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Tag: Brand Collaborations

  • A Detailed Look at Spotify’s Marketing Strategies

    Spotify is a premium music streaming service and one of the most popular internet destinations. It’s an excellent platform for musicians, artists, content creators, and other podcasters to share their work with a worldwide audience. Among the numerous digital media, Spotify possesses a number of traits that distinguish it as the undisputed king of music and audio streaming services.

    Daniel Ek created Spotify in 2006 with the straightforward idea of deterring music piracy and assisting artists in becoming more fairly compensated. Because of its simplicity and marketing approach, it now has nearly all of the best up-and-coming singers and songwriters as well as local musicians on its platform.  Spotify’s exceptional product and the time of its launch are both key contributions to its success.

    Marketing Strategies of Spotify

    Marketing Strategies of Spotify

    The average Spotify user is committed, spending around 118 minutes each day listening to the service, and the audience is more feminine than male (56% to 44% male). Young adults are the most common Spotify users, although elderly folks also like the app.

    Spotify leverages user data to find and follow up-and-coming local musicians, who are subsequently marketed to a global audience. This article discussed some key factors that influenced this company’s activities.

    Spotify Monthly Active User Region wise

    Let’s look into the  top strategies in detail that help Spotify to secure a 34% market share

    Freemium Model

    A free basic service is provided as part of a freemium pricing strategy. Freemium, which offers a limited, ad-supported music service for free, continues to be what sets Spotify apart from its competitors. Between-song advertisements are a source of revenue for Spotify for those who choose the free membership. The beauty of the freemium business model is that users can listen to music for free, which in turn helps to eliminate the need for piracy.

    Spotify’s free service is a great way to increase its user base and get more word-of-mouth referrals. Having a free version of the service allows more people to try it out and see how it can benefit them. In turn, these users are more likely to tell their friends about Spotify, which helps the company grow even more. More than half of Spotify’s listeners choose the free version, which boosts the chance of word-of-mouth referrals while simultaneously helping the company generate revenue from ad listening. These referrals can boost sales.

    Spotify Annual Revenue from 2016 to 2022

    Personalization

    Spotify’s AI interface is designed to be personalized for each user. Whether it’s a millennial using Spotify for podcasts or music, or Gen X searching for trending Instagram music, Spotify is ready to cater to all their preferences. Personalization may help organizations stand out in a crowded market. Businesses may differentiate themselves from the competition and retain customers by producing content that is specifically tailored for the user.

    In order to make its AI interface more individualized for each user, Spotify redesigned it in 2016. Accordingly, each user gets content that is customized to them (such as pre-made personalized playlists). In addition to making the entire experience more pleasurable, this assists individuals in discovering new music that they are more likely to appreciate.

    Minimalistic App Interface

    It’s important for brands that offer services on digital platforms to prioritize the user experience above all else. Spotify excels in this area by offering in-app features that are user-friendly and on target. Spotify’s simple design is an improvement over other music apps’ complex designs and offers a premium experience, even in the free version.

    Spotify wins users over with its sleek and ad-free design. The app’s audio ads are interactive and non-intrusive, which shows that the company knows how to strike a balance between being impactful and keeping things simple! The color scheme used on the app and the website is very energetic and attracts the millennials and GenZ.

    Number of Spotify Premium Subscribers

    Connecting Artists for Collaboration

    Spotify not only increased its audience base by collaborating with artists, but it also gained exclusive content. This is a familiar technique that not many companies use. By including visual and audio elements in their songs for free, Spotify made the artist’s work more accessible to their listeners. This is a major reason that more and more artists want their music to be published on Spotify.

    In 2020, when people were stuck at home, the podcast community started to grow. Spotify saw an opportunity and entered the market. They not only signed deals with big brands like Joe Rogan, but also featured people like Robert Downey Jr, Elon Musk, and Mike Tyson exclusive on Spotify. This gave them a huge advantage over their competitors.

    Emotional Ads for Promotion

    In 2013, after Spotify started to face competition from companies such as Apple and Amazon, they released an advertising campaign that focused on the emotional power of music. The campaign was very successful in helping Spotify stand out from its competitors and remains one of the company’s most memorable marketing moments.

