Today sees the release of a new 主播大秀 Music application for mobile and tablet. Executive Product Manager Chris Kimber describes the range of content available on the app and the features that ensure a personalised music experience.
This week we are releasing the first version of a 主播大秀 Music native application for mobile and tablet, available on iOS and Android. The app is packed with exclusive live music performances, interviews and playlists and will be personalised to your musical taste. Put simply, the new app offers users a personalised slice of music from the 主播大秀. It’s also the first 主播大秀 native app that asks users to sign-in to 主播大秀 iD before they start using it.
The aim is to make sense of the very wide range of content encompassed under the 主播大秀 Music brand, complementing the music programmes available in 主播大秀 iPlayer Radio and 主播大秀 iPlayer. The 主播大秀 Music product on both web and native app now also includes all the functionality previously offered by the 主播大秀 Playlister brand, in a way that we hope users will find easy to find and use.
Why a music app?
As my colleague Ben Chapman , the 主播大秀 already invests significantly in the music genre, from radio stations, TV programmes, live events, news and online content. We want to make that a coherent offer for audiences looking for a music experience, no matter which area of the 主播大秀 that content originates from, or what platform it was originally broadcast on.
Mobile has become such an important platform for music consumption, with many commercial music products focusing their efforts in this space. Looking at the usage data for , the clear trend is towards portable devices, which together make up well over half of all our web traffic.
So for 主播大秀 Music to have an impact with audiences it was clear that we had to have a great mobile experience, and in addition to making our website perform well on mobile devices we wanted to take advantage of the opportunities offered by native apps to offer a more personalised and seamless experience.
The 主播大秀 Music app homepage on iOS tablet
What does it do?
While the 主播大秀 Music website offers a comprehensive browsing experience (including , and genre aggregations), we wanted to keep the native app focused on music discovery and consumption. Thinking about the wide range of music content produced across the 主播大秀, we feel the best way to do this is to gather some basic music preferences upfront to allow us to offer a more tailored content offer.
So once a user has signed in to 主播大秀 iD and answered a few simple questions, we can then offer relevant short-form audio and video, including live performances, mixes and artist interviews. Our belief is that while we produce high quality audio and video content, the missing element is the one place to easily find all that’s relevant to the individual user.
Main menu options and curated playlists on Android mobile
Music discovery is key to our mission at 主播大秀 Music, so we have made our curated playlists available in the app, where users can preview short samples of all the tracks or listen in full via one of our partners, Spotify, Deezer or YouTube. Tapping the “Add Playlist” button on one of these playlists allows users to keep track of the latest tracks added to it by our presenters and programmes via notifications on bbc.co.uk, and improves the recommendations we can offer.
Similarly, we have now included 主播大秀 Playlister capability into the app, which means users can add tracks to their own personal lists (now called “”) then export that list to one of our partners for full playback. Adding tracks helps to feed our recommendation engine, so the more you add, the better the recommendations get.
Lastly we have included our feature, which allows users to find any track played on 主播大秀 Radio over the past seven days by selecting a date, station and time.
Users can add tracks to their personal playlists (shown on Android mobile)
What next?
We’re excited to be releasing the app and website changes this week, and we’re really looking forward to finding out what our users think is of most value. So we’ll be closely monitoring feedback and using it to help us decide what to build next. We’ll be releasing monthly updates to the app, taking on board the feedback we receive from our users.
There’s a Feedback link in the app Menu, or you can send feedback on our website via our here.
Download links
The 主播大秀 Music native app is available on iOS (versions 8 and 9) and Android (versions 4.1 and above).
主播大秀 Music on the
主播大秀 Music on
主播大秀 Music on