Digital radio has become an impressively versatile and integral part of media campaigns, with listenership growing exponentially. In fact, when you add up the mobile minutes spent by users on Pandora & Spotify they nearly equal the time spent on ALL of Google’s 49 mobile sites, according to number crunching by RAIN*.
Each of these dynamic platforms combine precision targeting with robust analytics to create a high level of ROAS, with differences in content delivery/user experience determining each service’s demographic “sweet spot”. Broadly speaking, Spotify has gained the loyalty of millennials while Pandora has a near lock on the Baby Boomers of Gen X. So, how do you decide which streaming service best fits your objectives? Let’s dig a bit deeper.
Spotify captures a younger, tech savvy demographic and enables listeners to choose the songs they want to play and when/how they want to play them. Spotify also engages users on social media, another feature younger demographics favor. In addition, Spotify enhances the listener’s experience with curated playlists and discovery tools, introducing the listener to new music to add to their list, and share with others in real time. Pandora users, on the other hand, create virtual radio stations, mimicking the best of traditional terrestrial radio in its heyday. Users can create stations based on specific artists, genres or themes that they already like, and then Pandora’s algorithms suggest additional material that is "musically similar" by way the individual user’s ‘Musical Traits’. Pandora’s main strength lies in its ability to help listeners discover new types of music. The channel refining tools are highly advanced, and the number of station combinations are unlimited, so users are always going to find something they like.
Strategically, knowing your desired demo and then targeting that demo as precisely as possible are the keys to unlocking top ROAS. Digital music has not only arrived, it is here to stay, and can’t be ignored. Spotify and Pandora are the undisputed leaders in this space. The decision to work with one, or the other, or both is where working with an experienced Media Buying Service (for research, analytics, planning and $ leveraging) can help insure the best results.
