Case Study — Spotify’s new home feed and the UTAUT 2
Executive Summary
The proper way of publishing updates is an important aspect of technology companies, including music streaming services like Spotify. With millions of users in Europe and worldwide, any changes made to the Spotify app can have a significant impact on user satisfaction and retention. The release of their new home feed in August 2022 for only a specific user group on Spotify coursed this case study to investigate the user acceptance of the supposed improvement. The relevancy of the study was also shown in the fact that some users have publicly complained about the changes.
After presenting the UTAUT 2 as the theoretical background, a user testing methodology with three steps: pre-session, usability testing, and post-session was described. Participants were asked to complete a questionnaire based on the UTAUT 2 framework, which evaluates user acceptance of technology in an acceptance score through factors and moderators like for example “Price value” and “Gender”. The results of the questionnaire showed an acceptance score of 3.88 out of 10.0, indicating that the new home feed may not be accepted by active Spotify users.
While the study was not representative, it provides valuable insights and an approach for implementing UTAUT 2 in a user testing setting. The findings of this study have important implications for Spotify and its user base. It highlights the need for careful consideration and testing of new features before implementation. Furthermore, the study demonstrates that the factors “Price Value” and “Social Influence” in particular contribute to the non-acceptance of the home feed. These findings should definitely be taken into account for future design decisions regarding the Spotify home feed.
In conclusion, this paper is recommended for UX designers, UX researchers, and the Spotify team to improve their products and new updates. It emphasizes the importance of user testing and the integration of theoretical frameworks like UTAUT 2 in evaluating user acceptance of technology. By incorporating detailed and scientifically based user feedback and testing, technology companies like Spotify can continue to provide an optimal user experience for their customers.
1. Choice of digital product
According to a study by MIDiA from for the second quarter of 2022, Spotify is the largest player in the music streaming business by number of subscribers with a 30.5% market share (MIDiA, 2022). Nevertheless, the market is constantly changing and competition is increasing. Compared to 2018, Spotify lost around 3% market share to other competitors. To remain competitive or even be the market leader, Spotify delivers constant adjustments and improvements to its music player app.
One possibility for increasing the quality of apps and websites is improvements to the user interface and features. In order to address this, Spotify released a bigger update in August 2022, in which the so-called “home feed” of the mobile app, in particular, was significantly changed (Spotify, 2022). Since then, users have complained about the differences in the new user interface on Twitter. One user asked explicitly for a “toggle” to switch between the old and the new design (Twitter, 2022b). According to another unhappy user, the new home feed is missing “daily mixes, recently played playlists, different mood playlists and playlists for genres, artists” (Twitter, 2022a).
As seen from a comparison of the designs, the lower section of the home feed has undergone the most changes (Figure 1). An endless scroll feature for previewing albums and playlists as well as new releases of recommended artists was added to the new design. The first elements and section of so-called above-the-folder elements and features remained mostly unchanged.
The new design has some significant differences in elements and structure. To sum it up, the goal of this study is therefore to get more insights by evaluating the new home feed with the support of a questionnaire based on the UTAUT 2 and give advice on how engineers and user researchers of Spotify should handle further updates in the app.
2. Theoretical Background — UTAUT 2
The UTAUT 2 model consists of twelve different factors (Figure 2). In addition, the model shows that these factors are grouped differently. For this study, the term “dimension” is used to describe this distribution. The model consists of four interrelated dimensions. What these dimensions are and how their relationship manifests itself will be explained in the following.
Vertical dimension
The UTAUT 2 models include a variable called performance expectancy, which refers to an individual’s perception of how using a system or an app like Spotify can improve their general performance (Venkatesh et al., 2012). This factor is similar to perceived usefulness in another technology acceptance model “TAM”. A second variable is effort expectancy, which relates to the ease of using the application (A. Chang, 2012). Social influence is the degree to which other Spotify users believe the individual should use the system while facilitating conditions referring to the infrastructural support by Spotify. Especially helping functionality like onboarding or a good user experience design itself are covered by this factor. Hedonic motivation is the pleasure or enjoyment derived from using technology and new changes like the new home feed of Spotify (Brown & Venkatesh, 2005).
It is worth noting that in organizational settings, employees do not bear the monetary cost of technology use, unlike in consumer settings. Prive Value is therefore an important factor. In the example of Spotify the paid membership is the monetary cost of the technology. The last factor of the vertical dimension is habit. Regarding Venkatesh et al. (2012) it refers to the extent to which individuals perform behaviors automatically due to prior learning.