    They released three video ads showing people of all ages and backgrounds enjoying music. While the ads feature different people, they all capture the joy and emotion that comes with listening to your favourite artist. The narration describes the feelings the people are experiencing, and how music can transport you to another place entirely.

    The following year, Spotify introduced its #thatsongwhen campaign, which invited users to express the feelings and experiences connected to their favourite songs. At a period when Spotify had just about 8 million paying users, both of these efforts aimed to raise the company’s brand awareness (compared to 155 million today). #Onlyyou campaign in 2021 and #Spotifywrapped in 2022 were all part of the emotional marketing strategy. Spotify also leverages emotional marketing to refresh its connection with its audience.

    People’s decisions can be influenced through emotional marketing. Ads become more memorable, shareable, and likely to boost purchases when they appeal to human emotions. When you examine the data, you’ll see that emotionally driven businesses get three times as many word-of-mouth recommendations and that emotionally driven advertisements are almost twice as likely to be successful. They also result in a 23% boost in sales.

    You must follow Spotify on social media if you enjoy music. The well-known music streaming service frequently publishes articles on various musicians and new album information. Spotify works on keeping unified branding across all of its social media profiles, which include separate accounts for various geographic regions. This social media marketing helps Spotify gain a large audience base. The platform not only runs various hashtag campaigns and social media trends to create awareness for its brand but also collaborates with social media influencers and runs sponsored ads. By working with influencers, the platform is able to promote its brand in a variety of styles that are sure to reach a wide audience.

    Social media trends can quickly make or break a business. In 2018, an auditory illusion was posted on Reddit that went viral. While some listeners claimed a man was saying the name “Yanny,” in an audio clip, others were certain it was the word “Laurel.”Spotify noticed the trend and decided to create a new billboard that capitalized on the conversation. Yet again, the brand’s cutting-edge approach was a hit and caught the attention of social media users.

    Brand Collaborations

    As of 2022, Spotify has partnered with 76 companies across the globe. Spotify partners with a variety of publishers and music labels to expand their digital reach and connect with new audiences. By collaborating with these different companies, Spotify is able to offer a wider range of music and videos to their users.

    A notable brand collaboration is with Starbucks where Starbucks members are able to curate Spotify playlists that will be played in their stores. Apart from this Starbucks employees get a Spotify premium subscription. This is a great way for Spotify to get more exposure and reach a wider audience.

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    Consistent Brand Identity

    Although Spotify is a very creative company, its logo is very bland and unassuming. It’s surprising that a company like Spotify, whose identity is based on music and innovation, would have a symbol that is anything less than artful. But I guess the crooked classic Wi-Fi emblem is just so iconic at this point that it’s become their identity. The key, obviously, is consistency.

    Over the years, Spotify has evolved and changed its brand identity several times to reflect different styles and eras. However, the company has kept its original icon throughout these changes to offer a sense of familiarity and consistency to its subscribers.

    Leveraging User Data

    Spotify has changed the game when it comes to how technology and data are used together. Their algorithms are designed specifically to help users explore new music and expand their list of songs. By recording users’ behaviours, interests, and past actions, Spotify is able to create a customized playlist for each person with personalized recommendations. This is just one example of how they’re using technology and data in an innovative way to improve the user experience.

    Spotify’s best example of leveraging user data is its “Discover Weekly” feature. Another is Spotifywrapped. Hope this helps you craft your business marketing strategy better!

    Conclusion

    Spotify is a great solution if you enjoy streaming music and podcasts. Not only do they have a huge selection of music and artists, but you can create your own playlists, save songs for offline listening, and follow your favorite artists.

    Spotify is one of the most popular streaming music apps and made many positive changes in the music industry. It not only allows the audiences to discover musicians but also local artists will be able to use Spotify as a platform to reach a global audience.

    FAQ

    What is Spotify’s target market?

    The typical Spotify user is young adults – Millennials and Gen Z – however there is not a small audience of older adults aged 55+ who also enjoy the app’s music.

    What is Spotify’s biggest market?

    The United States is responsible for the single largest Spotify market in the world.

    What makes Spotify unique?

    Spotify keeps listeners listening with its personalized Discover Weekly and Release Radar playlists. Listeners who want to put in a little effort to find new music can sift through any number of the artist- and song-specific radio stations.

