Tag: Stream On

Spotify Expands International Footprint, Bringing Audio to 80+ New Markets

February 22, 2021

As part of our ongoing commitment to building a truly borderless audio ecosystem— connecting creators, listeners, and content—Spotify is embarking on a sweeping expansion that will introduce the world’s most popular audio streaming subscription service available to more than a billion people in 80+ new markets around the world, and add 36 languages to our platform. These moves represent Spotify’s broadest market expansion to date. 

As we shared during today’s Stream On event, this expansion will help ensure that sounds and stories that once remained local can reach a global audience.

Our dedication to international artists and listeners is unwavering. Working closely with local creators and partners, we’ll deliver a Spotify experience that meets the unique needs of each market, with scaled language translations and specialized payment formats. These 80+ markets represent more than 1 billion people—potential Spotify listeners who have yet to tap into the power of our platform.

The existing rich music cultures in each of these markets will now be able to reach Spotify’s global audience. All this untapped music energy and access to our innovative creator tools will help propel artists to new heights and empower them to turn their passion into a profession.

Plus, giving our artists a global platform goes hand in hand with offering an unmatched catalog for our listeners. So as we enter new markets, we’ll accelerate the discovery of more genres like K-Pop, reggaeton, and amapiano that have earned a place in the global music arena. 

By reaching even more countries across Asia, Africa, the Caribbean, Europe, and Latin America, we’re giving millions of new creators the opportunity to create, discover, and build a career in audio creation—and giving a billion new fans the opportunity to hear it. Learn more about where we’re heading first in the infographic below.

In each new market, we will work with local creators and partners to expand our music offerings and deliver a Spotify experience that meets the unique needs of each market. Over time, the company aims to introduce the following offerings in each region:

  • Plans: Free and Premium plans will be available across all the markets. In select markets, Spotify will offer Individual, Family, Duo, and Student Plan options.*
  • User Experience: Listeners will be able to select and search from Spotify’s worldwide catalog when using the product, providing a personalized experience from day one. The home screen will surface personalized playlist programming for new listeners. The browse and search pages will feature worldwide content hubs, and adapt to the local market and the listener’s taste the more they use the service.
  • Music Catalog: At launch, Spotify will offer its full global catalog in these new markets. The company will continuously work with local rights holders and partners to expand its catalog to include more local offerings.
  • Podcasts: In the majority of these markets, Spotify will launch with its full podcast catalog.* For the others, it will work closely with local partners to introduce more podcasts from its catalog, as well as Spotify’s proprietary creator platform, Anchor.
  • Platforms: Upon launch, the Spotify experience will be available on Mobile and Desktop Web Player.* Similar to other features, the company will work with partners to introduce Spotify on more platforms, including TV, Speakers, Wearables, and Car in the coming months.

New Markets 

Angola, Antigua and Barbuda, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Bahamas, Bangladesh, Barbados, Belize, Benin, Bhutan, Botswana, Brunei Darussalam, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cabo Verde, Cambodia, Cameroon, Chad, Comoros, Côte d’Ivoire, Curaçao, Djibouti, Dominica, Equatorial Guinea, Eswatini, Fiji, Gabon, Gambia, Georgia, Ghana, Grenada, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Guyana, Haiti, Jamaica, Kenya, Kiribati, Kyrgyzstan, Lao People’s Democratic Republic, Lesotho, Liberia, Macau, Madagascar, Malawi, Maldives, Mali, Marshall Islands, Mauritania, Mauritius, Micronesia, Mongolia, Mozambique, Namibia, Nauru, Nepal, Niger, Nigeria, Pakistan, Palau, Papua New Guinea, Rwanda, Samoa, San Marino, Sao Tome and Principe, Senegal, Seychelles, Sierra Leone, Solomon Islands, Sri Lanka, St. Kitts and Nevis, St. Lucia, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Suriname, Tanzania, Timor-Leste, Togo, Tonga, Trinidad and Tobago, Tuvalu, Uganda, Uzbekistan, Vanuatu, Zambia, and Zimbabwe.

*Some exceptions may apply. See local guidelines for offerings in your region.

Five Things to Know About Spotify HiFi

February 22, 2021

Artists and fans have told us that sound quality is important to them. We agree, and that’s why today at Stream On we announced Spotify HiFi. 

Beginning later this year, Premium subscribers in select markets will be able to upgrade their sound quality to Spotify HiFi and listen to their favorite songs the way artists intended. 

