Spotify has launched a long-awaited audiobook feature, a small step toward becoming the be-all for audio and one giant leap toward seriously complicating your Spotify Wrapped.
Why it matters: Audiobooks account for ~7% of the entire book market, with Amazon’s Audible making up ~40% of sales. Following the trend of Big Tech companies refusing to do just one thing, Spotify is looking to challenge that dominance.
- By adding books to its existing app, Spotify can target its 188 million subscribers who might have never listened to an audiobook if it meant downloading a totally new app.
- Spotify also presents an exciting opportunity for cross-product synergy, like authors appearing on Spotify podcasts or curating playlists for certain newsletter writers.
What happened: Spotify will now host over 300,000 titles sold on a book-by-book basis from some of the world’s biggest publishers, including Penguin Random House.
- Down the line, the company may create a ‘freemium’ ad-supported tier, which would massively disrupt current ad-less business practices.
Yes, but: Amazon may have started as an online book store, but book sales are just a drop in the bucket for the company these days. Maybe Jeff Bezos chooses to pick a fight with Spotify, or maybe he focuses attention on the money maker that is Amazon’s cloud services arm.