Spotify Integrated Marketing Communications Strategy PDF

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Integrated Marketing Communications Strategy - Final report...

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Spotify Integrated Marketing Communications Strategy An effective marketing communications strategy serves a variety of purposes such as the promotion of a brand, differentiation, facilitating customer involvement, creating bonds, and adding value. Currently, Spotify is not taking full advantage of its integrated marketing communications (IMC) strategy to attract free users to switch to premium accounts. Personal Selling. Common personal selling tactics such as customer selling, training, and telemarketing are generally absent at Spotify. As a web-based service, it instead opts for digital marketing tactics. Spotify’s premium service removes advertisements and enables users to take their music offline, among other features. In contrast, free users periodically receive push notifications encouraging them to subscribe to a premium account (Appendix 9). Also, Spotify advertises its premium account on the front page of its website. However, users need to scroll down to get more information on its benefits. This can be a limiting factor in attracting users to the premium service. Finally, Spotify lacks a one-on-one interaction between the seller and the customer. Advertising. Spotify uses Internet channels to advertise its service. Its active presence on social media (Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Youtube) works to communicate its brand to consumers. However, Spotify's Facebook presence only represents a total of 18.4 million followers in comparison to its over 120 million subscribers, who are mostly millennials and spend significant time on social media. In the past, Spotify has created imaginative advertising campaigns such as the “Thanks, 2016. It’s been weird” campaign, which excelled in showing Spotify’s sense of humor to consumers while promoting the brand (Appendix 10). Even though Spotify’s campaigns and advertisements are highly localized and creative, it seems that they are simply aiming to get more users without emphasizing the benefits of a premium account.

Sales Promotion. The free service option offered by Spotify can be interpreted as a sampling tool since users are able to test most of the features offered on the platform. In some countries, users can try the premium account for a trial period of 30 days before subscribing to it. Moreover, Spotify has created numerous partnerships with Canadian phone carriers to offer a free trial to their customers. For example, the cellular service provider Fido offers new customers a six-month free access to Spotify premium. This strategy is effective as it removes any barriers to new users, who can test the service without involving direct financial investment to Spotify. Finally, Spotify offers bundles for families ($14.99 for up to six members) and students discounts ($4.99), but these rebates are not available everywhere. Even so, Spotify fails to clearly communicate these specific geographical limitations on their sales promotions to the public. For instance, a Quebecer who is visiting the Canadian website will come across a special sales promotion of “3 months of Premium for $0.99 CAD” (Appendix 11), which might pique their interest. However, they are soon disappointed when entering the advertisement page, as they notice a small warning notifying them that the promotion is not available in Quebec. As a result, there is a communication gap in this customer's experience, as there is a difference between their expectation and what is actually available to them. Publicity and Public Relations (PR). Spotify uses extensive PR measures that enable it to expand its brand awareness and user base, as well as attract investors and companies to use it as an ad platform. For example, Spotify takes part of international events such as Spotify House with Cannes Lions, dmexco, and Advertising Week New York. Moreover, it produces campaigns with partners such as BMW. For the launch of the BMW 320i, Spotify created a campaign in which “a branded app on Spotify enabled users to select from one of five iconic American road trips. Based on their selection, a custom playlist is generated featuring songs and artists from regions along the selected route.” (Dave Chaffey,

2015). Finally, Spotify pushes a lot of new content releases regularly and ensures its users are aware of them, using tools such as an online newsletter and weekly emails. Instructional Material. Spotify uses a simple webpage to explain its offerings to consumers. Overall, the service is straightforward, user-friendly, and does not require complex instructions, which is encouraging to new users. However, the list of advantages of Spotify premium listed on the webpage is limited. Corporate Design. As an online-only streaming service, Spotify does not utilize, nor does it need to, common corporate design strategies such as interior decor or equipment. Currently, the Spotify logo, typography, and colors are the only key features of their corporate design. In summary, Spotify has implemented a comprehensive IMC strategy in the past few years, taking advantage of numerous partnerships and a large online presence. However, as the industry is characterized by such fierce competition, it is essential that Spotify further develops its communications strategy and turn its focus from building a large user base toward switching free users to premium accounts....