Horizontal dimension
Age, gender, and experience are the moderators in the UTAUT 2 model. They can influence the relationship between the dimensions of the model (A. Chang, 2012). Younger people may have higher expectations for technology, men may be more likely to adopt new technology than women, and individuals with more experience may be more willing to adopt new technology (Venkatesh et al., 2012). Understanding these moderators is critical for developing a more nuanced understanding of technology adoption and use in different contexts.
Behavioral intention
Behavioral intention reflects an individual’s inclination to adopt and persist in the use of a particular technology and plays a vital role in predicting technology usage (Venkatesh et al., 2012). This concept is particularly relevant in the case of the new home feed technology in Spotify, as it can help to determine whether individuals will embrace the new technology and continue using it.
User behavior
The user behavior dimension represents the actual or anticipated usage of technology and is a crucial component of the UTAUT 2 model (C.-M. Chang et al., 2019). In the context of Spotify, this dimension would describe the current usage of the app’s home feed feature. Moreover, understanding user behavior can also help companies identify potential barriers to technology adoption and usage, and develop strategies to overcome them.
Hypothesis and Assumptions
People don’t like to change their behavior in general (Rehman et al., 2021). Therefore, you can conclude that there is a basic rejection of changes and updates in apps like Spotify. For this reason, every transformation and update of a digital product brings a high risk of nonacceptance by the users. The examples of the annoyed and unhappy Spotify users in Chapter 1 show that there might be a nonacceptance of the new home feed design. To open this black box with a scientific approach and to find out what the measured user acceptance trend of the new home feed is, this paper will provide a more detailed insight into whether or not user acceptance of the Spotify app home feed transformation may be given or not. This is the foundation for formulating the following hypothesis:
H1: Spotify users won’t accept and dislike the changes in the user interface and usability of the new home feed. They won’t change their behavioral intention and use behavior.
To get the data for evaluating the hypotheses a qualitative user testing with a questionnaire based on the UTAUT 2 has been planned and executed.
3. Data Collection
The method for collecting the relevant data is qualitative user testing with the relevant target group with three phases Pre-Session, Usability Testing, and Post-Session. The target group is active Spotify users. After some pilot testing and feedback from potential participants, it was discovered that only a few users even had this home feed update available on their Spotify version. For this reason, it has been decided to open and test the app with the new home feed on a separate test phone. This leads to the assumption that the home feed update is released gradually and only available for some users.
Pre-session
To get the data for the horizontal dimension and also more insights regarding the demographic data of the participants, a pre-session phase with the following questions were established and asked:
1. What is your Gender? (Gender)
2. How old are you? (Age)
3. For how long do you use the music streaming service Spotify? (Experience)
Usability testing
The users were asked to describe and test the new functions of the home feed update in usability testing with a total of 3 tasks. On the one hand, this in-depth experience of the new home feed was a prerequisite for answering the questionnaire at the end of the user testing, on the other hand, the observation of the user gave even more information about the actual user-friendliness and possible weaknesses of the new update.
The following Scenarios and Tasks were part of this 20-minute user testing session:
Scenario 1: Open your Spotify App and have a look at the homepage.
Task 1: Scroll through the homepage/home feed and explain what you can do in the different sections.
Task 2: Choose one Playlist or album from your homepage and add it to your Favorites.
The users had to describe what they were experiencing in the new home feed with a think-aloud methodology within the first task. The second task was to see if a goal — adding playlists and albums — was clearly and effectively possible on the Home feed.
Scenario 2: You recognized that the design of the homepage has changed.
Task 1: Look at the old design. Which one do you like better and would you like to use and why? A = old design B = new design
To get a direct comparison between the old and the new design an A/B test ended the user testing, to get a subjective opinion, on which variation the users prefer and why. This also answers qualitatively the behavioral intention of the UTAUT 2.
Post-session
After the participants fulfilled the tasks of the short usability test, a questionnaire with seven statements was shared with them. These statements were based on the vertical dimension of the UTAUT 2:
1. The new home feed increases my performance in the App.
2. The new home feed decreases my effort using the App.
3. For other people and users, it is important that I use the new home feed.
4. Spotify supports me while adopting and using the new home feed.
5. It is fun to use the new home feed.
6. The new home feed adds price value to my Spotify membership.
7. The new home feed is increasing my habits using the App.
The participants gave their subjective opinions towards the statements by scoring the scale from 1 to 10. The score of 1 was “completely disagree” whereas the score of 10 was “completely agree” (Figure 3). The statements were built in a positive way. Therefore, a high agreement suggests a higher acceptance score, whereas a low agreement indicates the opposite. The score of the participant is the most important part regarding the data analysis towards the UTAUT 2 because it gives stated data towards the acceptance of the new Spotify home feed.
