Spotify For Artists adds Active Audience data

Spotify for Artists has added “Active Audience,” a new metric offering insights into an artist’s listeners who have streamed their music in the last 28 days.

On average, fans who actively stream a song will play that artist’s music 4X more in the next six months.

An active listener has actively streamed an artist’s music in the last 28 days from the artist’s profile, album, release pages, or the listener’s own library or playlists. Passive streams come via editorial or independent playlists or are chosen algorithmically.  

Spotify For Artists Active Audience data is segmented based on streaming history:

• Super listeners: An artist’s most dedicated active listeners in the last 28 days. “They are also the most likely to keep streaming the music,” according to Spotify.
• Moderate listeners: Active listeners who intentionally streamed an artist’s music many times in the last 28 days, and could develop into super listeners.
• Light listeners: Active listeners who intentionally streamed an artist’s music once or a couple of times in the last 28 days and could develop into moderate listeners. 

How to use Spotify Active Audience data

“With insight into the streaming habits of their most active audience, we want to help artists turn listeners into fans who engage directly with their music,” says Spotify.

This kind of data is an important first step and can be used to compare fan reactions to new music and the effectiveness of marketing efforts.

But so far, Spotify has not offered a way for artists to communicate with or market directly to these new segmented audiences. That’s when Active Audience data will become truly valuable to artists, labels, and music marketers.

MORE: Everything Spotify just launched for Artists

Bruce Houghton is the Founder and Editor of Hypebot and MusicThinkTank, a Senior Advisor at Bandsintown, President of the Skyline Artists Agency, and a professor for the Berklee College Of Music.