iDolSync

Helping K-pop fans sync with their favourite artists & enjoy content without the Fear Of Missing Out (FOMO).

OVERVIEW

This was a short personal passion project created during the summer of 24', where I researched and designed a solution catered towards K-pop fans in being able to engage in content they enjoy in one place, whilst maintaining a healthy and balanced relationship with being a fan.

Throughout 2 weeks, I researched the pain points of K-pop fans related to high content influx, and prototyped & tested a web-app solution to help meet user needs.

DURATION

Dec 2023 - Jan 2024, 2 weeks

ROLE

Sole Designer & User Researcher

💡 Solution

A centralised & personalised fan hub & feed (web-app) to keep fans updated on the artists & content they prefer, while also controlling their content consumption levels to maintain a healthy relationship with being a fan.

Important artist updates across platforms, organised all in one place.

Instead of jumping across multiple social platforms to receive updates, a centralised update hub organises content under each of the users' favourite artists.

Personalised content algorithm, so users only see what they enjoy.

Users can clarify & filter the type of content they are updated, and can mute or block specific content types or sites at any time. Users can only view commentary/discussions from other fans if they choose to, otherwise this is hidden in a toggle.

Controlling content notifications & fan community engagement to minimise distractions.

Users have autonomy over how much content they engage in, such as controlling the frequency of notifications received, and silencing all notifications at any time to. Analytics keeps users accountable of their content engagement.

Scheduling content to align with users' personal schedule to reduce FOMO.

Instead of feeling the stress of watching every artist content as it drops, users can organise events to align with their own calendar to enjoy content in their own time.

Prototype Link

📌 The Problem

K-pop fans tend to engage in elements of para-socialism through attempts to always be updated real-time of artists’ schedules, content and new updates.

Discovery

Previous research identified that high content influx of the K-pop industry has a linear correlation with increased para-socialism.

Instead only releasing songs and doing tours, K-artists produce a multitude of content (variety shows, exclusive behind-the-scenes, real-time lives, and more), influencing how fans behave and engage with content.

📈 Pace of the K-Industry

45%

Market growth in 2020, fastest growing market of the year. (Blake, 2021.)

👥 Digital Engagement

7.8b

Daily global tweets from K-pop Twitter/X users alone (Blake, 2021.)

📲 FOMO

40%

Of younger fans check artist schedules/articles daily (Statistca Research Department, 2021)

Parasocialism

Path analysis of mediated attraction (Rubin & McHugh, 1987).

“Korean entertainment companies have established a structure where a special relationship is formed between the idols and their fandom. The structure: the building of exposure → the physical attraction → the task attraction (voting, streaming) → and social attraction, all contribute to and increase the relationship.”

(Espinal, 2021.)

💡 Learnings: It was initially difficult to find credible research articles on fan behaviour, but I found that using related keywords helped would incite more interesting & unconsidered insights from research with broad relations to the problem space rather than trying to find obvious links.

Research Approach

I wanted to research further into the frustrations of K-pop fans in keeping up with artist updates, and how this potentially impacts their daily life.

For time efficiency, 2 research methods were used to better understand both the attitudes and behaviours of fans in being constantly updated with their favourite artists, and pinpoint collective issues experienced in the fan-artist relationship.

💻 Explorative Questionnaire

60+ Kpop Fandoms | 50+ Countries

418 responses

Questionnaires were used to gain a broad understanding of common attitudes and behaviours among K-pop fans

Snippet of survey response.

🔍 Online ethnography

9 Kpop fandoms | 3 Platforms

32 sources

Online ethnography analysed & evaluated the unique experiences of K-pop fans and their content engagement behaviours.

Snippet of online ethnography analysis table.

Research findings were concisely synthesised and categorised using an affinity map to draw key user insights & pain points.

💡 Learnings: Promoting the questionnaire on different forums, such as K-pop and K-pop fandom subreddits proved to be beneficial as I was able to recruit many participants within 2 days, from various backgrounds, fandoms, countries and identities. Although I was able to find insightful sources from Reddit and X/Twitter fans for online ethnography, I would research more into X where many fans are active.

Bottom-up affinity diagram.

