KUNE
This was a group exam project for a real client in the second semester at KEA. We chose to work with KUNE Festival, which is a Danish electronic music festival. Kune needed a new website, logo, and an upgrade to its online presence.
Goal
How can we create a sustainable, digital solution for KUNE Festival 2023 that will create brand awareness and strengthen their community?
The Client
Kune is an Electronic music festival run exclusively with local funds and they do not have any sponsors. The name means “togetherness” in Esperanto. As the name implies, they are led by a collective of people passionate about music and art.
Knowing how collectives work, they do not make a profit out of the festival but try to build a community of people that support each other. It is a volunteer-based business model and they do not have employees. They do not have the resources to invest in digital platforms and the online presence they have was built by various interns and people that really wanted to help.
Approach
We used the double diamond as a guideline when we developed the project, since the model is a simple yet comprehensive and visual description of the design process. The two diamonds represent the process of exploring the problem more widely or deeply (divergent thinking) and then taking focused action (convergent thinking).
Results
We created a digital solution for KUNE that consists of a website built using HTML, CSS, and JavaScript, a Social Media guide with templates made in AfterEffects and Adobe Illustrator, a web guide, and video content edited in Premiere Pro. To create brand awareness, we researched to get insights into the target audience’s needs. Based on the findings, we created a SoMe Guide that encapsulates all the necessities for Kune to communicate the strategy to its loyal community and new potential customers. We strengthened the community by creating a professional and trustworthy solution based on the findings from the OMD model and user flow chart that will finalize a purchasing decision.
Tools & Competencies
Project Management – UX Research – UI Design – Design Documentation – SoMe guide – Content Creation – Web development (HTML, CSS, JavaScript, JSON) – Visual Identity
Project Management
We created a project management system in Notion, inspired by the PARA method of organizing knowledge. We chose Notion as the project management platform since it is a very customizable tool without many limitations, which made it easy for us to organize and share our work.
We divided the workspace into 3 databases, linking each project area to the assigned tasks/events and resources. We used resources to store all information, links, drafts, and notes needed for each area and tasks/events to plan our work between us and arrange meetings. We displayed our tasks/events in a calendar and each area in a Gantt Chart to keep up with our deadlines.
We assigned a task manager and a co-pilot for each project area, to make sure that every area had a responsible person in charge of things running smoothly, also taking skills and interests into consideration. My task management responsibilities included project management, design documentation, and coding.
Research
In our research phase, we conducted Client research, Market research, User Research, and Design research (including trend- and pattern research). The project involved client research through an in-depth interview, market research using a Competitor Matrix, and user research through desk research and interviews.
Overall, the user research provided the design team with a better understanding of the client’s goals, the competitive landscape, and the target audience. This information was then used to inform the design of a digital solution for Kune Festival that would align with the client’s mission, vision, and values, and would meet the needs and expectations of the target audience.
Finding the “Why”
Our team started the translation process by gathering information from user research. We used Figjam to create a brainstorm, where we wrote down the synthesis for the interview and survey we conducted. After mapping out our synthesis, we chose to map out the insights that we were able to draw from these.
Using the How-might-we method, we turned our insights into questions to be solved in this specific design challenge. We formed a group of how might we statements from the interview and survey.
Using Simon Sinek’s Golden Circle, our team determined how the company should communicate effectively. This exercise inspired the tone of voice of our solution by making us understand the importance of art, freedom, and self-expression in their business model.
Empathizing
We created three user personas based on research on our target audience. We used two methods, the User Journey and User Flow Chart, to map out the customer journey and guide users to the final purchasing decision. We identified our users’ goals, including finding inspiration, buying a product, joining a community, and being entertained. We used the OMD Eco model to identify the most efficient journey for the user, and we used card sorting to map out the user flow on the website.
Our flow chart illustrated how users would find their way to the third-party ticket app (WERZ) and secure their information to keep them in the loop with newsletters, updates, and deals. Throughout the planning process, we involved the client in our research findings and their expectations for the final product.
Evolution of the prototypes
For this project, we were tasked with creating a festival/event website that included a landing page, lineup page, and artist page. The client requested that we include specific features such as a section for sorting the lineup by activity type, a section that guides users to the application they wish to use as their ticket-purchasing system, and a volunteer section.
To streamline the navigation system and make it more intuitive for the user, we collaborated with the client to map out the navigational elements. We also created a complete site map to provide a foundation for expanding the online presence of KUNE Festival.
Our wireframe sketches were based on a mobile-first design strategy to accommodate the majority of internet traffic, with 60% coming from mobile devices in 2022. We also considered unique behaviors for mobile and desktop users, as well as device-specific limitations, such as hover states and information legibility.
The navigation design went through several iterations, and we used gestalt principles to create meaningful visual connections between the information on the website and the desired UX flow. Ultimately, we aimed to create a digital solution that accommodated both mobile and desktop users without sacrificing usability for either.
Final product
