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> a tech company that gives absolutely no fucks for the preferences of their paying customers. I suspect that end-user subscriptions contribute a relatively sm

> a tech company that gives absolutely no fucks for the preferences of their paying customers. I suspect that end-user subscriptions contribute a relatively small amount to total revenue. Their most valuable customers would be ad reps. That said, I think Spotify does a pretty good job making the end-user experience very nice. It's fast, reliable, relatively bug-free, has great integrations (it's a better sonos controller than the real sonos controller,) and the best catalog going. Criticizing the finer points is a useful exercise, but, personally, I'm not seeing any dealbreakers.

yusefnapora 5y ago
As a former Spotifier, I can say that your suspicion is incorrect. The free tier is just a really effective acquisition funnel for paid subscriptions; ad revenue is just gravy on top. Ads do pull in a decent amount of revenue, but it's tiny compared to subscriptions.
- ibejoeb 5y ago
  Wow, surprising! Thanks for in the info.
- jacquesm 5y ago
  The best Spotify users are the ones that pay but don't use the service.
  - jraph 5y ago
    How would you optimize the UX for this? Asking for a friend.
    - jacquesm 5y ago
      By keeping the monthly credit card payment below the two digit threshold.
bryan_w 5y ago
The problem is that their growth team are legitimately evil people who are constantly thinking about "how can we force our users to do things that they don't want to do?". They can have all the features they want but if the growth team keeps up with these tricks to extend "listen time" metrics, nobody will like the product
Arcuru 5y ago
> I suspect that end-user subscriptions contribute a relatively small amount to total revenue. Their most valuable customers would be ad reps. It is very much the opposite. In the most recent quarter[1], Spotify had revenues of 2,178 million from premium subscriptions and 323 million from ad-supported users. [1] Q3 2021, data from https://s22.q4cdn.com/540910603/files/doc_financials/2021/q3/Shareholder-Letter-Q3-2021_FINAL.pdf https://s22.q4cdn.com/540910603/files/doc_financials/2021/q3... More data is available: https://investors.spotify.com/financials/default.aspx https://investors.spotify.com/financials/default.aspx

yusefnapora 5y ago

As a former Spotifier, I can say that your suspicion is incorrect. The free tier is just a really effective acquisition funnel for paid subscriptions; ad revenue is just gravy on top. Ads do pull in a decent amount of revenue, but it's tiny compared to subscriptions.

ibejoeb 5y ago
Wow, surprising! Thanks for in the info.
jacquesm 5y ago
The best Spotify users are the ones that pay but don't use the service.
- jraph 5y ago
  How would you optimize the UX for this? Asking for a friend.
  - jacquesm 5y ago
    By keeping the monthly credit card payment below the two digit threshold.

bryan_w 5y ago

The problem is that their growth team are legitimately evil people who are constantly thinking about "how can we force our users to do things that they don't want to do?". They can have all the features they want but if the growth team keeps up with these tricks to extend "listen time" metrics, nobody will like the product

Arcuru 5y ago

> I suspect that end-user subscriptions contribute a relatively small amount to total revenue. Their most valuable customers would be ad reps. It is very much the opposite. In the most recent quarter[1], Spotify had revenues of 2,178 million from premium subscriptions and 323 million from ad-supported users. [1] Q3 2021, data from https://s22.q4cdn.com/540910603/files/doc_financials/2021/q3/Shareholder-Letter-Q3-2021_FINAL.pdf https://s22.q4cdn.com/540910603/files/doc_financials/2021/q3... More data is available: https://investors.spotify.com/financials/default.aspx https://investors.spotify.com/financials/default.aspx