Read on for five things you need to know about our new high-quality music experience:

  1. High-quality music streaming is consistently one of the most requested new features by our users.
  2. Spotify HiFi will deliver music in CD-quality, lossless audio format to your device and Spotify Connect-enabled speakers, which means fans will be able to experience more depth and clarity while enjoying their favorite tracks.
  3. Ubiquity is at the core of everything we do at Spotify, and we’re working with some of the world’s biggest speaker manufacturers to make Spotify HiFi accessible to as many fans as possible through Spotify Connect. 
  4. HiFi will be coupled with Spotify’s seamless user experience, building on our commitment to make sure users can listen to the music they love in the way they want to enjoy it. 
  5. Spotify HiFi will begin rolling out in select markets later this year, and we will have more details to share soon.  

President Barack Obama and Bruce Springsteen Join Forces in the New Podcast ‘Renegades: Born in the USA’

February 22, 2021

President Barack Obama and Bruce Springsteen first met back in 2008. Though the two have very different backgrounds and careers, they formed a deep friendship. Starting today, listeners can eavesdrop on their personal, intimate conversations in a new podcast: Renegades: Born in the USA.

The eight-episode series was announced today during Spotify’s Stream On event and is the second podcast to launch through Spotify’s partnership with President Obama and Michelle Obama’s Higher Ground. Over the course of the season, President Obama and Springsteen will explore topics of race, fatherhood, marriage, and the future of America.

Dollar Shave Club and Comcast will serve as the first season’s presenting sponsors in the United States.

The longtime friends discuss their hometowns and role models, explore modern manhood, and confront the painfully divided state of the country today—and offer a vision of how we can all move forward together. 

President Barack Obama asks in the introduction of the first episode of the podcast: “How did we get here? How could we find our way back to a more unifying American story?”

He then goes on to explain: “That topic came to dominate so many of my conversations last year—with Michelle, with my daughters and with friends. And one of the friends just happened to be Mr. Bruce Springsteen. On the surface, Bruce and I don’t have a lot in common. But over the years, what we’ve found is that we’ve got a shared sensibility. About work, about family and about America. In our own ways, Bruce and I have been on parallel journeys trying to understand this country that’s given us both so much. Trying to chronicle the stories of its people. Looking for a way to connect our own individual searches for meaning and truth and community with the larger story of America.”

The first two episodes are available exclusively to the hundreds of millions of Free and Premium Spotify users around the world now. Give them a listen:

 

 

 

Audio Brings New Dimension to the DC Comics Universe

February 22, 2021

In 2020, Spotify announced a multiyear agreement with Warner Bros. and DC for a slate of narrative-scripted podcasts that explore the stories of your favorite superheroes and supervillains. The first project, Batman Unburied, will be released later this year. The new original series is being executive produced by David S. Goyer (The Dark Knight Rises).

Today at Spotify’s Stream On event, Goyer joined Jim Lee, the Chief Creative Officer of DC, to give the world a look into how audio will bring a new dimension to DC’s universe of characters and stories. The duo discussed the prospect of the new Batman series alongside teasing other characters whose stories will be explored via audio, like Superman, Lois Lane, Wonder Woman, Joker, Catwoman, Katana, The Riddler, Batgirl, and Harley Quinn.

A New Era for Podcast Advertising

February 22, 2021

Over the last year, Spotify has made significant moves to modernize audio advertising. From the launch of Streaming Ad Insertion to the expansion of our self-serve ad platform, Ad Studio, to the acquisition of Megaphone, we’re committed to ensuring this industry reaches its full potential.

Today, we announced an exciting leap forward for audio advertising, creating a path for creators to earn more for their work while delivering greater impact for advertisers.

We believe that this space is primed for innovation as digital audio becomes an integral part of consumers’ daily routines worldwide. According to eMarketer, in the U.S., mobile time spent listening to audio content is now outpacing time spent on social media, video, and gaming.

It’s no secret that podcasts have played a pivotal role in the rise in audio consumption. Their intimate nature makes them an ideal medium for advertisers looking to connect with engaged listeners who are ready to learn, discover, or be entertained. Read on to learn about how we’re powering the next era of innovation for the entire audio advertising ecosystem.

Introducing the Spotify Audience Network

The Spotify Audience Network is a first-of-its-kind audio advertising marketplace in which advertisers of all sizes will be able to connect with listeners consuming a broad range of content. These include Spotify’s Originals & Exclusives, podcasts via Megaphone and Anchor, and ad-supported music. We’ll leverage our medium-defining technology to give advertisers the ability to reach our audience of hundreds of millions of listeners—at scale—both on and off Spotify. We are in the early stages of developing this offering and look forward to sharing more in the coming months.