Key Insights

I found that para-socialism was an extreme that impacts a small portion of fans; but there were more related issues that impacted the majority.

4 key insights were drawn from primary research, highlighting the pain points of K-pop fans when keeping up with artist content.

Fandom Pressue

K-pop fans are pressured to stay up-to-date with all artist content to avoid guilt, influencing FOMO and overwhelm.

“I had a baseline expectation of myself for what it meant to be a fan, I obligated myself to know every single song, watch everything released... but after the 3rd group, this became unsustainable." - Ethnographic Source

- 40% of fans feel FOMO when not updated on content real-time.

Minimal Control

Minimal autonomy over the algorithm make it difficult for fans to find content they genuinely enjoy, leading them to engage in whatever they see.

“It takes a lot of time to filter content on Twitter, and especially to catch up on something you missed out on.” - Survey Participant

- 68% of fans don't use available filtering or muting options to personalise their artist feed/algorithm on platforms.

Quality of Updates

Fans feel the need to jump across various artist platforms to stay updated.

“I don’t have an app or source of news that I can feel comfortable relying on by itself to stay up to date.” - Survey Participant

- 20+ platforms/apps/media sources can be used by fans to keep up with artist content.

Fandom Toxicity

Although fans want to engage with the fan community, conflict can disenchant them from the fan experience.

“I don't feel a sense of community or belonging when the comments/chat is too zealous and overbearing or takes K-pop too seriously." - Ethnographic Source

- 78% of fans find fandom toxicity as one of their least favourite aspects of being a fan.

💡 Learnings: Through thematic analysis, I found that focusing on more pressing issues that impacted the majority was more important than trying to address all insights, considering the short time span of the project. This would ensure insights gained were relevant and focused on one underlying problem instead of multiple.

💡 Opportunity

K-pop fans are pressured to consume a high volume of their favourite artist(s)’ content across multiple platforms, diminishing the potential for a positive & regulated fan experience and often leading to feelings of FOMO and/or disillusionment.

How might we create a personalised, streamlined & balanced approach for fans to consume artist content they enjoy without feeling overwhelmed?

Competitor Analysis

Although current artist platforms can provide real-time updates, little to none can centralise & organise content to align with users' needs or promote balanced engagement.

Research identified 7 different platforms fans use most to stay updated, which were assessed according to users' needs to draw out strengths and weaknesses. It was found that Reddit offered the most control & autonomy over the fan experience, but ultimately there is no one forum to centralise content and effectively promote balanced consumption levels.

K-pop Artist Update Platform Competitor Analysis Table

💡 Learnings: For competitive analysis, the criteria to analyse the most used social platforms/sources by fans to stay updated was drawn directly from research insights. I learned to analyse competitors objectively, as I was aware most survey participants used X & Reddit. I ensured I took time to research & refine judgements to accurately represent the platform.

User Personas

Target users are fans who want to stay updated without feeling overwhelmed, and fans who want to engage at their own pace, without toxicity.

Meet Kira

Fan of 4 Groups | K-pop Fan for 1 yr

The Excited Newbie: "I need to know everything at all times!"

Motivations: Feeling close to artists & community, comfort, the thrill of real-time content
Frustrations: High content influx, missing out
‍

“Because I enjoy my groups so much and I’m still so new to it all, I want to engage in anything I get. But this can feel like a full-time job..."

Meet Leo

Fan of 2 Groups | K-pop fan for 9 yrs

The Mature Fan: "Everything is best in moderation."

Motivations: Having content to actually look forward to, sensible fan discussions
Frustrations: Toxic fans, wasting time on multiple apps
‍

“Now that I’m older, I feel less stressed about keeping up all the time as I have other life commitments. I prefer keeping up in my own time”

💡 Learnings: Through developing personas, I learned that the main distinguishing factor between users were how long they had been a fan for, which influenced their behaviour and level of engagement. It helped me think of how a solution can both cater the needs of a newer, more eager fan, and an older fan who would like to occasionally stay in the loop amidst their busy life. I believe if there was time to complete user interviews, more richer insights about the user groups could be identified.

