‘Social’ Becomes Key Battleground for Streaming Music Providers
Overall satisfaction with paid streaming music service is highest among fully engaged customers — listeners who consume others’ content and who say they “always” or “sometimes” share their own playlists — according to the J.D. Power 2016 Streaming Music Satisfaction Study, released today.
The inaugural study measures overall satisfaction among customers who have used a subscription-based streaming music service within the past six months.
Customer satisfaction is examined across six key measures (listed in order of importance): performance and reliability; ease of use; cost of service; content; communication; and customer service. Scores for each measure are reflected in an index based on a 1,000-point scale.
The study finds that satisfaction with paid streaming music service is impacted by the level of engagement with listening to and sharing playlists and content with others.
There are four distinct listener profiles. The largest segment is passive listeners (customers who neither share their own content/playlists nor consume other users’ content), representing 44% of the total music streaming universe; 29% are fully engaged listeners; 22% are followers (customers who consume other users’ content/playlists but do not share their own); and 5% are sharers (customers who say they “always” or “sometimes” share their own playlists but do not consume other users’ content).
“The streaming music customer experience appears to be affected by a number of dimensions, including paid vs. free streaming, device choice and content selection,” said Kirk Parsons, senior director and technology, media & telecom practice leader at J.D. Power. “The key to success, however, is increasingly becoming how well streaming music brands create a viable music ecosystem that can not only support multiple types of devices, but also facilitate listeners’ social sharing and following of playlists with others.”