The Infinite Dial

UK-based Absolute Radio (who we're proud to work with) is teaming up with 20th Century Fox and Spotify to help promote an upcoming movie using a co-branded microsite where listeners can upload playlists of their favorite romantic (or breakup) songs. This is a win for all involved, and not just because it represents another online revenue success story for a radio client. If you haven't yet heard of Spotify (which has yet to launch in the US,) you soon will--as Jennifer Lane notes, they are well-funded and well-placed to occupy a potentially gigantic spot in the online music space.

Spotify's premise is to provide listeners with on-demand streaming of individual songs and playlists--essentially, to be able to listen to pretty much any song you want, whenever you want it. As broadband becomes essentially the next FM, technology has finally reduced the friction in this space to nil, and Spotify's overall user/listener experience is fantastic. Though you can't yet use Spotify in the States until their licensing is sorted out, where there's a will, there's a way.

Setting aside Fox and ShortList (who are also part of this promotion,) the collaboration between Spotify and Absolute is not only beneficial for both parties, it is a glimpse into how music radio--online and off--can continue to remain relevant in a world where ubiquitous, free music is a commodity. Certainly Spotify gets another promotional crack at a mainstream audience (this is their second big movie sponsorship) as they continue to position themselves abroad as a potentially dominant player in online music. Absolute, on the other hand, benefits from the association with Spotify and exposes their personalities (DJ's Christian O'Connell, Geoff Lloyd and Jo Russell will be involved) to Spotify's user base. The movie itself ('(500) Days Of Summer') is likely to be a big hit as well, which doesn't hurt. But what really excites me about this collaboration is the emphasis on the playlist--sharing, swapping, creating and adding value to user-generated playlists AND radio station-developed content.

We've got nearly 10 years' worth of research (beginning with Edison's groundbreaking Web Content Study from back in 2000) that clearly states what listeners are looking for from a radio station website. The number one answer, then as now: playlists. Listeners want to know the artist and title of not only what just played, but what has been played over the past hour, day or week. The playlist is the real 'content' of a music station--the carefully balanced, crafted and selected sequence of songs designed to fit a mood or fulfill a brand promise. And radio does this sort of thing very well.

Spotify allows listeners to create and share playlists, which puts it in the enviable position of being the next 'mixtape' for a generation of music fans. But Spotify has the same problem so many other online music sites have (which I wrote about elsewhere): when free music online is a ubiquitous commodity, it is essentially valueless on its own. Spotify, like Pandora, Imeem, Last.FM and others, has built a novel way to truck wheat. Unless that commodity is packaged in such a way as to add more than the intrinsic value of a clump of songs (that is to say, zero value) then they will not be able to command the premium advertising and subscription rates they will need to recoup their investment and become a going concern.

The answer is to add value to the playlist and package it in a way that is truly meaningful to a listener. There are two ways to do this--add context, and add curation. The Absolute/Spotify collaboration does both, by allowing listeners to share stories associated with their playlists AND by having the Absolute DJ's submit their own hand-crafted lists of the best relationship songs. One great song after another is simply not enough to stand out as a distinct offering--but having a talented personality like Absolute's Christian O'Connell give you a well-designed playlist, and the meaningful story behind it--well, that's been the stuff of compelling music radio for almost 50 years.

So, on the one hand, Absolute gets to link itself to another rising star in the online space, but on the other, gets the opportunity to demonstrate the real value of its offering, skill and personalities to become a real differentiator for their sponsors, for Spotify, and most importantly themselves.