Google Play/YouTube Music planning to add news in Australia which is likely to affect traditional media players according to a report from Roy Morgan, the Australian market research company. The conclusions from the report suggest that introducing news content into Google Play/YouTube Music streaming music services will present a significant challenge for TV, radio and traditional newspapers.
Over 5.4 million Australians now use music streaming services with Spotify the clear industry leader used by nearly 3.6 million users in an average week around four times the size of SoundCloud used by around 900,000 users in an average week.
Although Google Play Music, used by over 660,000 users and the newer YouTube Music, used by nearly 600,000 users currently do not have a huge market share there are strong prospects for growth as both services introduce news capabilities.
Triple J radio network most at risk
Analysis of the major TV and radio networks shows that Triple J is the radio network that potentially has the most to lose from a more capable streaming service with 41.6% of Triple J listeners also using music streaming.
Over 40% of listeners to Nova stations (41.2%) also use music streaming web/apps while just under a third of listeners to Southern Cross Austereo Group stations (32.7%) use music streaming.
TV subscribers more likely to use music streaming
Roy Morgan’s research shows that subscribers to Pay TV and video streaming are more likely to use music streaming that viewers who use Free to Air (FTA) channels. Just over a third of viewers of Pay TV/video streaming (33.7%) also use music streaming compared to just over a quarter of FTA TV viewers (25.3%).
Viewers of the commercial TV networks are more likely than viewers of the ABC and SBS to use music streaming led by Network 10 (25.4%) just ahead of Network 9 (25.2%) and Network 7 (24%). Viewers of ABC TV Network (22.7%) are slightly more likely to use music streaming web/apps than viewers of the SBS TV Network (21.5%).
Michele Levine, Chief Executive, Roy Morgan, said, “The announcement by Google that it will soon provide breaking news over its Google Play Music streaming service opens another front in the battle for scarce advertising and subscription dollars between traditional media companies and their newer digital competitors.”
With 5.4 million Australians (27%) using music streaming the addition of news content by Google has the potential to seriously impact more traditional media channels. Google’s combined audience is 1.1 million and Spotify is used by over 3.5 million users although it has not announced any plans to include news and current events in its offerings.
The report goes on to analyse the impact on individual radio stations and newspapers noting that ‘newspapers whose main function obviously is to provide news some individual newspaper brands are more exposed than others. Just over 30% of Australians who visited a listed newspaper site in an average seven days also use music streaming web/apps.’
To view the full report go here.