To get even more insights, the following statements and questions were asked as well at the end of the user testing:
8. I would like to use the new Spotify home screen. (Behavioral Intention)
9. I am using the new Spotify home feed at the moment. (Use behavior)Question 1: How do you like the way Spotify publishes Updates of their app? Question 2: Is there something you want to add?
4. Results
The following section of the study presents the results of the user testing that aimed to investigate the user acceptance of the new home feed of Spotify. The results consist of the four predefined dimensions “horizontal dimension”, “vertical dimension”, “behavioral intention” and “use behavior”.
Horizontal dimension
A total of five active Spotify users participated in the study. Of these, two were female and three were male. This roughly corresponds to the current user distribution of Spotify (Prateek, 2022). The average age of the participants was 22 years (21,8) compared to 6 years (5,6) of Spotify experience (Figure 4). In terms of age and experience with the app, all participants came to comparable and nearly similar answers. Therefore, the horizontal dimensions represented one specific user group and moderated the relationship between the factors of the vertical dimensions in a balanced way.
Vertical dimension
The overall acceptance score of the vertical dimension is 3.88 out of 10. It means that most participants disagreed with the positive statements regarding the predicted acceptance of the new home feed. Significantly, one male participant had an overall score of 8.0 which was different compared to the others. The worst results reached the factors “Price Value” and “Social Influence” with a final score of 2.0. The highest score was conducted in the “Hedonic motivation”. The users had partial fun using the new home feed (Figure 5).
Behavioral intention
80% of the participants wouldn’t like to use the new home feed of Spotify. This is the result of the last task in the usability testing section. In addition to that, the score of the statement regarding the behavior intention in the pre-session phase showed a low score of 3.2 (Figure 6). Spotify users are not willing to change their behavior towards the new home feed.
Use behavior
100% of the participants are not using the newest update with the new home feed right now. This was conducted after all participants rated the statement if they are currently using the new home with a “1” (Figure 7). Even though Spotify released the update officially in August 2022 on their homepage, all of the premium and freemium users aren’t able to use the new home feed in the app at the moment.
5. Discussion
The following discussion provides insights into the strengths and weaknesses of the new home feed design and highlights areas that require improvement. Besides valuable insights into user acceptance and behavior towards the new home feed of Spotify, the discussion also addresses the implications of the findings for the future design and development of the music streaming application.
Limitations
The results of this study should be interpreted in light of several limitations. In the first place, the sample size was relatively small, which might limit the generalizability of the findings. In addition, participants’ behaviors and perceptions of the feature may have been influenced by not testing the new feature on their own smartphones. Thirdly, it was a qualitative study, so the results may not be applicable to all users due to their subjective nature.
Recommendations for Spotify
The results of the study show that there is a lack of acceptance of the new home feed design and functionality. Even though a lot of the participants could achieve the task and get to know the new feed, the users’ subjective opinion was generally negative. The hypothesis in chapter 2.2 is therefore accepted and the negative attitude of several Spotify users in the introduction has been confirmed.
Spotify should be careful with rolling out the new feed to more users. The most positive point in the results was that it was fun to use the new home feed. This concludes the potential of the new home feed. Nevertheless, Spotify should definitely work on the social aspects and add a real price value to the feature.
Just like one internet user, one participant in the study wanted the ability to switch to the previous version for major updates. This emphasizes the importance of providing users with the ability to switch to previous versions, especially for bigger updates. Users should be able to actively decide after using or testing the updates if they want to keep it or return to the old version. This suggestion may help the users in handling updates and could improve the overall user experience.
After collecting and analyzing the results, it seems like for the home feed update not a lot of qualitative feedback was collected to develop the new design. Therefore, Spotify should definitely run comparable user testing with a technology acceptance model like UTAUT 2 to get even more insights and more significant results about the acceptance of their updates.
6. Conclusion
The study is not representative and is not significant. It only gives an approach to how to test new features in apps like Spotify and get faster results and assumptions toward the acceptance of the specific feature. Regarding the results of the study, the new home feed of Spotify will not be accepted by most of its users. The new version of the home feed will predictively seen as a downgrade instead of an upgrade. Spotify should really think about the changes again add price value and consider social aspects.
Even though Spotify released the update officially on their homepage in August 2022, all of the premium and freemium users aren’t able to use the new home feed in the app at the moment. This leads to the assumption, that on one hand Spotify recognized the lack of acceptance and is careful with the rollout of the feature or Spotify is currently testing the new design on a few users to get more information regarding the usability and acceptance.
References
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