Playing the same hits every year can only take you so far.
Undoubtedly, the way that we consume music has changed drastically in the digital age. People are no longer tethered to a radio. We listen to podcasts, stream highly-personalized Pandora stations and cue up our own playlists on our own devices. Media has become much more individually curated and less dictated by a handful of local radio stations. These new consumption habits carry over into the in-store experience as retail marketers begin putting together holiday strategies for their most important six to eight weeks of the year.
With the overall decline of traditional radio listenership and rise of more personal services, there’s even less of a runway for new holiday songs to become holiday classics and less exposure to seasonal songs in general. Overall, holiday music has a more difficult sticking factor and has the capacity to feel more abrupt when it’s suddenly cued up in stores the day after Thanksgiving.
Here’s what you need to know as we embark into the holiday season. Acclimating to the landscape
In the current ecosystem, it’s become more important than ever that retailers don’t create a jarring customer experience with the introduction of the wrong holiday music. Lucky for us, “Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer” is no longer playing every hour. The downside? Without the familiarity of as many new Christmas classics, brands that look solely to the current pop charts for newer, fresher holiday songs risk falling short in terms of tapping into the evocative power of holiday music in-store.
