Orange UK has launched a new free music streaming service aimed squarely at 16-24 year-olds today in a bid to capture a youth market hungry for free music. The new service – entitled ‘Monkey’ – is a JV between Universal Music Group, Orange UK, and Channel 4 and is the first free music package positioned entirely towards pay-as-you-go customers. The new deal will serve up thousands of songs from Universal artists, plus free competitions, news, gossip, exclusive access to artist content as well as providing the ability to share playlists via social networks. All of this will be free if users simply top up their phones with £10 credit.
“The free music element of the package fulfils an untapped market that is looking for a low-cost, easy access music service,” states Orange. “Unlike some music services, which are either restricted to high-end more expensive handsets or have download costs, Monkey is for everyone,” echoes Tom Alexander, CEO of Orange. Mark Mulligan of Forrester Research however takes slight issue with this highlighting how the 600 minutes a month restriction on Orange’s new pay-as-you-go music service positions it as slightly less than free in reality. He argues that customers regularly paying £30 a month in phone credit are actually paying the equivalent of £2.14 per album.
So where do other brands fit in this new musical picture? Well, the service is also expected to tie-in with Oranges recently announced partnership with Blyk, the mobile marketing company, with Orange suggesting that Monkey will include “great offers from relevant brands”. It’s plain to see the youth market wants free music, but do they want this to come with brands on board? The answer seems to be yes for a large percentage of the market. A recent KPMG Consumers and Convergence survey suggested that 40% of UK consumers are happy to watch mobile ads in exchange for free music. A figure backed up by an annual research survey from 3ple-Media, which stated that 41% of mobile subscribers are ‘quite likely’ to forward mobile ads in exchange for free access to music tracks. (Notably in these cash-strapped times this is up from 30% in last year’s survey)
What particularly interesting about the Blyk tie up is that Orange will serve advertising based on users preferences. How this works in practice in terms of what brands a Lady Gaga fan gets over a Razorlight fan is at present not entirely clear. However, the fact that music consumers want personalised advertising is. Around 48% of 18-45 year olds say they pay more attention if an online ad is relevant to them according to Lightspeed Research. One can assume this translates equally favourably across to mobile as well.
So can brands reach music consumers via mobile? Undoubtedly. Can they get the relevant cut through? Arguably yes if the ad content is personalised to user preferences. The main factor here is that advertisers need to see mobile as another touch point in a wider music related strategy. Around 51% of consumers say ads are highly effective if they “give me new information” according to a new Harris Poll. A non-related ad is going to get passed over, but one that drives the user into a deeper musical experience elsewhere is going to have the highest engagement factor. Mobile ads in this respect act as bookmarks to a deeper rooted music association in the minds of music consumers. Not so much music-on-the-go, more a music experience you can go to.
Read more »
