.
THE PROBLEM
Despite their recent focus on increasing the diversity of genres offered, many users struggle to find Peloton classes with music or playlists that they enjoy, leading to frustration (often vented online) and wasted time spent searching for a class with a playlist they like.
THE GOAL
Sounding Out the User
After establishing the problem, I set out to better understand how users felt about (and were using) Peloton’s current music offerings, so that I could explore solutions for playlist customization, and maximize users’ enjoyment and time spent using the app.
RESEARCH OBJECTIVE #1
To understand how users are using Peloton.
RESEARCH OBJECTIVE #2
To understand how users feel about the current music played during classes.
RESEARCH OBJECTIVE #3
To understand how users listen to music and playlists while not using the app.
THE APPROACH
Research Methods
After identifying my research goals, I then created a plan that mapped out which research methods I would use to gather the most valuable insights from users.
Methods Used:
Crowd-driven / Online Forum Analysis
Competitor Analysis
User Interviews
Affinity Mapping
1. Crowd-driven / Online Forum Analysis
Having found that Peloton had a very active and engaged user base online, I started by diving into community forums and threads in order to identify some early themes, with the intention of fleshing these out further in user interviews. The playlist-related frustration some users were feeling was evident, validating my early hypothesis.
R/PELOTONCYCLE
“Peloton needs to up their music game.”
“I can't see where to stream Spotify through the bike?”
User Demographics
Given that music was central to the problem, the connection between the Peloton user base and Spotify users emerged as an early theme. This lead to me to do a demographic comparison and find commonalities that could help me when crafting my user personas.
2. Competitor Analysis
After validating my hypothesis with some initial research, I analyzed Peloton’s competitors in order to gain an understanding of what features they offered, what was different about their products, and where there was overlap. Doing so allowed me to identify opportunities for new and innovative features not currently available from their competitors.
3. User Interviews
Next, it was time to talk to real users to gain a deeper understanding of their needs and goals, and how they were currently trying to achieve them. The insights gained from these interviews was invaluable in learning about individual users’ behaviour, and in helping me to empathize with the challenges they were facing.
INTERVIEWEE 1
“I select most of my classes based on the playlist.”
-john, spinning enthusiastINTERVIEWEE 2
“Sometimes I use the subtitles as a way to avoid a bad playlist or song.”
-david, frequent userINTERVIEWEE 3
“I use Spotify almost exclusively to find and play music for workouts.”
-julie, marathon runner4. Affinity Mapping
The 3 main insights derived from this process were:
Motivation
Instructor Preferences
Music Preferences
After completing the user interviews, it was time to synthesize, and distill my findings into key themes that the users were facing.
How Might We’s
Finally, before moving into ideation, I used the insights gathered to map out users’ pain points and opportunities to explore. I was then able to distill those down further into a succinct HMW statement, which would act as the foundation to guide the ideation stage.
HMW STATEMENT #2
How might we give music-minded Peloton members more control over the in-class music options in order to increase their motivation to exercise and enjoyment of their workout experience?
Who are we helping?
PERSONAS
Now that I had a solid understanding of my users, I created 2 personas that captured their goals and frustrations. Having their current challenges highlighted not only helped to build empathy with the users, but also helped ensure any proposed solutions firmly targeted towards their needs.
THE SOLUTION
Ideating & Prioritizing
Next, it was time to start sketching out possible solutions. After settling on a Spotify integration and “beatmatching” feature, I created a feature list to map out and prioritize what to design first.
User Flows
Next, I mapped out 3 user flows. Doing so helped me decide which tasks to prioritize, and which screens needed to be created first when it came time to start sketching low-fidelity wireframes.
Lo-Fi Wireframes
Having decided to start by designing the booking flow, I sketched out several iterations for how each screen could look and function before moving on to mid and finally high-fidelity wireframes.
Prototype Testing
USER TESTING
Next, it was time to test the prototype with real users to see what was working, and what could be improved upon.
Users were asked to complete 3 tasks:
TASK #1
Start a class, and edit your music options.
TASK #2
Select Spotify Sync and connect Spotify account.
TASK #3
Select your playlist, choose “Beatmatch” as playback type, and start workout.
The Results
Task #1
Start a class, and edit your music options.
SUCCESS
RATE
100%
Observations
All users were able to successfully complete the task.
Instructing users to read the info on the first screen was deliberately avoided in order to gauge how many users would click on this info un-prompted, the goal being to establish whether or not this screen/info was vital to the user’s understanding of the feature later in the test. While only 1/5 participants read the information, none reported difficulty understanding how the feature worked.
Most users did not click to “Learn More”, but had no additional issues understanding the feature.
This appeared to play only a supplementary role and was not vital to users’ understanding of how the feature worked.
Task #2
Select Spotify Sync and connect Spotify account.
SUCCESS
RATE
100%
Observations
All users were able to successfully complete the task.
Users encountered no issues with this task.
Users commented that the task was intuitive and worked as expected.
Task #3
Select your playlist, choose “Beatmatch” as playback type, and start workout.
SUCCESS
RATE
100%
Observations
After encountering the “error” message in this task (0/13 tracks found), all users stated that once they read the text associated with the message, they understood immediately what was being suggested as an alternative. All users chose to allow Spotify to “Suggest Tracks” and completed the task successfully.
Finishing Touch
Based on the feedback received, I felt comfortable that the design was overall very easy for the user to navigate, and required few changes. I decided to make just one small change to the Class Details screen, to bring more attention to the new feature.