 

Unlocking new features on Streaming Ad Insertion 

At the top of 2020, we unveiled Streaming Ad Insertion (SAI), which delivers the intimacy and quality of traditional podcast advertising with the precision and transparency of modern-day digital marketing. SAI introduced an entirely new set of data-driven insights to podcast advertising, including a full digital suite of planning, reporting, and measurement solutions. SAI is available in the U.S., Canada, Germany, and the UK, and we plan to launch in additional markets later this year. 

Over the past year, we have been refining SAI with our Originals & Exclusive content and now are ready to scale our innovation. We’re unlocking more product features, like audience-based buying, native ad placements, and reporting on creative performance, all of which play a key part in powering the Spotify Audience Network. Later this year, we’ll start to make this technology available to Megaphone podcast publishers and leading Anchor creators.

Simplifying podcast advertising with Spotify Ad Studio

The best way for advertisers to get started with Spotify Advertising is through our self-serve platform Spotify Ad Studio. Spotify Ad Studio makes streaming audio advertising accessible to advertisers of all sizes, from Fortune 500 brands to artist teams to local coffee shops. Through Spotify Ad Studio, advertisers have the power to reach our audience of hundreds of millions of listeners and leverage our streaming intelligence to ensure their message is heard by the right listeners, at the right moment.

Today, we’ll begin beta testing podcast ad buying on Spotify Ad Studio in the U.S. The introduction of podcasts to Spotify Ad Studio makes it simple for any advertiser to connect with engaged listeners at scale, whether they’re streaming their favorite podcast or discovering a new playlist.

These advancements—the Spotify Audience Network, Streaming Ad Insertion, and podcast buying via Spotify Ad Studio—will benefit creators, advertisers and listeners for years to come. We spoke to HBO Max’s Vice President of Growth Marketing, Katie Soo, to get her thoughts about how the streaming platform is leveraging Spotify as part of its marketing mix. 

“During the launch of HBO Max, our strategy was to expand our reach and align with digital audio to find entertainment seekers. We turned to Spotify, given its audio-first strategy, scale and cutting-edge technology, to address both of these key pillars,” noted Soo. “Our early campaigns have been successful, and we plan to continue partnering with Spotify to explore what’s possible in this growing medium.”

To learn more about these paradigm-shifting innovations, head over to Ads.Spotify.com.

‘Tell Them, I Am’ Higher Ground Podcast Brings Muslim Voices to the Forefront

February 22, 2021

Today, we announced Tell Them, I Am, the newest podcast in partnership with Higher Ground and Spotify.

The new season of the series, revealed at our Stream On event, is a compelling collection of narratives from Muslim voices—featuring activists, artists, actors, performers, and athletes. In each episode, listeners can tune in to hear thought-provoking stories that reflect the best of human nature. 

The podcast is hosted by Misha Euceph, a first-generation Pakistani American on a mission to make shows that inspire awe and push audio into uncharted territory. The new season is coming exclusively to Spotify and will launch the first day of Ramadan. Until then, check out some of the episodes from the first season below.

Spotify’s Anchor Innovations Are Bringing the Future of Audio to the Present

February 22, 2021

Over the past few years, our team at Spotify has unveiled several listening experiences that take you beyond the standard formats of playlists and podcasts. Your Daily Drive and The Get Up, for example, incorporate both music and the spoken word in dynamic settings, tailored to your day. But to truly unlock an ecosystem of new ways of listening, we knew we needed to enable the creation of new audio formats. So when we began testing Music+Talk shows last fall, we rolled out the listening experience alongside the ability to create this content—giving everyone the ability to curate music tracks directly into their storytelling. 

Platforms like Anchor and Spotify for Podcasters have enabled access to easier creation of podcasts. (In fact, Anchor accounted for 80% of the new shows on Spotify in 2020—that’s more than 1 million new shows.) And to truly build the future of audio, we want to give everyone the ability to take their creativity further, even beyond the existing concept of a podcast: to make audio experiences that have never before been possible. We think of these possibilities as the “future formats” of audio—and we believe that the best way to build an ecosystem of audio content is to enable its creation, by everyone. 

We began this journey with the rollout of Music+Talk shows and their corresponding creation tools in Anchor. But that was only the beginning. Today at Stream On, we shared several new and upcoming capabilities to enable the creation of future formats of audio. Read on to learn more.

Let your written words travel further with the Anchor + WordPress partnership

Today, we announced a new partnership between Anchor and WordPress to power opportunities for content creators to evolve their work and reach new audiences through the power of audio. With this new tool, available now, bloggers can publish their written content as a podcast with just a few clicks—and podcasters can create a website for their podcast just as easily. This offers a whole new group of creators—those who have historically focused on the written word—to access an entirely new audience via audio and share their voices on Spotify. Check out Anchor’s and WordPress’s blogs to learn more.

