For a few lucky listeners, using Pandora can get you a personal concert with one of your favorite artists.
The Internet streaming music service today breaks the new ad below from twofifteenmccann. It features a handful of users who were suddenly invited, via FaceTime, to a one-on-one live-streaming performance by Bush frontman Gavin Rossdale immediately after giving the rock band a thumbs-up on Pandora.
It's the second execution in a campaign launched last month with a similar video featuring electric violinist Lindsey Stirling.
It's a clever way to amplify one of the category leader's core features—the algorithm that extrapolates an individual listener's tastes based on which songs he or she gives thumbs-up or thumbs-down ratings using the site's buttons—even if the campaign's title, "Thumb Moments," is a little wonky (perhaps too reminiscent of the old Steve Oedekerk series).
Social Media Profile (as of 10/15/14)
Facebook Likes: 7.07 million
Twitter followers: 267,000
Instagram followers: 25,600
Moments are fast becoming a theme in Pandora ads. Earlier this year, a pair of twofifteenmccann spots freeze-framed and zoomed in on intimate scenes powered by Pandora. Here, it's smart to get the concept out of the way, and keep the focus on the music, and the audience.
Aimed at 18- to 34-year-olds, the buy behind the overall campaign (including other concerts in the series) will put $5 million into digital video (including YouTube and Viacom properties), native ads (via Nativo and Outbrain), as well as media on Facebook and Twitter.
Of course, with more than 76 million monthly users on Pandora—the largest of its class—and only half a dozen or so viewers per concert, the odds of getting a seat seem pretty long.
FAST FACTS
• Prior to founding Pandora in 1999, Tim Westergren played keyboards in a rock band and scored music for films.
• Westergren pitched his idea 348 times before AOL and Best Buy signed on in 2003.
• Pandora hands over 60 percent of its revenue to pay the royalties on the tunes it plays.
• Pandora Musicologists evaluate every song they listen to by using up to 450 different musical characteristics.
• A quarter of Pandora's 76.4 million monthly visitors are Hispanic.
• Traditional radio runs roughly 25 commercial spots per hour. Pandora runs three to four. Pay $4.99 a month, and you don’t have to listen to any.
CREDITS
Client: Pandora
Spot: "Thumb Moments With Bush"
Agency: twofifteenmccann
Chief Creative Officer: James Robinson
Associate Creative Director, Copywriter: Quentin Shuldiner
Copywriter: Kyle Davis
Senior Art Director: Alper Kologlu
Senior Producer: Vera Kacurova
Director of Integrated Production: Alex Spahr
Management Supervisor: Hannah Schaefer
Account Executive: Anne Cathcart
Managing Director: Kelly Johnson
Production Company: Skunk
Director: Greg Brunkalla
Managing Partner: Matt Factor
Executive Producer: Shelly Townshend
Head of Production: Jeanne Stawiarski
Line Producer: Christopher Cho
Director of Photography: Jason McCormick
Production Designer: Jason Kisvarday
Editing Company: Beast
Editor: Doug Walker
Assistant Editor: Nicole Salmeri
Executive Producer: Jon Ettinger
Mixing Studio: One Union Recording
Mixer: Eben Carr
