2018 - Present

Assumptions

Users want a place to discuss music, find bandmates, and connect with other musicians in their area

Users want to promote their events and releases

Users are looking for studio session gigs, but don’t know where to look

How might we…

…create a focused environment for connecting users?

…prioritize creating a safe space for musicians to meet each other that feels familiar, and provides a window into their local scene?

…provide an easy-to-use avenue for professional musicians to find work in their city, and promote their events to like-minded users?

The Goal

GoMUSE’s goal should be to connect people in an adjustable mile radius, creating a more focused view of what’s going on in the user’s area.

Users need to be able to meet people so that they can stay engaged in their local music scene, but they’ll also be able to see the gear of other users and hear their work to make educated decisions on who they engage with.

This eliminates a lot of guesswork when selecting your jam partners.

Discovery Insights

“Finding people that are aware of musicality, dynamic, and texture in their playing is difficult because there’s no way to vet those things in advance.”

Joshua Powell

As a touring professional who requires a lot of upfront skill from his bandmates, the amount of time he could spend teaching a potential new member was limited.

He needed to be able to rely on that person to be a good player, making the margin of error slimmer.

Having the ability to vet a potential bandmate by seeing their gear, and hearing the work they’ve done on their own, could help Joshua make an educated decision on who he engages with.

“There’s an intrinsic barrier to most, if not all existing platforms in the sense that direct media interaction is impossible, or it’s clunky.

Finding musicians on apps like Facebook is exceedingly difficult due to the amount of layers you have to go through to find them. ”

Jonny Carrol

Being a solo artist, Jonny found it difficult to interact with fans regularly due to the hoops you have to jump through using other platforms such as Facebook to promote his work.

His needs were not met using the current means because of the way the algorithms are set for these other platforms.

His posts weren’t breaking through, and when they did, it was often not to his target audience in his local scene.

“I wish there was a safe space where I could receive constructive criticism with no judgment.

If there was an artist-centric social media app, people would get into the feedback headspace naturally because they’d crave it for themselves to get better. ”

Jacquie Cope

Wanting to better her skills requires being able to play, and make mistakes.

Getting in a room with people that you aren’t sure you’re going to get along with doesn’t usually cultivate a safe space for people who are maybe less experienced.

After all, a huge part of being in a band is being a good hang.

Having the ability to make sure that there is a temperament match ahead of playing together is a huge deal.

Low-Mid Fidelity

Home Page // Communities

Create a hub for users to see posts from their chosen communities.

The home page will be the portal by which the end users will be able to navigate the rest of the application, as well as edit their information, make their own posts, and interact with other users.

Profile // Profile Management

The user profile should contain avenues for users to show what they can do.

Showing the gear that they use, as well as the music they’ve already made could help other users make educated decisions.

If the user doesn’t have recorded music, they can still share their social media accounts to show what they can do at their level.

Users should also be able to grow their network, regardless of their skill level.

Messenger

Give users a way to communicate with each other.

This will help cultivate relationships between users, and also help give users a better idea if their personalities are compatible.

Key Features // High Fidelity

Home Page

Your home page will display posts from the communities you have selected when creating your account, and the jumping-off point for the user to grow their musical community and knowledge.

Users will be able to post photos, blogs, videos, link posts to communities they are subscribed to, and interact with other like-minded users in these communities.

Communities

Through my research, I discovered that users wanted to be plugged into their community and to be able to make educated decisions based on the information available to them through the app.

Messaging

Cultivating a community takes communication, so GoMUSE has a built-in chat feature.

This creates a low-pressure atmosphere for people to get to know each other at their own pace.

Profile

The profile will function as the user’s hub containing all of their information such as their music portfolio, gear list, communities they are active in, and the friends they’ve met along the way.

Users will also be able to link their existing social media accounts for their projects to their portfolio, allowing another avenue to keep growing their following on social platforms.

Next steps & considerations

Sessions

While putting the application together, I noticed that the “Sessions” feature was a much larger lift than initially anticipated.

This feature merits its own section and extra functionality. So I’ll be building that next to ensure that professional musicians will be able to connect more directly with studios in the area.

Lost Gear

Through my research and my own experience, I’ve found that there is always a certain level of risk when playing out that your gear could get stolen.

Musicians are, generally speaking, not wealthy, so replacing gear can be really tough; Especially if the gear that was stolen was costly.

To hopefully remedy this risk, I am creating a “Lost Gear” function that will be a part of the user’s Gear List. They will have the option to report gear as stolen which will trigger a post to whichever community the user chooses to hopefully find lost gear.