Ideation

How might I design a suitable solution that caters to fans like Kira and Leo, while eliminating my own biases?

As the sole designer of this project, I could not leverage the perspectives of multiple minds when ideating potential solutions. I decided to engage in brainstorming exercises that would influence me to think creatively: reverse brainstorming, and challenge my own assumptions as a K-pop fan myself. It was significant to draw a line between my experience as a user against as a designer to truly empathise with what target users want.

Ideation Exercises.

Concept Selection & Feature Prioritisation

iDolSync was the strongest solution that catered to both the need to stay updated, as well as engage in selective content in a balanced way.

After comparing and selecting the chosen concept against a criteria of user needs, a feature prioritisation decision matrix was used to identify the most important problems to satisfy the varied needs of users, as well as the short time-span of the project. Features in larger, purple circles would be high priority, and grey low priority and would be considered as a future inclusion,

Feature Prioritisation Matrix: Purple = High Priority, Grey = Low Priority.

💡 Learnings: Through ideation and concept prioritisation, I utilised a business-centred approach when considering which features and ideas to invest in, for minimal effort & maximum reward. As I was dealing with different user groups, I found myself coming up with too many feature ideas that were not yet crucial for the MVP. The matrix helped me focus my approach and prioritise needs impacting the majority rather than all.

Lo-fi Sketches

After confirming features to prioritise, I mapped out an information architecture.

Lo-fi sketches were used to efficiently map out an information architecture to ensure the minimum viable product only prioritised users' necessities, and what a K-pop fan would need most to enjoy their favourite artists' content without feeling overwhelmed or pressured. Sketches would help transfer more quickly into into the prototyping & testing phases.

iDolSync Lo-fi Sketches

Wireflow

Translating K-pop fans' needs into a user flow to develop macro and micro user interactions.

Visually representing a user's journey when interacting with the solution helped clarify complex interactions users may want or need from the application, and how different features could be cohesively integrated. Using wireframes to set up a flow would be more efficient to test & gain feedback early on the current flow.

💡 Learnings: I decided to create a wireflow to assess the design choices and enhance the efficiency and effectiveness of the user flow. I found that asking myself questions such as "How would a user know to distinguish overall notifications with significant notifications?" or "Would a user want to be able to view artist events they just scheduled in their calendar?" and referencing user needs helped focus on more micro-interactions to streamline the experience.

iDolSync Wireflow

Prototyping & Testing

Users found it inefficient to silence artist notifications, and found favouriting artist content redundant compared to engagement analytics.

The wireframes were tested with 5 users for early feedback on the overall user flow, layout and integration & applicability of features. Feedback was analysed and synthesised into a key findings table, and iterations were prioritised according to the severity ratings of user feedback & usability issues. Significant feedback related to how users could manage or silent their notifications, and how they would navigate to the analytics page.

Wireframe User Testing Data Analysis

💡 Learnings: Due to the limited timespan of the project, I could not recruit as many testing participants as I would have preferred, but testing was still able to reveal usability issues that I had overlooked as the sole designer. In the future, I would use an online testing software such as Loop11 to send out to global K-pop fans (using the same process as recruiting research participants) to gain more diverse feedback.

Iterations

Iterations were made to reinforce iDolSync's purpose in streamlining artist updates whilst promoting user accountability & balanced consumption.

The key finding from user testing was that the efficiency of the overall user flow needed to be iterated most to gain & manage updates conveniently.

Significant Iterations

Encouraging fan-life balance through stronger CTAs

Flexibility & Efficiency of Use

Although users assumed they could manage their notifications in the notifications page, they pointed out that the significance of this feature should be reinforced and made accessible anywhere at any time on the app, not just through one page.

"I think it would be better to silent notifications at any time instead of going to notifications [page]."

40% unsuccessful task completion rate

Clearer information hierarchy on users' artist dashboard

Flexibility & Efficiency of Use

Users recognised the artist update feed summary on the home dashboard as the most important element, and expected to have viewed this first. To follow the users' line of sight, the columns were reversed so users could efficiently be updated of news.

"I'd be more eager to see the feed for updates more than anything else."

