Spotify has music, podcasts and audiobooks, but now it is expanding into another type of content: video learning.
For now this is just a test in a single market, the UK, where Spotify will offer a selection of video courses from four partners: BBC Maestro, PlayVirtuoso, SkillShare and Thinkific.
The courses aren’t free. Spotify users will be able to try at least two lessons from each course during the test before deciding whether to buy the rest – after which they’ll be able to watch them on mobile or desktop.
The most interesting partner from Music Ally’s perspective is PlayVirtuoso, because it’s a startup focused on music education courses. The company was one of the finalists in our Music Ally SI:X startups contest in 2022.
BBC Maestro also offers a few music-focused courses featuring Sir Tim Rice, Gary Barlow and Mark Ronson teaching (respectively) writing and performing musical theatre; songwriting; and music production.
Prices vary for the courses. MJ Cole teaching you how to make a 2-step garage beat costs £24.90; the Gary Barlow songwriting course costs £48.90; as does a course on starting and scaling a multi-million-pound business from startups guru Steven Bartlett. But at the high end, you can pay £239.99 for a course on YouTube storytelling and editing.
In a blog post this morning, Spotify said that its podcasts business has already provided some evidence that learning content goes down well with its listeners.
“About half of Spotify Premium subscribers have engaged in education or self-help themed podcasts,” said the company. Based on Spotify’s end-of-2023 numbers, that’s around 118 million people.
“Many of our users engage with podcasts and audiobooks on a daily basis for their learning needs and we believe this highly engaged community will be interested in accessing and purchasing quality content from video course creators,” said Babar Zafar, VP product development at Spotify.
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