CoLab,

CoLab,

The

The

hub

hub

for

artist

for

artist

and

for

artist

and

and

event

event

hosts

hosts

CoLab is an app that connects gig artists and event hosts, helping them discover gigs, improve their skills, and connect with other artists and communities, all in one place.

CoLab is an app that connects gig artists and event hosts, helping them discover gigs, improve their skills, and connect with other artists and communities, all in one place.

Back story

Our Client Dharam Tiwari and Nitin came up with an idea to design CoLab for, an MVP to revolutionize the gig industry by helping artists find gigs & networking. Our goal is to create a workflow prototype that brings CoLab's vision to life, attracts pre-seed funding, and initiates development.

Team

  1. Product Designer

  2. Bubble Developer

Timeline

2023 (July - Aug)

Skills

Product Design

Design

Creating an elegant and user-centric experience 🥳

Creating an elegant and user-centric experience 🥳

We designed the main flow with first-time users in mind, introducing them to the key features while having it feel simple and easy to navigate. Adhering closely to a set of product constraints helped us to set a focused approach:

We designed the main flow with first-time users in mind, introducing them to the key features while having it feel simple and easy to navigate. Adhering closely to a set of product constraints helped us to set a focused approach:

Personalized experience 💫

CoLab's homepage is the face for the entire app by helping users to find gigs easily with clickable gig cards and smooth navigation. During onboarding, signing in is straightforward with options like Google, Apple, and phone number verification

Why's?

CoLab is particularly designed to support multiple talents of the users to prioritise each and develop every talent at the same time.

The gig cards provide a full overview of each gig, so users don’t need to tap through each one and get frustrated.

Track your gig ✨

This section provides an overview of all gig applications submitted by the artist. Artists can monitor the status of each application

Reason:

Simply we understand users frustration and made the waiting time a bit more valuable 😉

This section provides an overview of all gig applications submitted by the artist. Artists can monitor the status of each application

Reason: Simply we understand users frustration and made the waiting time a bit more valuable 😉

Stress free-learning 📚

68.8% of artists in survey reported that inconsistent learning from YouTube videos limits their growth. That's why? we designed CoLab's learn section to help users

Choose their learning journey based on their interests and skill levels.


Whether mastering an instrument, understanding composition, or even exploring new genres

Future Plan:


We aim to design it as gamification in this feature to increase user engagement and higher Daily Active Users (DAU).

Community 🧑‍🧑‍🧒‍🧒

The Community Page has three sections

For You: Personalised post recommended based on user's interests and interactions,

Explore: Browse featured groups and discover new artists through their posts.





Groups: Join various artist groups based on different art forms, skill levels, and interests.

Again WHY?

🫂 + 🧠= ✨👩🏻‍🎤

We know our creative users want to both find gigs and grow, We bring up with a community idea To feed their networking and learning from relevant post. and giving them every possible way to grow.

Message 💬

We added a chat section in CoLab to enable seamless conversations between artists and event managers for negotiations and contract sharing.

Me 🫶

The “Me” section is a personal profile space with two key slides About & Profile. where users can set up and display their complete details.



How it benefits & Why? 🤷‍♀️

We know that for creatives social media and portfolio is everything (Yup! heard it right portfolio is everything 😂 ). So we designed Me section that whenever a recruiter view a profile they see a complete details with socials and their work.

Research

Understanding the
problem better 🧐

Understanding the problem better

We conducted interviews and sent out a survey, sampling the viewpoint on


  1. How does gig artists find gigs and network for better connections and learn to grow in their career.


  2. Particularly what are all the struggles that they faced while starting their career?

Our research led us to a few emerging patterns that guided
a perfect direction: 🎯🛣️

Our research led us to a few emerging patterns that guided a perfect direction:

Data Gathering

Understanding the
Market with data 📈

Understanding the market with data

Understanding the Market with data

Secondary research was as important as primary research in identifying our target users. We used data from MIDiA Research, which analyzes the music, video, and entertainment industries.

1. According to MIDiA, the indie sector's market share rose to 34.6% by 2022,

2. Yet many emerging talents struggle with opportunities and networking.

3. Billboard reported that independent acts reached a 43.1% market share in 2022, but over 60% of artists struggle to find gigs and 80% face career-start challenges.

Our extensive research revealed that finding,learning,networking was a significant pain point for our users so, We gathered all substantial raw data on both quantitative and qualitative insights to jot down the problem 😶‍🌫️

Our extensive research revealed that finding,learning,networking was a significant pain point for our users so, We gathered all substantial raw data on both quantitative and qualitative insights to jot down the problem 😶‍🌫️

After reviewing the data, I documented key observations on Post-it notes and organised them into an Affinity Diagram, grouping related insights into logical categories.

Information Architecture

We grouped out everything together and mapped out a flow on what are all the sections to be placed inside and what are all the important flow? 🔮

We grouped out everything together and mapped out a flow on what are all the sections to be placed inside and what are all the important flow? 🔮

This helps us to bring a mutual understanding between us and our client on what comes next and why

User testing

It was time to validate our design by conducting usability

tests with real users, aiming to 💁‍♀️

It was time to validate our design by conducting usability

tests with real users, aiming to 💁‍♀️

Gather insights on how users interact with the prototype.

Ensure the prototype meets client and user preferences and needs.

Evaluate users' ability to perform tasks outlined in the design.

Confirm the project's alignment and direction.

Capture user reactions and feedback for further improvements.

Iterations 📽️….🎞️

#1

After user testing we realised that user wants to know more about event details like

1. How much the attendees will be there for the event?


2. What are all the instruments that can be provided by the event management?

They were not only just expecting the compensation with the date and time details added with that they want to get a little preview 🎬 on what the event is about

#2

So,What we did?

We added up the information of the gig with number of attendees and what are all the equipments or the instruments the event management can provide?

We designed a separate tab for event details to get overall view about the event


Moved the venue section below with opened face of map and the address details.

(Did that worked ?- Hmmm no surprise yup! it worked well among users and got a good result while again testing it 😎)

Prototype

Conclusion

Design concluded with 🌈

Design concluded with 🌈

  1. Our UX process refined CoLab's flow and design, solving

    user pain points and bottlenecks.


  2. Creating a community and course platform cleared learning source confusion and doubled gig artist's learning speed 2x.


  3. Enhancements have been made to the schedule feature,

    allowing users to track their application right on time effectively.





What we learnt?

Learnings & Takeaways 🤓

Learnings & Takeaways 🤓

  1. It was extremely challenging and interesting to design an

    entertainment and event host industry as a mobile application,

    ensuring intuitive interfaces that accommodate complex micro-interaction flow processes.

  2. I learnt how to design an MVP for a flexible and scalable design

    foundation that can be accommodated future iterations and

    expansions of the product without sacrificing usability or

    performance.



  3. Since this was the first-ever version of the product, I also had to

    plan the kind of brand impact it would be making.