Mingo is a location-based social search mobile app where musicians can find new friends to form a band. It’s designed to quickly and easily discover instrumentalists and vocalists with similar tastes, goals, and skill sets.
“Mingo” is a play on the words “mingle” and “bingo,” indicating a platform where users network to find a match. Need a bassist? Bingo. Eli’s your guy.
Research
Music is one of my passions. As such, I’ve been intricately involved in local music for nearly a decade, both as a fan and a musician. Over the years, I’ve noticed a number of pain points all of us face in the music community, so I decided to focus my research there. I conducted observational research as I attended concerts and sat in on rehearsals, interviewed subject matter experts, and conducted user surveys to get a clear lay of the land.
It wasn’t until I really dove deep into researching needs that I found what my app needed to address. DIY musicians need an easy way to connect with other musicians. They’re either looking for new band members, or for the right group to join. Most commonly, musicians find bandmates through acquaintances or social media groups. The former is ideal, but leaves a small selection pool. The latter provides more options, but is severely lacking in ways to evaluate if a musician will be a good fit for the band.
86%
of DIY musicians struggle finding
the right bandmates.
71%
of bands go through a line-up
change in the first year.
57%
of bands have spent over 6 months with a
vacancy, waiting for the right musician.
“I don’t even know how to begin networking.”
“It’s difficult to find musicians who are equally passionate.”
Many people have written songs they try to record on their own or perform at open mic nights, but they struggle finding the right instrumentalists to bring their songs to life.
They need a networking tool that is designed to help them find those closet musicians who’d love to play in a band if they just knew what was out there.
Data Modeling
I took my findings to the whiteboard and constructed an affinity diagram to better organize musicians’ tasks and priorities when organizing a band.
User Persona
Based on my research, I made a user persona to help guide future design decisions. The persona encapsulates the goals, needs, and frustrations I found most prevalent in the music community.
Wireframe
The wire-framing process was arguably the most rewarding step as I conducted usability testing to determine expectations and app requirements. I worked through several different iterations before I arrived at this wireframe.
