Streaming audio platform Spotify is exploring ways to compensate video creators who are willing to distribute their content within the Spotify app, according to a report published on Thursday.
The report, from financial news outlet Bloomberg, said Spotify was willing to ink seven-figure deals with some video creators who are popular on platforms like YouTube, just for the privilege of also distributing their web shows through Spotify.
Bloomberg cited anonymous sources for its report, who cautioned that not all video creators approached by Spotify had been offered high sums of money in exchange for distribution of their content on the platform. Instead, the “deals vary significantly depending on the talent,” the article said.
The deal isn’t intended to help Spotify boost its advertising business by offering marketers the opportunity to buy against video content, Bloomberg said, nor is Spotify interested in directly producing shows with content creators. Instead, the deal is simply intended to help Spotify offer its millions of users more videos to watch, keeping them engaged with the platform.
Spotify bills itself as the world’s most-popular streaming audio platform, counting 246 million paying subscribers among its 626 million global users. It offers more than 100 million on-demand audio tracks, 6 million podcast titles and over 350,000 audiobooks — but its efforts to break into the video space have been more turbulent.
Years ago, Spotify offers some of its premium subscribers the opportunity to watch short-form video clips from partners like Viacom’s Comedy Central (now part of Paramount Global), BBC News and Vice News, though a beta test of the feature never fully rolled out to users.
Spotify offers some video podcasts that are supplemental to its audio programming, but only around 140 million Spotify users have engaged with video content on the platform when offered.
That could be changing. A spokesperson for Spotify did not dispute Bloomberg’s report, but affirmed that “the popularity of video is surging on Spotify.”
“Our making deals with creators is not new…Spotify has worked with podcasters and creators on shows that include video for several years,” the spokesperson continued. “Spotify has worked with podcasters and creators on shows that include video for several years.”
Getting video content from YouTube to Spotify might not be an easy task, Bloomberg said, noting that independent content creators — including those who are essentially one-man teams — will have to increase their workload in order to syndicate their content to the service. Absent a tool that makes it easy for creators to upload their shows to YouTube and Spotify simultaneously, most producers will have to distribute their shows to Spotify separate from their distribution on YouTube.
There may be few incentives to do so, as Spotify “hadn’t fully built a competitor to YouTube’s automated ads offering, called AdSense, a primary money driver for video creators,” Bloomberg said, though that could change if Spotify can win over content creators to the platform.
