Trackdrip – a time of reinvention
As people spend more time than ever in their homes around the world – companies such as new Ding partner TrackDrip are seeing increased demand for their services. These lifestyle changes have meant industry such as music streaming have seen a change in how their customers use their service – and like industries all around the world re-invention has been required. This quarter we speak to Phill Tevreden, co-founder and CTO at TrackDrip – about keeping up with customer needs, and how content remains king.
Ding: Tell us about TrackDrip and what’s unique about the company?
Phill: TrackDrip is an on-demand music streaming app dedicated to local artists, serving audio, video and User Generated Content (UGC) specifically focused on the Caribbean and Cuba. Our goal is to offer a better selection of local artists and understanding of local tastes in regards to their digital entertainment consumption.
Ding: Who is your typical customer and how have their needs changed?
Phill: Our typical customer is the music lover ignored by the traditional international streaming services due to being part of a niche market or having limited wireless connectivity.
The growing penetration of smartphones and smart devices, in combination with cheaper mobile data access, has driven record levels of online data consumption and increased the appetite for the convenience and personalisation music streaming can offer, creating a growing market opportunity for TrackDrip.
Ding: Covid-19 has meant people are spending more time in their homes and looking for ways to entertain themselves – what has this meant for TrackDrip?
Phill: The lockdown has amplified music video streaming, with more downtime and consistent access to WiFi for consumers, while the decrease of daily commutes has had an impact on audio streaming. During this period we have released new features like live streaming, making the experience in our music service more appealing.
Ding: What, if anything, is the pandemic doing to the music industry?
Phill: Right now, we are seeing a lot of changes in peoples’ lifestyle and consumption choices due to the Covid-19 situation. It has had an impact on many industries which now need to re-invent themselves. Music industry revenues have held up relatively well during pandemic when compared to other industries. There have been modest disruptions to streaming as a result of COVID-19. At the start of the pandemic, audio streaming saw a decrease in listening hours as consumers drove less and focused on other platforms (e.g. video streaming) and forms of entertainment (e.g. TV and video gaming). However, these declines returned to growth by the end of April.
The growth of digital streaming has allowed consumers to access and enjoy music regardless of social distancing restrictions.
Ding: What is the greatest challenge to your business at the moment?
Phill: Emerging markets take time to convert as users need to get familiar with the service via extended trials before slowly converting to paid, though always at lower rates than in developed markets due to their lower purchasing power.
Ding: What does the Ding partnership mean for your business/customer?
Phill: Through Ding we can now offer international mobile recharge services to a growing portion of our target group, while also being connected with the global operators. This allows TrackDrip to further engage with the evolving needs of that same customer base – providing them with easy and affordable access to digital entertainment. It’s a great match for us.
Ding: How do you keep on top of what your customers wants and need?
Phill: Our in-depth understanding of the unique needs and consumption habits of our target audiences within the local music communities enables our TrackDrip application to grow at an accelerated pace and keep a mass-market approach to user acquisition in our territories.
We know our customer – we have extensive local curation teams to cater to our markets to make sure we stay updated on their wants and needs.
Ding: What is working well for you in terms of customer acquisition and retention?
Phill: Content is king and we are working very closely with the local artists to make sure they have all the tools they need to keep creating consistent and high-quality content so that our service can continue to be packed with new and exciting material, promoted and endorsed directly to the fans (our customers) by their own favorite local content creators.
Ding: TrackDrip is growing – what major opportunities do you foresee for the brand and what’s next?
Phill: There is a huge opportunity for niche streaming services like TrackDrip to continue delivering deeper, local content and recommendations and, in doing so, create unique ways to engage with customers for local retail brands, Telcos and OEMs.