Cultivate direct connections with listeners via new interactivity features

Historically, podcasting has been a one-way street—from creator to listeners—with little opportunity for direct feedback. But with Spotify and Anchor, the creation and listening technology is brought together in the same ecosystem, allowing for a back-and-forth. This has enabled us to build interactivity features like Polls and Q&A, which we’ve been testing in partnership with a small beta group of creators. We will be widening that group to more users in the coming months, and creators can sign up here to express interest in participating in future tests of interactivity features.

Combine audio and visual storytelling with video podcasts

In the coming months, we’ll begin testing the ability for creators to add video to their podcasts when they publish via Anchor—meaning these creators will have the power to complement their audio with visual. We first began testing video podcasts on Spotify in July of last year and have since been iterating on the offering. Later this year, more creators can expect to access this feature as we expand the test via tooling that will live in Anchor.

New models for monetizing your work on Spotify

Going forward, we’ll also begin testing a capability for podcasters to explore new revenue streams through paid subscriptions supported by their listeners. Recently, some podcasters have started earning revenue by offering bonus content exclusively for paid subscribers—and soon they’ll be able to do the same on Spotify, where their content can easily be discovered by fans around the world. Creators can sign up here to learn more and express interest in this feature.

We’re excited about what’s to come, and to see creators take advantage of these new tools as they’re released over the coming months. Ready to experiment with your own future format now? Try out Music+Talk, a show format that allows creators to incorporate songs from Spotify’s music catalog directly into their storytelling. Find novel Music+Talk shows—including Maggie Rogers’ Notes from the Archive, Maluma’s Una Semana en Jamaica, and Hulu’s The Ultimate Playlist of Noise—in the Music + Talk hub on Spotify, and make your own show on Anchor.

Spotify Unveils New Ava DuVernay Podcast Dedicated to Social Change

February 22, 2021

Earlier this year, we shared news of a multiyear partnership between Spotify and award-winning filmmaker Ava DuVernay, who is known for powerful movies and television like Selma and Queen Sugar. Spotify and DuVernay will produce exclusive scripted and unscripted original audio programming through ARRAY, DuVernay’s multi-platform arts and social impact collective dedicated to narrative change. ARRAY will partner with Spotify’s Gimlet studio on a number of scripted and unscripted narrative podcasts.

Today at our Stream On event, we shared more details on the first project—an unscripted podcast—that will be launching through the collaboration.

Photo credit: ARRAY

This unscripted podcast is based on ARRAY’S Law Enforcement Accountability Project, launched after the murder of George Floyd by on-duty police officers. The podcast is an investigative series that chronicles officers who commit murder, revealing the alarming truth about the blue wall of silence that protects police after they pull the trigger. The series explores a new case each week, zeroing in on the lack of repercussions and accountability despite fatal wrongdoing. 

Creators and Storytellers Shine Bright at Spotify Stream On

February 22, 2021

At Stream On, Spotify founder and CEO Daniel Ek was joined by artists, podcasters, and other notable storytellers. We’d like to thank these guests—from all over the world, both established and emerging—for participating in our virtual event earlier today. 

Visit here for more on our commitment to empowering creators—the new, the rising, and the icons—around the world using our unparalleled data, insights, and powerful platform.

Spotify is Proud to Partner with Iconic Creators the Russo Brothers and AGBO

February 22, 2021

Today at our Stream On event, Spotify announced a new partnership with AGBO, Anthony and Joe Russo’s entertainment company. The Russo brothers are the iconic creators behind films like Captain America: Civil War; Avengers: Infinity War; and Avengers: End Game.

Through this multi-year, multi-series deal, AGBO will bring some of its most exciting storytelling universes to Spotify.

The Russo brothers are known for genre-based sagas that connect fans of all ages on a global basis—especially those who love embracing expansive, inter-connected narratives. This partnership is an ideal fit as Spotify embarks on a journey to tell more stories that have the power to span generations and territories.

Stay tuned for more updates as Spotify, the Russo brothers, and AGBO work together to open up a new universe for Spotify listeners.

Spotify Stream On Explores Power of Audio Creation

February 22, 2021

For Spotify, audio is our past, present—and future. Our mission when we set out in 2008 remains the same today: to connect creators with fans and empower creators to live off of their art. 

We’re hosting Stream On to explore the power of audio, the journey of creation, and the opportunities ahead for millions of creators and billions of fans around the world. A number of speakers—from global artists to Spotifiers to world-renowned storytellers—are joining Spotify founder and CEO Daniel Ek for our virtual event beginning today at 11 a.m. EST.

Visit Spotify.com/StreamOn for the livestream and additional information.