Spotify in NZ

Spotify is an online music listening service that may change the way we consume our music in NZ. The application is simple and easy to use which can be installed on a computer or device with internet access.

What separates out Spotify from products that offer similar services is that it has secured its contract with record companies, making it legal. It has also included a social aspect where it can connect your Facebook/Twitter account to the application. Now you can see which One Direction song that old mate Bobby Bob is listening too or even send Bob a song to listen to.

First launched in Europe in 2006 it has amassed over 10 million users and is soon to hit the Australasian market. For New Zealanders the uptake shouldn’t be an issue, it would be the mobile data plans that would hinder maximum potential.Spotify bridges that gap of pirating music and paying for music closer together, record companies would be insane not to sign up as it’s a another revenue stream.  From a consumers perspective all is not for free as there is opportunity to advertise on this platform and consumers will see the brunt of this. However you can pay per month to get Spotify’s premium product which will allow you to access it on a mobile device and see no advertising.

Spotify launched on the 22^nd of May here in NZ and discovered some handy features:

• Apps
• Friends list
• Playlists
• Radio (to connect artists with similar artists)
• Importing your local content from hard drive onto Spotify

I’ve had a bit of fool around on this and it has somehow become part of my life, goodbye iTunes and illegal file sharing. As everyone has different personalities in our office I thought it would be good to see what music inspires us in our day to day work. I have compiled a playlist of PHDiQ’s pickup tracks - which you can subscribe to “PHDiQ Work Out Songs” to experience our full emotions.

• Anna Woods: “Back on the chain gang” – Pretenders
• Polly Williams: “Dutchies” - Shapeshifter
• Christophe Spencer: “Greatest American Hero theme”
• Graeme Douglas: “I believe I can fly” – R Kelly
• Brendan Hewitt: “Lightning Crashes” – Live
• Mike Harland: “Call me maybe” – Carly Rae Jespen
• Gareth Treacher: “Saved by the bell theme song”
• Jane Crabbe: “Welcome to the jungle” – Guns & Roses
• Ivan Atkins: “Unchained Melody” – The Righteous Brothers
• Shay Young: ”What makes you beautiful” – One Direction
• Stephanie Sokolich: “Love Story” – Taylor Swift
• Phillip Sue: “Juicy” – Biggie Smalls
• Nikki Rogers: “9 to 5” – Dolly Parton
• Craig Whitaker “Getting No Where” – Magnetic Man
• Isreal Hartley: “Eye of the Tiger” – Survivor
• Keila Bituin:”Raining Blood” – Slayer
• Nick Sadler: ”Lovefool” – The Cardigans

The Decade of Mobile

At least once every year for the last three years I’ve heard someone at a digital conference proclaim that “this will be the year of mobile”.  Their tone has always hinted that this will be an event in media planning that none of us will be able to ignore, akin to the moon landing or Sir Ed knocking the bastard off.  But then it’s never seemed to happen.  Instead it’s been more like Kanye West - a steady accumulation of content, audience and commercial opportunities. 

Nevertheless, and arguably unlike Kanye, there is no doubt that it has slowly but surely become an increasingly important media space for planners and clients to consider.  The challenge that remains is that there isn’t a great deal of market data around of the NZ market.  Sorry Roy Morgan, I usually love your data, but it seems hopelessly out of step for mobile when the answer to ‘how many people say they need a mobile phone to access the internet?’ is 7%. 

But last week InMobi, in partnership with Decision Fuel rode into town with a piece of research that delivered some quite interesting insights (albeit from a sample size of 500 users… coincidently, about the same sample that dictate TV ratings). 

So, a few numbers that no one has delivered before;

• Of 6.2hrs media consumption, 114mins are via a mobile
• 53% of market are using their phone while watching TV
• 65% using phone while lying in bed
• 23% using to access social Media
• 21% using to access entertainment
• 7% are using to shop

This OurMobilePlanet tool has also recently come to my attention (thanks Mitch Campbell and nzh).  About as accurate as any other tool on NZ market about penetration (ie, take with grain of salt), but least it’s fun to play with.

