Playlisting and the Demographic Destiny of Streaming

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The 20,000 Foot View: With playlists representing streaming’s lingua franca, the dramatic shifts in consumption they are powering are rewriting the rule books on music marketing, music formats and revenue generation, all in one swoop. Though the rate of change is partially offset by the grandfathering of the download format and, in certain cases, the resistance of physical markets (Germany and Japan), the economics of playlist monetisation is a rude awakening for the industry at large. It has also created notable distinctions in audience consumption habits, meaning expectations in revenue must account for target audience and their format preferences.

Key Findings

       of all streams come from playlists        of UK subscribers say that playlists are replacing albums for them, while        say they are using curated playlists more than six months ago
• Playlist growth rates slowed towards the end of 2017: ‘Creating own playlists’ in        was just one percentage point up on        2017 at       
• Beast mode, a work-out playlist, was the fastest growing on Spotify, rising at        YoY in 2017
• Global Top        the second most followed playlist on Spotify grew        in 2017
       of paid streamers are listening to playlists compiled by the streaming platform of their choice compared to just        of free streamers        year olds are most likely to create playlists
• Just        of streaming users aged        plus identify as consuming curated playlists

Companies and brands mentioned in this report: Apple Music, Deezer, Spotify, YouTube