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the app: The Apple Podcasts app serves as a centralized platform for discovering, subscribing to, and listening to podcasts.
user: Me!
pain points:Too many screens to reach the end goal, the app doesn't save your place, and endless scrolling
TLDR: 2 suggested improvements:
1. user does not need to choose See All to move into a list of every episode available (remove the extra step), all the user has to do is scroll
2. Add the user’s most recently played/listened to episode Above the Fold so the user does not have to scroll excessively in order to locate the episode where they left off, even if they haven’t listened to the show in months.
BONUS: Select option to Mark As Played so you don’t have to go through one by one when you have episodes that have 2 minutes left on them that you don’t want to listen to, or bonus episodes with content you don’t want to listen to (ex: minisodes, intros to other shows, previews, interviews, etc)
case study - apple podcasts
current flow: Frustrating, the anti-happy path
Let’s say I want to listen to an episode of a podcast I’ve listened to before, but not in many months. The easiest way to find this podcast (let’s say it’s Handsome), is to try to find an episode listed under Up Next or find the podcast by heading to Library.
Option 1: Up Next Home > Scroll forever and cross my fingers that there’s even a recently dropped episode listed (in this case, this step took 5 taps to scroll > select the podcast Handsome, this leads me to their most recently released episode, but I like to listen to shows from their first aired episode, so this isn’t the episode I want. Now I need to select Handsome from this screen, which will take me to Handsome’s home page. This clearly wasn’t the best/most efficient way to get to the episode I want.
2 ways to choose your settings:
1. Library > Handsome > Settings > Episode Order > Oldest to Newest OR
2. Library > Handsome > Episodes Dropdown > Oldest to Newest
The second option was the easiest path, but I’m still not happy with it. Even now that the episodes will be shown in the order that I’ve selected (oldest to newest), it still requires me to select See All and scroll forever while also keeping an eye on the titles to make sure I get to the episode I actually want to listen to based on the last episode I listened to, months ago.
This takes me from the happy path because I’ve had to work really hard to find my place. Also, depending on the number of episodes available from the podcast, I might have to scroll for even longer - imagine if the show doesn’t organize their episodes into seasons, or if it's been dropping episodes since 2016 - this means I have to scroll through each year (how would I remember which year the episode I want falls under?). Even by narrowing down the options by selecting only Unplayed episodes, this only helps me if I’ve listened to the majority of the episodes already - if I haven’t, this doesn’t really help me at all.
Home > Library > scroll > select pod > menu > settings > Oldest to Newest > back to podcast Home page > See All > scroll to guess most recently listened to episode This path varies depending on if you’ve edited your episode order preference (you will need to do this step separately for each podcast’s settings), as well as how the show is organized (i.e. Seasons vs Years) Seasons vs Years: Seasons are organized formally by the show into organized categories that you can filter. If the show does not organize their episodes by Season, it is organized by Year - Years are not a formal category - there is no way to isolate episodes by year. This means, if your show started in 2016 and is still dropping new episodes, you will have to scroll forever to find the most recently listened to episode, say Episode #2 out of 700 episodes.
proposed solution: less steps, listen where you left off
proposed solution #1:
where you left off
1. Main change: adding a highly emphasized Where You Left Off feature that showcases the user’s most recently listened to episode, even if they haven’t listened in months. The user doesn’t have to scroll and scroll and scroll (depending on the show’s organization structure and number of episodes - i.e. organizing their episodes in *Seasons vs Years) and can just start where they last left off.
<Remove See All option - no longer relevant as all available episodes are shown by default
2. Remove See All option from the Show’s Home screen. This is no longer needed because the default Home screen will now show the entire list of available episodes, reducing a step from the original flow (Home > See All > scroll to correct episode) to just the Home screen instead. Less steps = happy path
*Currently, podcast episodes are organized into only 2 specific categories: 1. Seasons and 2. Years. Seasons, like a tv series, have the option to filter by. Years, however, are only organized in a list - no option to filter by year. This is another reason that showcasing the most recently listened to episode Above The Fold on the home screen of the show can save a lot of time (and unnecessary scrolling).
Proposed Solution #2: optimized episode selection
Incorporating a feature that allows the user to select multiple episodes at once and mark them as Played, Unplayed, or to Download. Currently, you can only select episodes one at a time. A user might find this manual/one by one step to be tedious and too time-consuming and might fall from the Happy Path. Being able to select multiple episodes at once (like Apple’s Mail app offers) makes it much easier to organize and reorganize their preferred episode list. I for example, would use this feature to select every episode that still has 10 minutes or less of play time left, to mark them as Played and move on. I find that I like to skip the last few minutes of most episodes because the content in this time frame is usually just rambling banter from hosts and then the show’s credits. Don’t be ashamed! Skip those credits and last ads! This feature could also serve to allow users to “remove” or “unsee” episodes with content that deviates from the usual episode structure/style (i.e. intro episodes to spinoff shows, bonus episodes, re-uploads of previous episodes to fill space, etc)
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