Musicians employ various strategies to promote music on Spotify, including creating and curating playlists that feature their tracks, collaborating with famous artists, and engaging with fans through social media to drive streams and shares. Additionally, merch and music come hand in hand.
Artist Merchandise or ‘merch’ is a powerful tool that artists can use to not only generate revenue but also to strengthen their connection with their fans and create a more profound sense of loyalty. The concept of owning merch for fans goes deeper than just being products, as it becomes a way for fans to pick up tangible pieces of their favorite artist’s identity and express their devotion heartfeltly.
You would see people wearing an AC/DC shirt, Yeezy shoes, Chance The Rapper hats, etc. To fans, it contributes as a fashion statement to say that they love their music so much that they would wear it. To artists, it’s revenue and free marketing.
Spotify understands the demand for merch as people would previously rush over to Spotify artist’s profiles to get whatever is new. Once, it wasn’t all that seamless on the platform. Now, Spotify has created a way for listeners to browse and shop for merch easier than ever with a dedicated Merch Hub on the Spotify app itself, powered by Shopify.
A Closer Look At The E-Commerce Giant: What Is Shopify?
Shopify is an e-commerce multinational company headquartered in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. While the company has been making its name globally known, especially in recent years, it was originally founded in 2006. The Shopify platform provides a diverse range of services to online retailers, including payment solutions, marketing tools, shipping services and customer engagement resources.
The company has solidified its reputation over the years. As of December 2022, the company disclosed that over 2 million businesses were using its platform across approximately 175 countries. It reported a substantial revenue of USD 5.6 billion in 2022, and now has more than 11,000 workers. With that, Shopify ranks as one of the top 20 largest publicly traded Canadian companies in market capitalization.
For Users And Artists: Navigating Spotify’s Merch Hub
Previously, artist’s merch was visible on their artist profiles, the Now Playing view, and the release page. While they will continue to be visible at these locations, everything will also now be visible in one place where you can browse and click on available items to explore and purchase right through the Spotify app.
Additionally, Spotify integrated its powerful personalization technology to its shopping feature so you could see personalized recommendations according to your listening habits.
For artists, Spotify’s integration with Shopify allows you and your team to manage your inventory much easier and you can control what is featured. With that, you can capitalize on big and small moments for releases, celebrate anniversaries of past work, promote your tour, and more!
Setting things up to get your merch business on Spotify is pretty straightforward. Select your merch from your Shopify store that you would like to publish on Spotify and it would be available for browsing and purchase. From there, you can choose up to 3 items to feature that will present themselves as your “Artist Pick”. You can then add in relevant tags to your merch, which allows your merch to be suggested and appear on the Now Playing view, album, and single pages.
