QZ
January -- April 2022, Service Design @ N Stuff Music
Innovate N Stuff Music service system to attract more customers
Poster of our innovative service system
Overview
Research, design, and pitch a digital service innovation for N Stuff Music store
Since opening in 1968, N Stuff Music has provided Pittsburgh area musicians with the best selection of musical instruments and professional audio equipment. In 2008, N Stuff Music expanded its successful brick-and-mortar business to the world with the launch of www.nstuffmusic.com, and it is the #1 musical instrument store on yelp's Pittsburgh area list. However, as more and more competitors emerge, N Stuff is looking for a breakthrough to bring a better experience to its customers.
In the spring of 2022, I had the privilege of being a part of this project. Through research, understanding, design, testing, and iteration, our team chose to build the instrument recommendation system on N stuff's website to help beginner-level customers to choose the right instruments.
N Stuff Music's original website
The Challenge
Innovate this relatively well-established service system in 7 weeks
The high-level goal of our project is to provide better, faster, and more convenient services to our customers and to recruit more customers for N stuff's physical stores. However, N stuff has a wide range of businesses, they not only have sales, rentals, repairs, second-hand buying and selling section, but also the music lessons. How to innovate this relatively well-established service system in 7 weeks to accommodate the fast-growing business and a more diverse user base.
My Role
Cooperation with two teammates
As a user experience designer, I collaborated with two other teammates throughout the whole design process. Among them, I was mainly responsible for the research part of the physical research, analyzing ideas, making creative matrices, drawing conceptual models, developing personas, drawing storyboards, making low-fidelity models, doing user tests, and creating movies depicting the service experience.
User Experience Designer
7 Weeks
Qianhui Zhi -- User Experience Designer
Clare Lee -- User Experience Designer
Yue Wang -- User Experience Designer
Figma, Adobe Illustrator, Adobe Photoshop
Design Preview
Problem
Customers who are beginners to the musical instrument that they are trying to buy have a difficult time knowing what to look for in an instrument and where to start. Beginner-level customers are also less likely to purchase an instrument through the N Stuff website compared to more experienced customers.
Hypothesis
Giving customers product recommendations on its website and connecting them to someone at N Stuff based on their needs and preferences will make them more likely to visit the N Stuff’s offline store and make their purchase.
Solution
Breaking Down Our Service Proposition
Our service proposition is to let customers get personalized recommendations and checklists based on their goals, wants, and budget & get matched with someone at N Stuff.
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Providing a list of personalized expert recommendations through an online quiz on the N Stuff website where the customers answer questions about their goals, preferences, and budget
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Providing a “what-to-look-for” checklist for the type of instrument that the customers are looking for
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Providing an option to connect with someone at N Stuff whom they can consult with / talk to before and during their visit to the store
The Design Process
Initial Thinking
Overall Approach
To gain a better understanding of our client and its current Product-Service System (PSS), we used a combination of experiential research (physical and digital), informational research (customer reviews on social media platforms), and guerilla research (interviews with the owners, employees, and customers).
Research
Experiential Research – Physical (Store)
How we did it
We spent an afternoon exploring N Stuff Music. We talked to the employees, chatted with the customers, and took a tour around the store.
Takeaways
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Many musical instruments can be seen through the large glass windows, giving customers the desire to go inside.
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When customers enter the store, they can clearly see that the store is divided into two floors. Inside the store, there are many employees with kind smiles on their faces.
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There are employees in each area who are ready to help answer questions if customers encounter them.
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Lots of chairs are around so the customers can sit and try out different instruments comfortably.
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The store plays pleasant music, and if a customer wants to try a certain instrument but doesn't know how to play it, the employee is happy to help.
Research
Experiential Research – Physical (Little Lesson House)
How we did it
We were given a tour of the little lesson house by Bob and had a brief chat with one of the instructors.
Takeaways
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The outdoor waiting area is convenient for customers.
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The waiting area in the lesson house looked very well-designed, cozy, and comfortable.
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Classes are held in individual cubicles, and the rooms are soundproofed.
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There are about 8 small classrooms in total, dedicated to different instruments.
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The overall look of the house is clean and tidy with a very warm and artistic atmosphere.
Research
Experiential Research – Digital
How we did it
We explored N stuff music's services by simulating different scenarios of using his website.
Takeaways
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The cover of the webpage is clearly categorized into 5 major categories, making it easy for customers to quickly understand the business of this store.
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The chat feature in the bottom right corner automatically pops up for customers to ask questions.
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It would be more secure for parents to have more photos of the environment on the course section of the website, but the current photos are only one, which is not good for parents to understand the real environment.
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The sales section of the website lacks a comparison function, which is not very convenient for customers to compare prices and features.
Creative Matrix
Generate Many Service Innovation Concepts
Research Findings and Insights
Refine to One Service Proposition
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When buying a new instrument, recommendations from experts are important to beginner-level customers.
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Customers who are knowledgeable about the instrument, unlike beginner-level customers, have their own criteria for choosing the instrument that “feels right” to them. Recommendations from exports are important but not as much as beginner-level customers.
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Beginner-level customers buy the instrument at the store if the employees at the store are knowledgeable and friendly, and their overall in-store experience is good.
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Beginner-level customers are mostly hobbyists and tend to look for instruments within a lower budget and try to get the highest possible quality and features within that budget.
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Beginner-level customers will do research online before going to a musical instrument store and will have in mind a few big brands that are highly rated.
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Although beginner-level customers use the information they found online to make their buying decision, the information that they get from visiting the store, including touching, hearing, and playing the instrument, plays a much bigger role in their buying decision.
Persona
Our Target Audience
Storyboard
How customers experience the whole service system
Wireframes
Our original version
User Tests
Reflection on Client Feedback & Plan for Proceeding
Mockups
Our final version
Reflection
Takeaways
The focus of this project was on user research and identifying user needs. When we first started the user research, I was glad we spent an entire afternoon in the brick-and-mortar store and carefully observed the conversations and needs of the customers coming and going. This helped us find the inconveniences in this service system. It was a little difficult for us to identify one of the many innovative options. Because many innovations were good, we finally chose the one we wanted to do in a comparative decision. If I had more time, I could have done more user testing to iterate on our model. Our customers really like our solution because it meets not only the user needs but also the business needs.