Jay Z has relaunched subscription streaming service Tidal by launching a celebrity-bolstered assault on social to celebrate.
To earmark the relaunch, the rapper and a bunch of his celebrity buddies have started a Tidal wave, with the likes of Beyonce, Nicki Minaj, Rihanna and Madonna changing their social media avatars to the distinctive teal blue of Tidal's logo and tweeting the hashtag #TIDALforALL.
The Swedish-based service was acquired by Jay Z this year, after he bought its parent company Aspiro for a reported US$56 million.
Its point of difference? The service seems to be banking on quality: lossless music streaming, HD video, “curated editorial” written by experts – and all of it ad-free. Instead of advertising or offering a listen for free service, Tidal operates on two pricing tiers: its flagship service at US$19.99 a month offering CD-quality songs, and a standard quality offering at US$9.99 per month.
In addition, the streaming service aims to tap into momentum against the allegedly low pay rates for artists on other platforms, which recently led to Taylor Swift removing her music from Spotify.
While the service is already available in Australia, Pandora CEO Jane Huxley told AdNews the use of social to boost the profile of the service will go a long way, but that the local streaming market is a competitive space.
“There is no question that many major artists colouring their social profiles teal will have an impact o the fans of those particular performers,” Huxley said. “But time will tell.”
Huxley said that the music streaming landscape is characterised by three types of behaviours: aggregator services which draw in people looking for podcast, the on-demand category aimed at music lovers and streaming radio, which is where her business Pandora, fits.
Huxley said that the on-demand pool in Australia is an extremely crowded space, with roughly 14 players in the market aimed at around 20% of the population who “identify themselves as a music lover first and foremost”.
“It is a small pool of people but it is a lucrative pool of people because these are people who will pay,” Huxley said. “My view is it will be those with the loudest voice who will win, so people who are able to successfully market the differentiation of their service will be the ones who emerge.”
“With the backing of Jay Z and the likes of Beyonce and those other players behind it, it will get a very loud voice, but whether or not it can scale is the key factor. It will be interesting to watch.”
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