Introduction
GigZone: A platform that allows musicians to do what they love most…performing for an audience!
This project was my graduation project (2023) and was completed over a span of 3 months.
Problem statement
There are several thousand talented musicians around us who want to build a career as performing artists. Due to the unorganised nature of the music industry, a majority of these musicians don’t know where or how to begin their career. A major communication and information gap is prevalent in the music industry, making it difficult for musicians to establishing themselves as performers within the city and local groups.
Assumptions
• Musicians generally land a gig via a mutual contact (friends, relatives etc.), which limits the number of potential gigs they can get and the people they connect with.
• Musicians are not being compensated fairly.
•There is a lack of promotion for their shows, hence they do not get any recognition.
What did I find?
Musicians:
Lack of support from the music industry and funding.
Limited performance opportunities and exposure.
Difficulty in finding quality music education and resources.
Limited access to equipment.
Inadequate compensation.
Struggles with mental and emotional health in the demanding industry.
Inability to find musicians with similar interests and goals.
Music education is not necessary to begin and grow. But it can become the differentiating factor to make you stand out from the crowd.
Venue / Event managers
Venues are looking for newer talent and new voices.
Many venue managers are unaware of where to find newer musicians. Others have agents that brings them performers and musicians.
Managers are skeptical of giving opportunities to new musicians due to lack of confidence in them.
Finding entertainers is a small part of their job and is not given as much time.
With the time restriction, narrowing down my research became crucial. I did a quick analysis to identify the problems I could address in the remaining time.
To try out all iterations and different elements possible, I sketched about 20 pages of wireframes to narrow down the iterations and permutation of elements that worked best for the given context.
Finding gigs
Shows venues that are looking for performers. Apply for the gigs you want in just a single click.
Lessons
Learn from the basics to advance concepts of music to stand out from others.
Rental
Event musician needs good gear, which they can't afford. But they can rent it & sound great on stage.
Style guide
UI Designs
A simple yet comprehensive onboarding to create a personalised home page for users. The gigs shown on the home screen would change based on the user's musical taste, catering to their preferences.
Easily find the right gigs for you. The app recommends the right places for the user's talents, promotes upcoming gigs to look out for. Get the essential information like the rating by others who have performed at the venues and whether the gig is paid or not.
All the details about a gig, a clear, simple layout, telling users everything they need to know before they register or send in their profile for it.
Every musician needs great gear to sound awesome on stage. But not all of it is affordable. The app allows them to rent gear, filter it by category, set dates for rental to see which gear is available on those days for rent and also get recommendations about the best gear for their style of musical preferences.
A filter with images made it much easier to recognise the category, with minimal time spent on looking for it and more focus can be on finding the right piece of equipment.
Users can easily add their favourite equipment to the cart, fill in the delivery details and checkout. This allows musicians to sound great at every performance, helping them get more opportunities.
With a musician's busy schedule & juggling multiple tasks, it does not leave them with enough time to learn via long videos. To ease this, the app breaks down larger concepts into bite sized chunks to make it easy to learn, ensure it is not overwhelming and fit the time constraint.
The courses are divided into 3 categories: Beginner, Intermediate and Advanced. This makes it easy for users with different levels of knowledge and experience to find the right courses to help them upskill.
To get users to buy more courses over the span of their time on the app, some of the courses would be available for free. This would let users gauge the quality of information.