Spotify Advertising for Small and Medium Sized Businesses

What’s new with Spotify advertising in 2020? Spotify currently has around 102 million U.S. listeners, 57 million of whom are non-paying, ad-supported, users. In recent years Spotify has made advertising more accessible for local businesses. If that’s not enough to pique your interest, then read on!

Spotify is the most popular music streaming service in the U.S., and it has a bright future as its MAUs (monthly active users) continue to grow year over year. Spotify overtook Pandora in total listenership in 2019. While Spotify continues to grow, Pandora maintains a large listenership but is losing market share: Pandora lost 8.1% of listeners last year, a trend that is expected to continue through 2024. Nonetheless, Spotify and Pandora continue to dominate the streaming space and are both extremely exciting options to extend the reach of your messaging.

Spotify offers two ways to advertise on its platform: audio ads and video ads. Audio ads interrupt a free listening session periodically and are non-skippable. Video ads are opt-in only: each time Spotify users choose to watch a “video takeover” ad they receive 30-minutes of uninterrupted, ad-free, listening. Both ad types are delivered with a companion banner, another opportunity to showcase your brand.

When it comes to budget, Spotify advertising is more flexible than its biggest competitor, Pandora. Media spend minimums are 20x less, which lowers the barrier to entry for many clients eager to see how this platform can contribute to their marketing strategy. This is a big pivot for Spotify, which had previously only accepted ad campaigns with 6-figure budgets. Today, national and local advertisers trade commercials on the same industry-leading platform.

So say you’re not currently advertising on any streaming platform. Why should you? Similar to other digital advertising options, Spotify boasts targeting parameters that help you narrow in on your most important customers. You can choose to target Spotify users based on their interests, music taste (genre), or activity (what they’re doing in a specific moment related to the song or podcast they’re listening to, like cooking, for example). This enables you to reach a very specific audience based on the product or service you’re selling.

If you think Spotify is right for you, or you simply want to hear more about the options available to you, get in touch with us!