Research; Spotify

Spotify 

What is it; Spotify is an online music, podcast and video streaming website

Founded; Founded on the 23^rd of April 2006 with its headquarters in Stockholm, Sweden

Founders; Daniel Ek and Martin Lorentzon

Spotify is one of the leading websites being available in most of Euroope and America, Asutrailia, New Zealand and parts of Asia. With Spotify’s content available to millions of people the service is available on most modern devices including macOS, Windows and Linux computers as well as smartphones and tablets.

Users can browse Spotify for specific artists, playlists, albums, genres and playlists to find the type of music they like but also they can create their own playlists of their favourite music to keep it all in one place. Bsut they aren’t limited to this, users can also follow others playlists to keep updated with new music and get to see new genres they perhaps wouldn’t have listened to.

With over 50 million paying subscribers and 100 million monthly active users (As of March

2017), Spotify makes a large amount of profit but unlike with physical or downloadable sales Spotify pays royalties based on the number of artists' streams as a proportion of total songs streamed on the service. They distribute approximately 70% of total revenue to rights holders, who then pay artists based on their individual agreements. Spotify have used web technologies to their advantage, having market a service that is 100% online allows them to regularly update their website and make alterations without having to alter offline services. Also by having a online service everything is connected and linked so it's easier for the users to find everything about the website. 

Layouts;

 Spotify's general layout is clear and and has a user-friendly interface with playlists, songs and browser's on a side panel. Having a side navigation bar allows users to navigate easily through the website, as well as using the search tool at the top of the site. Having the play bar at the bottom is a consistent tool used on Spotify, to allow the user to pick and choose what they're listening to despite what page their on. What l like about Spotify is how clear they display their content, spacing out the information so you can easily identify what you're looking for. Also by allowing users to follow their friends and celebrities, Spotify has allowed them to explore new music genres and see what everyone else is listening to by following their playlists. This is a feature l think is unique about Spotify as their combining streaming with social media and making their site appear to be more social.

Spotify's website generally has less content because all the streaming content is on their app for their users and the website is used primarily for information. Like other streaming websites Spotify's site is minimal but highly visual, using album covers and artists to promote the variety they have on their service. Therefore, information is given in either few words or short sentences to fit their minimalist theme, this works well because they have used panels to split up their information and so the user can recognise that each panel has a slightly different topic. 

Spotify don't have a complex navigation, with only six pages it makes the users experience easier because everything you need to know is clearly labelled and detailed on the site. 

Brainstorming

Before l can do anything, l needed to think of what works and where there is a gap in the market for a new online media service. The main online service areas l think of are;

• Social Media
• Podcasts 
• Film/Music streaming 
• Digital News Magazine

Firstly, l looked into sites l enjoyed and used the most such as Netflix and Spotify and how they marketed themselves online as well as how they work. Because these are two of the sites that l use the most, l thought l would also go down the streaming route and begun to think of gaps in the market. When it comes to video streaming Netflix and Amazon Prime are two of the biggest streaming companies, in the market. The one thing l noticed was that these websites don't have is new releases, when films have been in cinema's they take a while to be released onto DVD and online. So, my first idea was to have a company dedicated to getting new release film and TV before any other streaming company. The benefits of this would be that the users could constantly stream the newest content and they'd always be the first ones to see it, however realistically the content would only be new for a few days before other online and offline business' could also distribute the content. So, I'm doubtful of who would in fact buy into this online service, as people tend to watch the newest films and TV through pirated websites. Perhaps, with more research and better knowledge of the media industries business deals it could be the foundation of a great new online service.

Secondly l wanted to take inspiration from sites such as Tumblr and Reddit where the content is heavily driven by fans of media franchises. On YouTube I've watched several fan films, most of which are inspired by the Star Wars franchise, so l wanted to create a new online media service that catered to premiering this fan made content. However, the site would look less like a social media site and more like streaming so the content creators would get more credit and hopefully more hype around their productions. I wanted to look into a media service that wasn't driven by Hollywood blockbusters because l think giving smaller producers and companies the chance to premier their products would be really rewarding and often some of my favorite films are created by independent companies, ('The Machine' Red and Black Films). Although l still really love this concept and think it could work really well to give people something new and different, l wanted to go with something l felt really confident about, music streaming.

Despite my love for film and TV l wanted to go with music streaming, as music is one of my biggest passions and something l know the most about. However, music streaming has a busy market with companies like Spotify, Apple Music and Deezer dominating it. So l started researching into them and seeing what they didn't have, nearly all music streaming sites have a free package for their users, so there wasn't anything special l could offer with that while still being able to make money. So l looked at rewards! The only thing l notice with these online media companies is they don't have the same benefits of physical shops, they no longer offer and points for being loyal to their service, this is one of the biggest difference I've personally noticed with online only services. With this being one of the biggest gaps in the market I've seen, l decided to go for and looked into creating 'listening points', where users can earn one listening point for every song they listen to and once they have enough points they can use them to download any song on the website for free. This means that users get rewards for simply listening to music, without having to have any form of subscription! The premise of my website is to therefore promote this reward system and promote users to listen to more music and earn more points.

With the foundations of my ideas, the next stage is I'm going to start researching into streaming sites such as Spotify and Apple Music and to start creating wireframes of my website.

(Brainstorming mind map)

Website Proposal