Last week, Spotify gave its 640 million or so users a detailed breakdown of their listening habits for the year with its 2024 Wrapped campaign.
But Spotify doesn’t just document people’s aural preferences, it shapes them, too. Its focus on playlists, for example, has changed how people listen to music, and these compilations have long since become a vital route to market for new songs and artists. Little wonder, then, that that brands from every sector, from fashion to FMCG, are also flocking to the platform to earn time in customers’ ears with playlists of their own. Starbucks was one of the first brands to partner with Spotify after it stopped selling compilation CDs of its in-store playlists in 2015. As part of the partnership, Spotify made Starbucks’ playlists available to its users and even allowed those who upgraded to a Premium subscription to earn points towards Starbucks’ rewards programme. Today, Starbucks has over 700,000 followers on Spotify and continues to curate playlists for its customers. And brands from various industries have followed the coffee chain’s lead, launching their own profiles and playlists on the platform to engage customers.
Here’s how.
Like Starbucks, H&M has also made its in-store playlists available on Spotify. According to a spokesperson for the fashion retailer, The Sound of H&M playlist aims ‘to capture the essence of H&M’s brand’ and create a ‘fresh and culturally relevant musical experience that enhances the overall brand connection.’
Gucci meanwhile has over 40 playlists on Spotify, including The Sound of Gucci which, according to the playlist description, was curated by DJ and producer Mark Ronson, to complement the feeling of the fashion house’s latest collection.
But while it is easy for brands that already incorporate music into their customer experiences to create playlists, what about brands that have no association with music? How can brands that produce pasta, chewing gum, pet food, mattresses, and other products use Spotify to connect with customers?
Complementing products
In 2021 the world’s largest pasta producer, Barilla, released a series of Spotify playlists that ranged from nine to 19 minutes in length, to serve as timers for cooking different types of pasta. Now, it has over 480,000 followers on the platform. ‘Barilla and Spotify partnered to create eight playlists designed to help people cook their pasta perfectly al dente,’ a spokesperson for Barilla told MediaCat. ‘Each playlist is designed to match the cook time for each pasta and once the playlist is done, the pasta is cooked. The playlist options include different genres of music all covered by Italian artists.
The playlists can be found on Spotify’s profile and include Mixtape Spaghetti, Boom Bap Fusilli, Pleasant Melancholy Penne, Moody Day Linguine, Simply Classics Linguine and more.’
Another brand using Spotify to complement its offering is Nike, with over 1.2 million users following its Nike Run Club profile. Runners can listen to the sportswear brand’s popular Nike Run Club playlist or tune into one of its ‘Run With’ playlists, curated by athletes such as Dalilah Muhammed, Junaya Future Khan, Bretman Rock, and others. The playlists complement the Nike Run Club app, which seeks to equip runners with ‘everything [they] need to start running, keep running and enjoy running more.’
Building on foundations in 2024
In 2019, KFC France went viral for its Bucket Bangers playlist, which compiled over 40 hip-hop songs that mention the fast food chain. In May, Budweiser Brazil built on this idea with its ‘UninterruptAds’, turning songs that feature ‘Budweiser’ in the lyrics into targeted ads on Spotify. The advertised songs were programmed to feature on playlists based on genre, making the ads feel organic instead of disruptive.
This year, we have also seen brands go beyond curating to creating music. On World Sleep Day (15 March), Emma — The Sleep Company launched its first music album, Scores of Sleep, and held a ‘sleep concert’ where audience members listened to a live performance of acoustic tracks from the comfort of Emma beds. The company claims that 59% of attendees fell asleep, and the Scores of Sleep album is now available to stream on Spotify, complementing Emma’s products and adding value to customers.
Also this year, Mars Wrigley’s Extra released Chewns with BBC Radio 1Xtra host Joelah Noble, leaning into the popularity of ASMR content and creating songs from the sounds of chewing gum. The brand also announced a giveaway of Chewns vinyl records on Instagram.
‘Our research shows that music and chewing gum are top ‘me-moment’ activities, so it made perfect sense to create an album that fuses both together and sparks interesting conversation,’ Lucy Sherlock, senior brand manager at Extra told us.
Another example of a brand experimenting with music is Mars’ Pedigree, which presented dogs with various objects (eg, tennis ball, broccoli toy, toothbrush, etc) and then asked orchestra musicians to play along to the animals’ wagging tails as if they were a conductor’s baton.
The brand then recorded the outcome, created a Pedigree Tail Orchestra profile on Spotify and uploaded the symphonies. Pedigree promised to donate money to the Pedigree Foundation for each stream of the Tail Orchestra album. At the time of writing, some tracks have been streamed over 190,000 times.
Pedigree also collaborated with Spotify in 2023 to launch its ‘Adoptable Playlists’. As part of this collaboration, the platform featured real dogs on the cover of playlists in its ‘Feel Good’ category of music, presenting users with adoption opportunities. Spotify and Pedigree also included information on how to adopt the dogs via targeted audio ads and playlist descriptions.
Reshaping how brands and music interact
In February, Spotify announced the launch of a consultancy, AUX, to help brands understand how to use music and to reach new audiences through artist collaborations. Coca-Cola was AUX’s first partner, and it facilitated a partnership between the beverage company and South Korean DJ and singer Peggy Gou for the Coke Studio campaign. The partnership spanned live events, social media content, a branded playlist, and even a video game (Peggy Gou’s Race to Puglia).
‘Sound surrounds us, and brands must think about music as a core pillar of their marketing strategy […] AUX isn’t just about placing brands alongside music; it’s about reshaping the way brands and music interact,’ Jean-François Pathy, global head of Spotify AUX told For the Record, it’s in-house publication.
Featured image: Pedigree Tail Orchestra / YouTube
