Accordion Games: Why Spotify’s Free Service Should Constantly Grow And Contract
Spotify is feeling pressure from Universal Music Group and others to drop or drastically reduce free streaming. But Jon Maples argues its not an either or proposition.
____________________________________
Guest post from Jon Maples
UMG’s CEO Lucian Grande woke up one day and figured out that Spotify was giving away too much music and it was impacting digital sales, which have slumped considerably. The company controls a considerable amount of popular music throughout the world. In some markets it’s as much as 40 percent of all music sales, so when it doesn’t like something, you can be assured that something’s gonna change. Outside of the absurdity of all this, there is a point here. And it comes down to the funnel.
You see Spotify uses free music as a customer acquisition funnel. By getting the largest number of people possible playing music, Spotify believes that it can convert a significant number of them into the paid products. Spotify has pushed to create the biggest funnel possible by giving unlimited free music on the desktop, and allowing shuffle play listening for free on mobile phones.
All information has shown that Spotify has had a great year. Its growth numbers in free and paid listeners has grown tremendously. Early data signals are showing that Spotify ate into other free services, like YouTube. And while the company wheels out data points that claims it hasn’t eaten into iTunes sales, it bends credulity to believe that Spotify hasn’t eaten into track sales.
Think Accordion, Not Funnel
The main point of Spotify’s troubles comes down to how it considers free playback. The company would have much more success in identifying those who would pay by considering free as an accordion that expands and contracts from time to time. Instead of 100 percent free plays all the time, the company could limit free playback occasionally, or better yet, carve up its user base into intelligent cohorts based on their playback behavior and value to the company.
So if listener creates awesome playlists that gets tons of followers, that person gets as much free music they want. If someone shares more playlists than most, free music. If one has more active friends, give ‘em free. The company could even create scores based on user’s future possibility that they might subscribe and keep them around. Others should see a wall when they get to a certain number of plays. And when Spotify’s funnel starts to collapse, open it up again. Free music for everyone.
It has been my contention that sooner or later, Spotify will have to have a system like this in place. Right now, the content costs are crushing to the company, and eventually, playtime will be over. Time to get the books right. But right now in its run-up to an initial public offering the company is 100 percent focused on growth. Therefore, it must keep the funnel as big as possible.
And finally, it’s absurd to think that the major labels are going to do anything to jeopardize Spotify’s IPO. All the labels own a chunk in Spotify and will benefit from the IPO. It could be big money. Just last year UMG made hundreds of millions on Beat Electronics sale to Apple. So free music might be more limited sooner or later. But let’s not pretend free music is going anywhere before Spotify makes labels millions.
Jonmaples.com: Major Label Are Truly Home of the Free (Music)
FT: Universal Takes On Spotify’s Free Model
