NEW YORK (CelebrityAccess) — As music streaming titan Spotify gears up for its debut on publicly traded stock exchanges, the company is ramping up efforts to drive subscriptions with aggressive promotions.
In time for Valentine’s Day, Spotify is offering a chance to “cozy up” to its premium subscription tier with a bonus of 60 days of ad-free music streaming for new subscribers.
Free, ad-supported streaming is the key difference between Spotify and their rivals such as Apple Music, which, while offering trials memberships, requires users to pay to play with its music library.
The new promotion comes as Spotify is taking a gamble by bypassing the traditional initial public offering (IPO) model, and instead, angling for a direct listing on the New York Stock Exchange. If the promotion is a hit, it would allow Spotify to boast about new highs for its premium subscriptions as the company goes public.
Spotify’s move will likely serve as a test case for other high profile tech companies such as Airbnb and Uber which have unusual risks for investors, making them a challenging target for a more traditional IPO. Spotify filed for its listing in December and has been approved for the move by the Securities and Exchange Commission.
Spotify’s new marketing push also comes as rival Apple Music appears to be making headway. As recently reported in the Wall Street Journal, Apple, who has been something of an also-ran in the streaming world, is currently on track to eclipse Spotify in the U.S. later this year.
Per the WSJ report, Apple is currently reporting monthly growth rates of paid subscribers of 5% per month in the U.S., compared to just 2% for Spotify. If that math doesn’t change, Apple will pass their Swedish rivals in the all-important subscription count metric but this summer.
Updated to reflect Apple Music’s improvement in the U.S.
