Amazon already offers a music service bundled in with Prime, but it’s smalltime compared to competitors such as Apple Music and Spotify. As such, Jeff Bezos is apparently re-thinking Amazon’s music strategy, and wants to offer a new service that’s on a par with the others. So why would you want to switch? Vinyl.
As the number one seller of physical music, Amazon is in a unique position to offer customers a way to impulsively purchase records. Stumble across something you like? Buy it with one click while listening through Amazon’s new music streaming app. It’s a win-win: fans gets to purchase their favorite albums, and record companies and artists get a kickback from the sale.
Because Amazon’s service will balloon from about 1 million tracks to upwards of 30 million, it’ll be separate from a Prime subscription, which means users will need to pay about $10 per month; Echo owners will apparently only need to pay about $4, not only giving incentive to buy the personal home gadget, but to switch from Spotify over to Amazon.
According to the New York Post, Amazon plans on offering a discount on the service to Echo owners, which will presumably have a fun tie-in. Right now, Echo owners who are also Prime subscribers can tell Alexa to play a certain artist, making for a great hands-free experience; we’ll probably see similar functionality in the new app if and when Amazon’s rumored service launches, though it’s unclear if we’ll see any further functionality.
Amazon is reportedly aiming to launch its new service this fall, which is a long way off. But with a rumored Echo mini on growing interest in physical media, it appears Amazon is in a position to capitalize on the market in a way no other service can offer. Whether people will want yet another music streaming service remains to be seen.
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