    What are the best marketing strategies for Spotify?

    The following are the best strategies of Spotify

    • Freemium Model
    • Personalization
    • Minimalistic App Interface
    • Connecting Artists for Collaboration
    • Emotional Ads for Promotion
    • Jump Onto Social Media Trends
    • Brand Collaborations
    • Consistent Brand Identity
    • Leveraging User Data

    How does Spotify use social media to promote?

    Spotify runs multiple regional accounts on Instagram, which has more than 8.5 million followers. They regularly post images of popular artists and top tracks trending on the platform. This helps them share only the most relevant content for each country, thereby targeting the right audience for their content and business.

  • What Is Engagement Optimisation? | How to Do Engagement Optimisation for Your Brand?

    Many companies feel that once they’ve captured the attention of their audience, they can sit back and relax. While it’s true that a company’s brand should reach a stage where it is in the front mind of its audience to be effectively called a brand, capturing interest is only half of what needs to be done for this.

    Reaching such a stage requires a lot of work and a well-worked-out strategy to keep the captured interest engaged. When done right, engagement optimisation not only increases visibility by keeping your brand at the top of the minds of people but also generates leads that can thereafter lead to conversion.

    What is Engagement Optimisation?
    How to Do Engagement Optimisation For Your Brand?

    What is Engagement Optimisation?

    Engagement Optimisation is the process of optimising your website’s user experience thereby increasing the time spent on the site and the number of pages viewed by the users per visit. This optimisation can occur only when you can understand the specific features on your website which give the users more reasons to stay on your site and return in the future.

    Engagement optimisation also includes measures that can drive your audience to share your content via social media or other online sharing platforms. All in all the goal of engagement optimisation is to increase traffic and reach by making content more capitulating, agreeable, and shareable, which in turn increases the number of impressions for your website in general and that piece of content in particular. This in turn will increase the number of opportunities you may have to grab the attention of your potential customers.

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    How to Do Engagement Optimisation For Your Brand?

    Leading Digital Consumer Engagement Tactics According to Marketers Worldwide (as of 2021)
    Leading Digital Consumer Engagement Tactics According to Marketers Worldwide (as of 2021)

    You can do engagement optimization for your brand by focusing on the following:

    Focus on Different Types of Content

    Types of content are going to play a large role in content marketing success. While many marketers will tell you that all types of content are important, it is no secret that some are more effective than others depending on your target audience. You must identify what will click well with your audience and design a content framework that works to fit the need and demands of your audience as well as your brand. This way you will be able to attract your target customers to your brand and therefore, better engagement optimisation.

    Focus on Your Social Media Outreach Strategy

    With the growing trend of reels, stories, and posts on various social media platforms such as Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube, a prominent online presence of any brand for their products and services has become a necessary task. It helps to build a successful engagement optimisation where brands can reach the target audience through posts that resonate with their unique interests.

    However, customer or community engagement is essential if you want to make a profit from social media. Furthermore, this trick can hike up the engagement strategy as well. All you have to do is engage with the potential clients as consistent communication between the brand and customers can boost engagement smoothly.

    Average Instagram Follower Engagement With Selected Post Types Worldwide (2022)
    Average Instagram Follower Engagement With Selected Post Types Worldwide (2022)

    Here we will discuss a few top-notch strategies that can enhance your social media outreach strategy:

    Build Meaningful Connections

    Engagement optimisation is all about building a more meaningful connection with your target audience, which in turn can lead to increased brand loyalty. In today’s time, you are not alone if you are looking for an engagement optimisation strategy that can help increase your brand awareness.

    Everyone from small business owners to national companies is turning their attention toward social media marketing because it allows them to build relationships with potential customers at no cost. When done right, engagement optimisation is free advertising that helps your business grow by fostering trust and creating online communities around your products or services. Things to consider while building meaningful connections:

    • Use catchy but simple and clear language while promoting your products.
    • Post content that is humorous yet relatable to the products or services your company is offering.
    • Adding videos can also help you to reach the audience. It helps to determine an in-depth clarity of the audience’s understanding of the product.
    • While you are organizing any marketing campaign for your brand, keep a track of your audience’s reactions. You can create polls to understand the desirability of your service or product. You can get new ideas and also get to know about the improvements required from the public reactions.