Replacing 'Favourites' with User Analytics

Flexibility and Efficiency

Users could not differentiate between "bookmarks" and "favourites", thus found favourites redundant on the main navigation bar. Analytics was moved into the main naviagtion to reinforce user accountability of their engagement levels.

"I didn't expect analytics to be at the bottom, I thought it would be at the top."

Simplifying the process of regulating content consumption

Aesthetic & minimalist design, consistency & standards

Some users' immediate reaction when editing their notification settings was that they did not expect the density of content, and users did not know where to look first. The settings were made more simple to only highlight features users would want to change.

"It looks like a lot of words, I don't think i'd read everything."

💡 Process Learnings: When analysing testing data, using a key insights table helped me balance qualitative data (verbal feedback or think-aloud notes) with quantitative (how long it took users to complete a task/amount of errors). This identified misalignments between what the user stated against what they did & how, so it was important to consider that not all iterations will be informed by feedback the user has verbally stated.

iDolSync Final Hi-Fi Prototype Screens (Click to see each screen!).

Success Metrics

Feature utilisation, changes in user behaviour & frequency of regulating content would be key success metrics.

The overall positive response from target users indicated that HappiLink would not only be an app students would try out, but want to use frequently to slowly get out of their shell and optimise their experience abroad in a culturally diverse environment. If HappiLink was to get developers on-board, we'd look at the following key success metrics:

Success Metrics

Frequency of content regulation

- % of users who silent/regulate notifications over a period of time (within 1d, 1w, 1m, 3m)
- Compare ratio of users who prefer watching content real-time vs. scheduling content
- % of users who block sites & use content monitoring features overtime

User Satisfaction & Positive Changes in User Behaviour

- Identify reductions in content consumption levels overtime (comparing durations of engagement/usage of artist platforms over 1 week, 1m, 6m of usage)
- Net Promoter Score (NPS) to gauge how useful users find the application, feedback on behavioural changes & reductions of FOMO
- Increase in % of users who regulate notifications

Click Through Rate of Filtered Notifications

- Percentage (%) of users who click into a content notification to identify relevance and effectiveness of filtering content system
- % of users who utilise content filtering system
- Overall app retention rate over time (1-day, 30-day, 1 year retention).

Future Steps & Inclusions

Continue Prototyping & Testing

Due to the short span of this project, I would like to continue more rounds of user testing with more fans globally to receive diverse feedback on the overall user flow, and identify which features need to be focussed on more to match the system to the real world.

Web Extension Element

A web extension feature would extend the functionality of the web-app through complimentary features, like saving artist content the user has found online to their bookmarks or schedule it to their calendar without having to go into the web-app, especially for older content. This would also help promote consuming content at the user's own time.

Personalised Fan Community & extend target market

Research found that there are varied opinions on fandom interactions. A personalised community integration would enable users to interact with fans in ways they prefer (mature discussions, or promote fan-held events, share fan art, etc). Extending the market to different fans beyond K-pop would also be considered,

iDolSync Artist Notifications Screen

Pain Points vs Solution

How iDolSync addresses the core problem:

Instead of overwhelming fans, it empowers them to enjoy their favourite artists' content in moderation, focussing more on what they personally prefer & what aligns with their lifestyle in a way that is organised, streamlined and offers control.

Retrospection

Key learnings I made along the way

Adapt the process to the circumstances

As this project was a personal challenge for myself to quickly research, prototype & iterate a design solution within a short period of time, I had a better understanding of prioritising and leveraging UX tools to understand the target audience & optimise the design solution. This was imperative instead of implementing certain exercises or industry standard practices that offered no impact to the effectiveness of the solution.

Be wary of assumptions

As a K-pop fan myself, I wanted to engage in a project related to something I was passionate about, but I was hyperaware of any personal biases or assumptions I could have as a user that may diminish my credibility as an empathetic designer. It was significant to identify and challenge any preconceived notions that may have immersed during research, ideation, and prototyping.

☁️ Fun Fact

Why "iDolSync"?

A K-pop idol is what artists from the Korean pop music industry are referred to as. Sync refers to syncing fans with artists to reap the benefits of fandom in a way that is beneficial to the user.