Wake Up - Its 2012

The team at Blackberry Australia have learned a very valuable lesson this week. Their Wake Up Australia  teaser campaign generated such a high level of interest and intrigue that they had to out themselves over a week before their big reveal – which is still set for 7 May (countdown clock still ticking down).

It seems they planned three week teaser campaign. Three weeks! That’s, like, a lifetime in the digital world. According to my five minutes on Google - in three weeks:

-          14.7 million people join Facebook

-          1.8 million hours of video are uploaded to YouTube

-          2 billion hours of video are watched on YouTube

-          3.7 billion tweets are tweeted

-          151 million photos are uploaded to Flickr

-          1.7 billion photos are uploaded to Facebook

In the age of social networking news travels fast. Very fast. And we would all do well to remember this when planning campaigns and activations even if they aren’t strictly digital.

Five things I learned at Ad Tech Sydney

This year I thought AdTech Sydney was good. Not brilliant. Just good. Good because the things I heard there confirmed my thinking – something which is important when you are working in a small and isolated market like New Zealand. And good because organisations seem to have gotten over themselves and are happy to share what they are up to in the social space – the good, the bad and the downright ugly.

So here goes - the five key learnings I took from Ad Tech were:

1.       Brand stories need to be cohesive even when fragmented:  according to Jeff Julian from www.monkeysac.com your consumers won’t see your campaign in its entirety, or – for that matter – as a story at all. They’ll dip in and out piecing the story together based on their own media touchpoints and social connections and most likely in a different order from that intended by the creative or media agency.

Making sure you have the right creative assets for each channel is critical. It never was acceptable to treat your TVC as a piece of video content, or cut up your magazine ads to create an online banner, but in today’s social environment it’s unforgiveable.  

Ensuring each channel stays true to the creative vision will enable your message to be received when consumed in a fragmented way. And if you do need channel selection take priority over creative vision ensure you understand why this decision is being made.

2.       When it comes to Social Media, timing is everything: Andreas Panayi of FTI Consulting (www.fticonsulting.com) presented a study of how 144 businesses operate in the social space. While 83% of businesses had social policy in place only 56% had a plan in place to manage issues breaking or escalating in the social space.

Scary – especially given 38% of social media crisis arise due to poor brand experiences, influencer relations, community censorship or just a plain and simple failure to respond – things that are completely within the brands control.

If you are managing a social presence, then ensure you have license to respond quickly. With 38% of crisis breaking on either Twitter or Facebook – even the slightest delay can be the difference between resolution and escalation. Which brings me to the next thing I learned…   

3.       The jury is still out on who manages social media: the answer to this is “it depends”. Speaker Ben Kimber (@benkimber) felt strongly that all social media activity should be managed in house – particularly if there was customer service involved. Yeah – like that’s never been outsourced before.

To me the more decisive factor is resource. If you need to be in the social space but can’t resource this internally, then outsource you must.

And what about brands that are more about experience than customer service? Coke, Lynx, Skittles to name just a few. I don’t know for sure, but I’d be willing to bet that their agencies are pretty heavily involved in their social presence.

4.       Socially enable everything: put as much focus on creating discoverable content as you do on finding ways to deliver content. How the content is found and consumed is what gives it power. Information sent – and so endorsed – by a friend, or discovered yourself through search, will always have more credibility than something you see in an ad – even if it is the same content.

Rob Norman (@robnorman) of http://www.groupm.com/ also made the point that the conversion rates from reach to engagement are so low that it’s absolutely critical for brands to work harder at turning engagement into advocacy.

5.       Life’s a game, play it: Create a game with a sense of purpose and before you know it you’ll have your customers doing exactly what you want them to do – and enjoying the experience to boot. They don’t have to be ‘gamers’ to take part - a good game can appeal to even the most conservative audience. An example of this is www.mint.com – gamifying your finances – or “Epic Win” (http://www.rexbox.co.uk/epicwin/) which turns your everyday to do list into a game.

According to @chriserb from www.easports.com, get it right and the rewards for your business are significant – increased engagement and loyalty and a lower propensity to shop around.

Looking through my notes, this list could have been so much longer – so stay tuned for more from AdTech over the coming weeks.