You have to admit Spotify is one of the best music streaming apps out there, barring the torture of a stream of advertisements that non-premium users face every third song, the app is satisfactory. Highly personalized playlists that even your partner wouldn’t be able to make, exceptionally good recommendations of artists and genres around the world and a wide array of interesting podcasts are just some of the things that set Spotify apart. But it is none of these features that cemented Spotify’s position as the best in the game, it was a data release at the end of every year called ‘Spotify Wrapped’ that made it possible.
All users get a mail starting with a statement like, ‘This year no one listened to music like you’ in December and then the next half-hour is spent on a personalized slideshow exploring your music habits, gasping at the number of minutes you listened to music on Spotify discovering probably 50 new genres and fondly playing your top ten songs of the year. And of course, this might be followed by showing off your top artist or your music taste range on Twitter or Instagram because Spotify just reassured you that you are indeed special. This might be the most innovative marketing strategy any app can implement, tell the user who they are- more like how cool they are and just wait for them to shout it out to the whole world. This was started in 2017 and needless to say users caught on to the trend. So much so that people eagerly wait for December and even after a week after it is released social media is filled with stories, shares and tweets of people’s wholesome Wrapped.
Especially this year, after navigating through grief, unpredictability and loneliness, users got a much-needed relief with Wrapped 2020. Maybe seeing that your friend was also equally miserable as you, listening to 90s Blues or your Twitter crush having the same favourite Rap artist created this feeling of solidarity that has been absent for a long time.