    Track Your Social Media Metrics

    • The number of followers increases in your social media account reflecting the popularity of your brand. If customers are happy and engaged with your posts then the insights, as well as the number of your followers, will increase. So, it is important to keep a track of your followers on different social media platforms.
    • Reactions of your audience to the posts and stories on your social media are the second most important thing to track. It allows you to gain a piece of thorough knowledge about the interests of the users in your account related to what products they like the most.
    • For EOS (Entrepreneurial Operating System), you should have clear visibility online. Therefore, you should check the reach of your post to the target audience. Hence, the more reactions or comments on your posts, the more is the visibility of your brand.
    • The concept of click-through rate is another element for direct quotations or conversions. Again, while calculating the CTR there is no accurate number that is defined as a good CTR value. In general, it is counted as any number above 2-3% is better than the average.
    • Conduct competitive analysis to boost customer engagement for your brand.

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    Focus on Increasing Your Brand’s Engagement on Social Media

    Engagement optimisation is a concept that has grown more prominent in recent years as brands realize how much reach they can achieve when they leverage social media to boost their presence. Not all social media strategies result in engagement, so how can you make sure yours do? Below are some of the tips on how you can optimise your brand’s engagement on social media platforms:

    Video Content

    These days people spend more hours watching video content on social media that any other form of content. Therefore utilizing the video content for your brand can build a strong audience engagement. It is observed in surveys that video content is more beneficial than text or audio content. Posting fewer images and more videos can channel the marketing of your brand in a better way.

    Transitory Content

    Similar to the video content there can be small temporary videos that are posted on stories on various social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram, etc are known as transitory content. These small videos can either last for 2 seconds like a boomerang or 15 seconds in the form of stories.

    Customer Feedback

    Gaining customers’ trust and building a relationship with loyal customers for the long term is an essential factor for all companies. Therefore, whatever you post should be customer opinion-oriented. In this way, you can expect a considerable amount of engagement on your social media platforms.

    Here, you can also create polls, small videos, or reels regarding customers’ opinions about your brand.

    Collaboration With Influencers

    On social media platforms, influencers and bloggers have already established their fame through huge fan following. You can promote your product or services by collaborating with the. This strategy will help you to reach a huge audience in less time. Things to know while collaborating with influencers:

    • Select your brand’s niche.
    • Select the bloggers or influencers already working in the same niche of your brand. For instance, if your brand deals with food items then collaborating with food bloggers can be helpful. Similarly, if your business is related to clothing or jewelry then lifestyle influencers can do the job.
    • While selecting the influencers, do check if they have the organic follower list and have not purchased any. Otherwise, the brand collaboration will not reach the target audience.
    How do marketers determine which influencer to partner with on social media?
    How do marketers determine which influencer to partner with on social media?

    Focus On Messaging Platforms

    Messaging is a great way to understand your customers’ requirements and it also helps to create new leads. According to Userlike, 68% of the customers prefer chatbot services as it provides quicker responses irrespective of the time of the day. Since social media channels have a huge user base, focusing on platforms like Facebook messenger chatbot, Instagram messenger chatbot, and WhatsApp is a great way to enhance one’s brand engagement.

    You cannot control everything, sometimes, the users will leave your site no matter what. But how they feel about their experience on your site can make a big difference in whether they come back or not. So, giving importance to the customers by listening to their requests or issues increases engagement and thus, better chances of customer retention and acquisition.

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    Focus On Features That Are Working On Your Website

    It is a good idea to look at your bounce rate to determine which features on your website are keeping users engaged and which are not. If you notice that a large percentage of your visitors are leaving without going through any other page (other than your home page), then you may want to tweak or re-evaluate the content you are offering. You can also check how long people stay on each page using Google Analytics. By looking at these numbers, you can see where the customer engagement is high and where it is low. After analyzing, you can make the alterations accordingly.

