It’s the most wonderful time of the year! Spotify Wrapped season!
Every year in early December, millions of people wake up, grab their phones and notice it’s finally time. Facebook and Instagram stories become enveloped in everyone’s personal tastes of the year, your respect for some increases while you question the tastes of others, and you wonder how on earth you listened to Bad Bunny for 13 hours in one day, no? Just me? This is the phenomenon called Spotify Wrapped, and it has us all hooked.
But why does it consume us so much? It’s easy to find our listening data at any point in the year, but something about Spotify Wrapped has us all addicted, waiting patiently for the campaign that’s all about us!
What is Spotify Wrapped?
Spotify Wrapped is an annual personalised recap of users’ listening data for the year. It collates data from the previous 12 months and creates a visual story highlighting top artists, songs, genres, minutes listened, and unique insights about how users engage with music and podcasts.
Why does it work?
Simply put, people love hearing about themselves, especially when it’s in a pretty, shareable, bite-sized format. Every year, Spotify tweaks its visual design, with the change in visual stimuli keeping users excited for what they will discover. It’s not a one-size-fits-all method; these little changes keep things interesting.
Spotify Wrapped is one of the most effective marketing tactics of the past decade. It’s the perfect example of what happens when you blend design, user psychology, brand strategy and social proof. The design turns user data into a story. People don’t share tables and graphs; they share attractive, portrait pictures that fit perfectly onto their social media story.
It’s personalised
In 2022, Spotify played on the Myers-Briggs personality type by creating 16 music listening personality types. These details were kept vague, but still, users shared and shared all over the internet. This phenomenon is known as the Barnum Effect, the tendency to accept personality descriptions as accurate, even when they are very vague.
People like to centralise themselves and prove what makes them unique, and Spotify Wrapped allows them to do so. Seeing other people post their exclusive Spotify Wrapped line-up inspires others to do the same thing. This is an example of social proof, a psychological and social phenomenon which acts as incredibly cheap marketing for Spotify.
Businesses on social media are also creating their own versions of Spotify Wrapped, with LinkedIn seeing an influx in ‘Wrapped’ posts!
It’s all about you
The campaign is entirely about the user. Consumers increasingly want to be centred – long gone are the days we listen to brands go on about themselves, now we want to hear them talk about us! Users’ top songs are also carefully curated while listening, making the overall user experience that much more enjoyable.
It creates FOMO
Fear of Missing Out (FOMO) is a huge driver in purchasing decisions today. Imagine waking up to see all your friends’ fun recaps, while you can’t see your own. This trigger will psychologically make you more likely to buy in, as then you can be a part of the experience with everyone else.
It makes you want to stick around
Anticipating Spotify Wrapped makes you want to stick around; it creates an emotional attachment to the platform because it speaks to you. It combines nostalgia, self-reflection, curiosity and humour into the experience. Showcasing your past self, your music, your tastes, style and more. It’s like they truly understand you, and this fuelling of emotion creates loyalty.
Spotify stands out against competitors
All music platforms offer similar core features. Spotify Wrapped makes Spotify stand out against competitors. While competitors and other organisations scramble to create their equivalent of Wrapped, Spotify stays far in the lead. For example, last year, Monzo released their ‘Your Year in Monzo’, which had users red-faced with their financial decisions.
The consensus is, Spotify created a movement with Wrapped, and while other brands are following suit, none of them are doing it quite like Spotify.
Want to create memorable user experiences for your customers? Let’s chat! No jargon or fluff, just honest conversation.
