Spotify · Product sense · Mid · 45 to 60 minutes

Fix broken flow in music discovery

Spotify is a global audio streaming service for music, podcasts, and other audio content. Answer this product management case and get it graded line by line against a weighted rubric.

Product sense
Prioritization
Metric design
User empathy
Tradeoff analysis

The situation

The Director of Music Personalization has asked you, the PM for core listening, for a recommendation before the next planning cycle. Spotify already helps people discover music through playlists, radio, search, and personalized surfaces, and many sessions start from a moment of emotion rather than a planned search. But user research shows an unstable pattern: when recommendations match a user mood, sessions become long and exploratory, yet one off target song or a clumsy attempt to regain control often pushes people back to old playlists. On free accounts, interruptions can make this loss of flow feel even worse. Leadership believes this is hurting trust in personalization, repeat discovery, and eventually premium conversion, but the team cannot tackle every friction point at once. Some leaders want better recommendation quality, some want mood and tempo controls, and others want easier queue management when users want to steer. Apple Music and YouTube Music are close enough that leadership wants a clear product direction now. Your job is to recommend what Spotify should prioritize in the discovery to immersion journey next, and how success should be measured.

What to produce

Write a 1 to 2 page product strategy memo.

Your answer must

Identify the primary user and the key moment in their listening journey where Spotify is losing trust or momentum.
State the core problem to solve and explain why it matters more than adjacent issues like acquisition, podcasts, or annual social sharing.
Recommend one primary product direction for the next planning cycle, and briefly discuss 1 to 2 alternatives you considered but did not choose.
Describe the proposed user experience concretely enough to evaluate, including how it balances effortless personalization with moments of user control.
Define success metrics and guardrails, using leading indicators tied to discovery, immersion, and re engagement.
Propose a lightweight experiment or rollout plan, and name the biggest risks or failure modes.

Constraints

Use Spotify's existing music catalog and current app surfaces, do not assume new licensing deals or exclusive content.
Do not remove ads or change pricing as the primary solution.
The proposal should work for mainstream listeners at scale, not only for expert music users who want complex controls.

Format

Use headings such as user problem, options, recommendation, metrics, and risks.

How Spotify actually played it

Teardown of Spotify covering persona, journey, metrics, positive highlights and improvement areas, with attention to Wrapped and personalization.

Personalization turns data into emotion
Shareable summaries drive organic reach
Define metrics for each journey stage

Built from Spotify Product Teardown: The Science Behind Your Perfect Playlist by Prod Lab.