A Music Oriented Short Video Sharing App Dongci is a Chinese music-oriented short video-sharing app launched in Jan 2018. It currently has 2,000,000 registered users and 200,000 daily active users . Short video apps are popular in China (e.g. TickTok) and become a competitive market. Dongci distinguishes itself by focusing on the musical communities and providing multi-frames video experience .
Current Research Design Situation Insights Solutions
KEY USERS PRO GENERAL MUSICIANS USERS Early Seed Users Music Lovers Original Content Creaters Music Content Comsumers Created the Overall Musical Dongci Need to Engage Them Atmosphere in Dongci in Oder to Grow Expect the Community Low Engagement to Stay Music Focus High Churn Rate
Music Videos of One Man Band with Multi-frame Independent Musician Play and Sing Current Music Content Band Live Records Skill Show Off Group Multi-frame Collaboration
Remixing Videos Remix video function is derived from the multi-screen video experience. Users can collaborate with the original musician by adding or replacing their own video on one of the frames to create a new video .
Current Research Design Situation Insights Solutions
KENNY • Need a place to show off PRO their skills and gain more MUSICIANS exposure • Meet other great musicians Early Seed Users • Mainly communicate offline Original Content Creaters or through messenger apps, Created the Overall Musical Atmosphere in Dongci there is no remote collaboration platform for Expect the Community to Stay Music Focus musicians in China
SARAH GENERAL USERS • they only share their music in private groups Music Lovers • they have limited ability in Music Content Comsumers music, uncomfortable to Dongci Need to Engage Them create content alone in Oder to Grow • they get bored easily Low Engagement if they play music alone High Churn Rate
• Music focused atmosphere • It’s hard for general users to • Seed users Musicians create high participate in the music community quality content • Recommendations are not accurate • multi-screen technology enable users • Limited revenue generators to make creative videos • S W Remix video function enable users to engage each other O T • Short video apps are popular • More apps are adopting the multi- • Star-making variety shows are hot and screen technology bringing traffics to the music industry • Compete with high traffic apps for • Current music products in the user’s time market focus on “listening” and content consumption
DESIGN GOAL Get More Users to Participate while Maintaining a Music-Focused Community
Current Research Design Situation Insights Solutions
Build a Strong Connection between the Scenario and our Product
Dongci Video
play music together *current slogan of Dongci
play music together
Whenever the user wants to play music together with someone else they use Dongci Video.
Create an atmosphere for our target users to want to play music together
How might we enable our target users to collaborate better and play music together ?
How do we define better ?
MORE easy • convenient • flexible
Where did we start?
Remixed Multi-Frame Videos Multi-Frame Video Multi-Frame Videos with Multiple Players with Multiple Players 32% 2.83% 12.8% *statistics is calculated by going through 600 videos Dongci Video recommended
Followers ： Music Piece ： Collaborations more work 8.2K ： 271 : 0 ≠ more collaboration 414 : 51 : 80 more fans 190K : 50 : 3 ≠ more collaboration
Collaboration Rate: (#collaboration / # music piece) 0% 8.2K ： 271 : 0 414 : 51 : 80 156.86% 190K : 50 : 3 6% compare to overall 2.83%
leave an empty frame welcome others to join and remix Video is broken down to one instrument each frame Well known and popular song set song name as a tag
• Creator intentionally invits others to join them leave an empty frame • Participants know they are welcome others to join and remix welcomed to join Video is broken down to • flexible for participants with one instrument each frame different skills to join • easy for regular users to join the Well known and popular song remix set song name as a tag • findable and searchable
• Enable creators to invite • Let participants know they are welcomed to join • Make videos flexible for participants to join • Make videos easy to be found and searched for • Reduce user’s learning cost
How did we put them to use?
Start a Join a Creative Collaboration Collaboration Collaboration
Enable users to start a collaboration and invite friends to join
start a collaboration 1.0
PRO: CON : • easy to implement • hidden feature, easily missed • works into the current flow • require user to publish unfinished work • not flexible for multiple-user collaboration
start a collaboration 2.0
Studio
Studio PRO: • Sarah gets bored easily when she plays alone . • support multiple-user collaboration • Kenny wants to play with other musicians. • encourage real collaboration during • There is no online collaboration tool for the process musicians in China. • enable general users to get help and • Sarah has limited ability in music to create feedbacks to polish their work for original content on her own. publishing • Sarah is uncomfortable share unfinished work • addressed the privacy concerns in public environment. CON : • new module that’s harder to implement • will need more effort to educate users
Studio key features
Building a Team Problem: Currently, users can only interact with each other after content is fully produced. Even though they can use the remix function to collaborate, it lacks the real sense of collaboration when they are making the music. Approach: The Team concept is introduced as one of the key element for Studio. Building a team in studio enable users to engage each other at early stage of content creation and get advised by trusted friends and musicians.
Sharing Work in Process Problem: The Draft feature in Dongci is temporary with limited features. There is no ways for users to share their work in process with friends to get feedback before posting to the public. Approach: The Track feature in Studio serves as a temporary gallery for group members to view and give feedback to each other without posting it in public.
Real Interactions Problem: The current users could only interact with each other under the comment sections when the music piece is posted or remix existing music work. Musicians mentioned that they have to talk and share files with collaborators in other messenger apps such as WeChat. They need a centralized place to communicate. Approach: We aim to create a private space for users to collaborate. The Update section combines the feature of a chatroom and new update of the group so users can communicate.
Easy Setup Users may easily set up and invite friends to collaborate on their exciting new project.
Starting with a Conversation Communication is the key to any collaborations. Studio allow users talk and plan the project with their group members, right at where they record.
Work in Process Sharing Record and share work in process in Studio, viewable only to group members. Enable users to get feedback and help from trust friends before sharing their work to the public.
Compose with Confidence Enjoy playing music with friends and get ready for the master piece. Compose the final piece with best version of their work.
Future Development Use Case Product • Enable users to build team and • Provide realtime interaction through groups with other musicians, so they audio and video chat • Provide recording feature during the can communicate as a group and produce better content video chat • Enable professional musicians to • Develop other collaboration tools for future revenue generation mentor grow users through private sessions to help general users to grow
Start a Join a Creative Collaboration Collaboration Collaboration
Current Entry Point • Remix Button when playing the video in full screen • Collaborate Button when the video is paused in full screen • Remix Button under Discovery hot posts • Users could only make a remix if they come across the music they like while swiping through the videos
However… the users said… Who do you want to collaborate with? • Friends • Famous Musicians • Musicians I follow • Musicians share similar music taste These videos are hidden under updates with messages and comments. What kind of content do you like to work on? • Music I know how to play • Music I love Videos are only searchable by musicians and topics, not by the name of the music.
Recommend
More recommend
