NFTs provide currency & engagement for a festival

Coachella Valley Music & Arts invited NFT startup Fanaply to create the Coachella Coin program for the 2019 Festival. Their goal with the program was to drive digital engagement onsite and to introduce digital assets to festival goers.

I helped Fanaply create the overall service design of the experience. I created user experience flows for the “Coachella Coin” section of the official Coachella app that included a system of challenges and rewards that users could access via QR scanning and augmented reality.

The Coachella Coin section of the festival app, with a coin balance above a list of challenges.

Key Experience Features

Festival attendees received their festival bracelets in the mail several weeks before the event. Once they activated their bracelets, they could do the “Make Friends” challenge. This involved scanning their friends’ QR codes to earn Coachella coins. Fans loved it. They went online and spread word about the program. Pre-festival engagement was so successful the Coachella Coin merch tent had a line out the door with people ready to claim their rewards less than an hour after the festival gates opened.

Two app screens: My Coachella Wallet with a personal QR code, and the Make Friends challenge.

The pre-event Make Friends challenge

Festival goers queuing at the Coachella Coin tent to claim rewards.

Coachella Coin participants line up to claim rewards less than one hour after the festival opened.

At the Event: Augmented Reality Makes the Experience Self-Driving

We used augmented reality to let festival goers check-in at challenges with a quick scan of a poster, making it possible to expand the range of challenges and distribute them throughout the festival grounds without needing a QR code or staff member at every check-in point.

A festival goer scanning a printed artwork panel to check in to a challenge.

Festival goers checking in by scanning artwork distributed throughout the event grounds.

Post-event: Digital Collectibles with Long-term Value

At the event, fans earned digital badges by completing sequences of challenges. These badges made users eligible for bigger ticket prizes such as VIP upgrades. In addition, the badges could be exported to the blockchain as permanent mementos for users to remember the event by.

Two app screens: a Coachella 2019 badge award, and the badge collection grid.

NFTs reward attendees who completed themed challenges.

Sample Documentation

Two app screens: the challenge list, and a sponsored Amex Card Member Lounge challenge.

Wireframes for Coachella Coins: a coin balance with challenges and rewards, and a check-in screen.