Integration is the watchword and in the crowded music streaming space, differentiation could be key. Songl is hoping its partnership with Nine and its involvement with Big Brother will go a long way to helping it stand out.
If you've been watching Big Brother this week, and at least 1.3 million metro viewers have, you might have seen Songl as one of the major sponsors of this year's series. Beyond the brand ad spots during the commercial breaks, the Big Brother contestants have also put together individual playlists of their favourite tunes on Songl.
But there is much more to come. “We have a hell of a lot more integration, massive amounts of in-show integration, coming up in the next 12 weeks,” said Mark Shaw, chief executive of Digital Music Australia, the overarching company which runs Songl. Shaw won't disclose what that in-show integration is, preferring to keep it a mystery for the moment, but he promised it will be big and it will go across Channel Nine and Ninemsn.
So far, Songl has seen colossal spikes in traffic to its platform during the Big Brother commercial breaks and Shaw said he's really happy with week one.
The Big Brother integration is the first major piece of the long-term Songl and Nine Entertainment Co commercial partnership, which Shaw described as working collectively in the market around the music offering, building content, integrating and generally collaborating across all the Nine properties. He wouldn't elaborate on what the partnership entailed except that it provided commercial benefits to Nine. It's been reported the deal is a revenue-sharing agreement.
Nine inked the deal with Songl, a joint venture between Sony Music, Universal Music and Southern Cross Austereo, in late June, about three months after the music streaming service launched.
It has no shortage of competitors in a category Shaw said has less than 10% awareness among the general Australian public – Spotify, Rdio, JB Hifi Now, Pandora, Mog and Deezer to name a few. Which is why he believes it's important that Songl has a different model.
“We have a differentiation is terms of strategy of creating a strong music brand,” Shaw added. “Our approach is a mass market one and targeting that audience in integrated ways to connect with the consumer to trial, subscribe and endorse Songl.”
He said the company was ahead of its targets – its metrics are driven by registration and subscriptions – in the few months has been up and running but Shaw declined to give figures.
He stressed integration, not just with Nine but also with co-owners Southern Cross Austereo, Sony Music and Universal Music has made all the difference. “The all-encompassing approach, and there are many companies involved, has driven a lot of activity," said Shaw.
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