listening habits Archives

The internet has ruined our already short attention spans.

In the early days of entertainment, consumers were likely to try anything at least once. New artist? Let’s hear their single. New sound? Let’s see how this compares to what worked in the past.

Today’s consumer is far more fickle, but that didn’t happen overnight. As media has grown, so has the number of options consumers have at any given moment. In 2018, anyone can watch or listen to virtually anything with just a few clicks. From free content to streaming services and (unfortunately) pirate sites, nearly all entertainment ever produced is available at all times all over the world.

With that in mind, who has time for the unfamiliar?

Music blogger Paul Lamere analyzed billions of plays from millions of Spotify listeners all over the world to discover their skip rates. Here’s what he found:

24.14 percent likelihood of skipping to the next song in the first 5 seconds.
28.97 percent in the first 10 seconds
35.05 percent in the first 30 seconds
48.6 percent skip before the song finishes

Digging further, Lamere found that the average listener skips 14.65 times per hour, or about once every four minutes. Females skip slightly more than males at 45.23% to 44.75%.

The mobile skip rate is 51.1% while on a desktop it’s 40.1%. That data suggests that desktop listening is a background activity, something used to fill the void of silence, which makes sense. Most of us listen to music while working, and most of us have a very particular preference when it comes to what sounds help us work best.

Lamere also discovered some interesting correlations between age and skip rates. Teenagers, who are notorious for their short attention spans, skip more than 50% of the tracks they hear. Adults, on the other hand, skip about 35% of the material.

Weekend skip rates are higher than those during the week, which is due at least in part to fewer people listening via desktop. People know what they want to hear on the weekend because they’re often trying to create a mood to accompany a specific activity. Once an attitude or style is identified, skipping anything that doesn’t fit that desired consistency is second nature.

The big takeaway here (and most obvious), is that grabbing the attention of listeners is harder than ever. Artists need to catch us right away if they have any chance of gaining fans, especially if they’re hoping to target a younger demographic.

Not so long ago, radio was the primary form of home entertainment. Families would gather around their stereos, which were as large as many televisions are today, and they would listen intently to songs and stories being shared over the airwaves. You probably don’t remember this time, but if you’re lucky enough to have grandparents they probably have a story or two to share. It looked something like this:

Those of us born in the last fifty years have most likely never spent an evening gathered around our stereos with those we love the most. At best, we have shared some memory making experiences with those closest to us while singing along to car stereos on road trips or late night drives under moonlit skies, but even those moments are becoming something of an ‘old time’ hobby. Radio is dying, and car stereos are mostly used as a mean to connect our smartphones with our stereo systems to play our favorite songs or playlists.

Home listening, however, has long been in a state of flux. While TV and later streaming gained popularity, the use of radio or stereos of any kind in the home began to wane. That is until the recent rise of smart speakers began to take the nation by storm.

A recent survey looking to understand the listening habits of people over the age of 16 by AudienceNet, a company out of the UK, found the increasing popularity of smart speakers by companies like Sonos and Google correlates to a rise in overall music consumption. Despite only 14% of the U.S. population owning smart speakers, those that do listen to 50% more music and 49% longer than before. They also check out more playlists as well.

With the holiday season right around the corner, the number of American homes with smart speakers in them is likely to grow in leaps and bounds. Early Black Friday ads from Best Buy and other retailers place emphasis on the devices, and a number of marketing efforts with buzzworthy groups such as Greta Van Fleet have no doubt made more curious about the technology than at the same point a year ago.

Further encouraging adoption is Spotify, who recently launched a promotion that offers a FREE Google Home speaker to anyone with a Family subscription plan on the streaming service. The offer applies to new and existing subscription holders and runs through the end of December, meaning its likely to help thousands, even millions, with their gift-giving efforts.

Families may no longer gather around the stereo at the end of the day, but with smart speakers becoming commonplace they are engaging with music (and other services provided by the devices) like never before. We expect a wave of tips and tricks to encourage specific artist engagement to hit the music blogosphere, including this site, in the near future as a result. Stay tuned.