Tag: Audio content

Singapore – Global advertising company WPP has announced a global partnership with audio streaming services company Spotify, allowing WPP’s clients to have access to Spotify’s ad products, first-party intelligence and creative ways to reach engaged audiences at scale.

The partnership will have WPP looking to use Spotify to develop integrations that provide Spotify’s first-party occasions insights to help clients understand aggregated listening patterns in order to inform more creative and effective digital audio advertising strategies.

Moreover, WPP will work with Spotify to deliver market-leading thought leadership and scaled training programmes for its employees and clients that focus on digital audio creativity and Spotify’s innovative ad products. WPP’s teams and clients will also benefit from early access to Spotify’s neuro-insights research focused on audience trends and insights.  

Stephan Pretorius, chief technology officer of WPP, said, “In the fast-evolving media and entertainment landscape, audio streaming has become an integral part of everyday life. At WPP, we recognise the power of audio as a critical component of marketing. The intent of this first-of-its-kind partnership is to integrate Spotify’s insights with the Choreograph platform to create more innovative and relevant ways to connect our clients with their customers.”  

Meanwhile, Brian Berner, global head of advertising sales at Spotify, commented, “We’ve long partnered with WPP to enable agency planners and buyers to make more informed decisions when planning for digital audio. With our new global partnership, we’re helping WPP clients modernise their strategy and planning.”

He added, “More than 550 million people across 184 markets come to Spotify every month to be entertained, to learn and to discover for nearly 2.5 hours each day. As we continue to drive innovation in audio and the advertising industry at large, partners like WPP are critical to delivering for advertisers, creators and audiences wherever they are.”  

Singapore – Global audio streaming services platform Spotify has announced new personalised and curated experiences to observe the holy month of Ramadan. They include Ramadan-centric music, podcasts, and talk content dedicated to families and communities celebrating the holy season.

Listeners can also find personalised content on the “Your Ramadan 2023” playlist and see the music and talk content that is trending in their respective countries, and podcasters are constantly developing and publishing new Ramadan-related episodes.

Previously, Spotify’s editorial teams had curated playlists, podcasts, and talk content for their users during Ramadan. Through this new announcement, Spotify aims to spotlight content that changes each day, creating personalised playlists with songs picked just for listeners, and highlighting trending content that people are listening to in their region.

Moreover, the platform is aiming at making readings from the Quran easily accessible, and listeners can also find exclusive clips and greetings from their favourite artists and celebrities wishing them a blessed Ramadan.

For Gautam Talwar, managing director for Spotify Asia-Pacific, they are proud of delivering this new Ramaden-centric experience to their listeners during this holy month of observance.

“We’re designing an experience on the platform that allows our listeners to take a more active role in discoverability as well as to foster more meaningful connections with artists and podcasters they love on Spotify,” Talwar said.

Meanwhile, Rhea Chedid, senior podcast manager at Spotify, commented that they are now seeing more and more podcasters release series that are the ultimate companions to everyone observing Ramadan.

“Everything from shows about cooking and the history of Ramadan traditions and Islam, to audio scripted series that entertain and podcasts that review your favourite Ramadan television series, we are really witnessing creators think deeply about how they can better the lives of listeners through audio during this time,” Chedid said.

Singapore – Global creative agency AnalogFolk has announced its recent investment to Untold Fable, a newly-launched global content production company founded by entrepreneur Kate Tancred, who also serves as Untold Fable’s CEO.

AnalogFolk Group will become a majority shareholder of Untold Fable, and it will be running its specialist brands – AnalogFolk, Untold Fable and Serum (UK) – as stand-alone businesses.

Through the investment, Untold Fable will offer clients the added value of tapping into on-demand digital agency services from AnalogFolk. This joint offering is designed to provide one entry point for clients into the creativity and efficiencies of a tech-powered production offering and the strategic precision of on demand creative digital agency services.

Untold Fable was founded on a greater need for video and audio content across entertainment and advertising, to which the company aims to cater to by creating a platform that houses studios, sound designers, sound engineers, composers and voice talent from around the world, assisting brands with their audio identity while communicating with consumers via one of the fastest-growing ad formats in the world.

Furthermore, Untold Fable allows brands, publishers and agencies to also have the option to measure their diversity and inclusion (D&I) statistics across their productions throughout the year, empowering them to put the issue front and center by giving them the data when it comes time to commission talent. 

According to data from branding and design company IMPACT, 70% of consumers have shared a brand’s video, with 52% saying watching product videos makes them more confident in online purchase decisions. About 72% of businesses, meanwhile, stated video has improved their conversion rate. 

“It is the first community-based production model to be built with diversity at its heart, promising to ensure the makeup of the network reflects the world we live in as well as launching technology features that make connecting with traditionally underrepresented talent from the creative industry much more accessible to clients,” the company said in a press statement.

With the existing footprint of AnalogFolk globally, Untold Fable will offer clients on-the-ground teams in London, New York, Sydney, Amsterdam, Hong Kong and Singapore from day one. 

“I spent the last 10 years driving the efficiencies and creativity of a tech powered production offering. Untold Fable expands on that model by connecting clients with a curated network of diverse, award-winning talent and layering over digital creative services from one of the most celebrated independent digital agencies in the world. Combining these offerings enables us to produce audio and video content in a way that the industry is yet to experience,” Tancred said.

Meanwhile, for AnalogFolk founder and chief client officer Bill Brock, their recent investment in Untold Fable speaks to the agency’s mission of using “digital to make the analog world better.”

“With the launch of Untold Fable, we not only diversify the group’s offering, we break exciting new ground on this enduring mission. We’re leveraging the power of technology to make it easier than ever before for brands and publishers to work with a more diverse talent pool,” Brock stated.