    Conclusion

    To conclude Engagement Optimisation is the key to success in Digital Marketing especially since there is so much noise out there to snatch the attention of the audience. This means that your content and presentation need to be unique and must appeal to the audience and thereafter, they need to feel the connection with it to remain engaged. Finally, they have to be convinced to stay loyal to your brand and at the same time suggest your brand to their community. Thus, focusing on the above-mentioned essential aspects will help you to increase engagement for your brand.

    FAQs

    What is an engagement strategy?

    An engagement strategy consists of various activities and interactions with the customers to ensure a great before and after purchase experience for them.

    What are the types of engagement?

    The following are the types of engagement:

    • Personal engagement.
    • Situational engagement.
    • Organizational engagement.

    How can I drive brand engagement?

    You can drive brand engagement with the help of the following:

    • Create a seamless brand experience across all channels.
    • Take part in social media discussions.
    • Use the live chat to engage with customers directly.
    • Personalize your content.
    • Conduct contests, polls, and giveaways.
    • Prioritize feedback from customers.

    What is branded search volume?

    The volume of visitors to your website that came from a branded keyword on a search engine over a specific period, such as a month or quarter, is known as branded search traffic. It shows the growth of your brand’s recognition among the people.

  • What Should a Brand Look For Before Partnering With an Influencer?

    This article is contributed by Mr. Sumit Gupta, Founder Whizard API and The Viral Pitch.

    Influencer marketing as a new-age marketing strategy has gained prominence over the period of time. Influencers are considered a beneficial medium that helps boost traffic generation in today’s times. However, what is often goes unnoticed is that not all are relevant or impactful for your marketing strategy!

    Factors to be kept into consideration before associating with an influencer

    For a brand, the follower base of an influencer is only the tip of the iceberg. It is imperative that brands know the influencer in-depth before planning to associate with them. It is trust that forms the foundation for any association. Since brands will be collaborating with them for their brand communication; it is essential that they know the influencer well so that they can trust them with their campaigns.

    Hence, a brand should keep various aspects into consideration before finalizing on the influencer for collaboration:

    Knowing the influencer’s follower base

    Every influencer boasts of a strong and diverse follower base. However, it is important that you analyze the influencer’s target audience first since you will be tapping them via your campaign. Apart from the influencer’s content feed and storytelling format, followers’ insights should also be taken into consideration. Their age, preferences, interests, etc. are of prime importance when you are conceptualizing your campaign and choosing the influencer.

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    Gauging engagement rate and relationship with the audience

    It is advised that you do not finalize the influencer basis their face value. Other factors such as their engagement rate and their relationship with their audiences are equally important. The influencer’s personal connection and rapport with their followers are relevant points and should be kept in mind while selecting the influencer for your brand campaign.

    Ensuring the values and core beliefs are aligned

    Your association and campaign will reap benefits only when your beliefs will be in sync with those of the influencer you are opting for. The collaboration will turn out to be advantageous and authentic if they believe in your brand and its core ethos. Hence, you should choose the one where this coordination and alignment are either present or can be worked out in the future post discussions.

    Numbers do count

    Indeed your decision should not rely only on numbers but the fact of the matter is that they do count! The amount of the follower base and the audience composition hold relevance before zeroing down on the influencer. The authenticity of the influencer is also one of the major factors to be considered while selecting the influencer for your brand communication. Hence, it is important that you look out for fake followers specifically.

    Analyzing past associations

    It’s always advised to do a thorough check of the influencer’s brand value and their past associations. The kind of collaborations they had, the brands that they partnered with, the reach, engagement, and clicks garnered, that is the campaign success are important points to be kept into consideration. If the influencer does not meet these criteria, then probably they aren’t the right fit for your brand and your campaign!

    Communicating personally

    Associations are best formed when there is a personal connection. Hence, apart from communicating via texts or DMs, set up a meeting where you can interact and get to know each other well. This informal interaction will give you an idea about the persona and personality of the influencer, their ethics, morals, ideology, etc., and will help you in eventually building a fruitful relationship.

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    Conclusion

    Influencer marketing is one of the effective ways to expand your social media presence. However, a one size fits all approach won’t work. For every communication, a unique campaign and associations with diverse influencers would be required. Content relevance, reach of the influencer as well as resonance (potential level of engagement the influencer can build with the audience relevant for your brand) should ideally be considered before you narrow down on the choice of the influencer for your brand campaign!