Napster To Go doesn't understand the tyranny of too much
The now-legal Napster service is attempting to make a big splash this weekend with a Superbowl ad promoting its subscription-based music services. The new wrinkle: they are using Microsoft's Janus technology to allow subscription tracks to be downloaded to Windows Media Player-compatible music players such as those made by companies like iRiver. This new service is named Napster To Go, and it will be promoted using an ad called "Do The Math" which compares the cost of filling a portable media player using Napster and iTunes:
We've written about the poor marketing behind the Janus technology underpinning this service previously. But regardless of the technology issues (of which there are several), will consumers buy the new service? After all, won't people see that it is cheaper to spend $15 per month to load their media players with whatever they want instead of thousands of dollars at the iTunes music store?
Our call: this new service will not make any significant inroads into iTunes market share. Why? Because this new service assumes that consumer choice of a million tunes to load your music player will drive subscriptions. But that process of choosing music you don't already know and love requires the user make choices among the nearly a million songs they could load. As we've noted in previous tyranny of too much opinions, this amount of choice is actually demotivating. By pushing excessive choice onto the consumer, Napster is actually creating customer dissatisfaction.
Want an analogy that drives the point home? If easy access to large libraries was a big driver of subscription services, we'd see for-pay libraries popping up in malls and near the local Wal-Mart instead of Borders Books or Barnes & Noble stores. When consumers find content they like, they want to make the choice once and own the content, not continually have to subscribe to it.
We predict a number of customers will try the service, but will rapidly cancel their subscriptions once they realize they spend way too much time trying to figure out what they want. Add the dissatisfaction that will spread when those same subscribers realize they lose access to all that music once they cancel their service, and we believe that Napster To Go will rapidly mirror the performance of other would-be-iTunes-killers such as Buymusic.com, Wal-Mart.com, and MSN.com. And this is without adding in the frustruation that users have with Microsoft's technology, which often doesn't work with players that are supposed to "Play For Sure."
As an aside, why doesn't iTunes have this problem? Because Apple actually understands the tyranny of too much and provides services that reduce the amount of choice that users have to deal with. Services like iTunes Essentials, public iMixes, Billboard Charts, and Most Popular lists allow consumers to buy what other people recommend without having to choose amoung a million different songs. And of course, because they control both the on-line and the iPod experience, they are able to make the buying process easy and seamless.
So while you are watching the Super Bowl ads this weekend, try asking yourself, "Does this product or service add to the tyranny of too much choice or does it add value by limiting choices to good ones?" That process will change the way you look at advertising.
We've written about the poor marketing behind the Janus technology underpinning this service previously. But regardless of the technology issues (of which there are several), will consumers buy the new service? After all, won't people see that it is cheaper to spend $15 per month to load their media players with whatever they want instead of thousands of dollars at the iTunes music store?
Our call: this new service will not make any significant inroads into iTunes market share. Why? Because this new service assumes that consumer choice of a million tunes to load your music player will drive subscriptions. But that process of choosing music you don't already know and love requires the user make choices among the nearly a million songs they could load. As we've noted in previous tyranny of too much opinions, this amount of choice is actually demotivating. By pushing excessive choice onto the consumer, Napster is actually creating customer dissatisfaction.
Want an analogy that drives the point home? If easy access to large libraries was a big driver of subscription services, we'd see for-pay libraries popping up in malls and near the local Wal-Mart instead of Borders Books or Barnes & Noble stores. When consumers find content they like, they want to make the choice once and own the content, not continually have to subscribe to it.
We predict a number of customers will try the service, but will rapidly cancel their subscriptions once they realize they spend way too much time trying to figure out what they want. Add the dissatisfaction that will spread when those same subscribers realize they lose access to all that music once they cancel their service, and we believe that Napster To Go will rapidly mirror the performance of other would-be-iTunes-killers such as Buymusic.com, Wal-Mart.com, and MSN.com. And this is without adding in the frustruation that users have with Microsoft's technology, which often doesn't work with players that are supposed to "Play For Sure."
As an aside, why doesn't iTunes have this problem? Because Apple actually understands the tyranny of too much and provides services that reduce the amount of choice that users have to deal with. Services like iTunes Essentials, public iMixes, Billboard Charts, and Most Popular lists allow consumers to buy what other people recommend without having to choose amoung a million different songs. And of course, because they control both the on-line and the iPod experience, they are able to make the buying process easy and seamless.
So while you are watching the Super Bowl ads this weekend, try asking yourself, "Does this product or service add to the tyranny of too much choice or does it add value by limiting choices to good ones?" That process will change the way you look at advertising.
posted by Carl Howe at
10:35 AM
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