Spotify brings artist merchandising tool to Australia

Australian Spotify users are part of its new move to allow artists to sell their merchandising through their artist profiles.

According to Swedish company, this will give “artists even more opportunity to grow additional revenue streams”, following the launch of its virtual event listing, tipping, and Fans First emails tools.

It has gone into partnership with Ottawa, Canada based e-commerce platform Shopify.

This arrives seven months after Amazon Music introduced its artist-merch store.

Artists, or their teams, will need admin access to their Spotify for Artists accounts, and a Shopify store (one an act).

Once connected, they can list up to 250 items, with three spotlighted on their artist profile.

The process is easily managed, Spotify insists. The user taps on the product and hits a “buy it now” button which directs them to Shopify.

Out-of-stock items are automatically removed from profiles. New merch can be shared with fans alongside the release of new music.

During a beta period, the Shopify merch will only be visible to users in Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the UK, and the US.

Shopify is offering a 90-day free trial to all Spotify artists signing up for the first time.

After that, the basic ‘Bronze’ Shopify plan will cost $14.99 per month, Advanced is $24.99 per month, and Plus is $48.99 per month.

Camille Hearst, head of Spotify for Artists, noted the power of the tool.

“The integration of Shopify’s powerful backend for powering commerce presents a significant step forward in our efforts to help artists maximise additional revenue streams and give them agency over their careers,” she said.

Amir Kabbara, director of product at Shopify, meanwhile, highlighted the natural synergy between the tool and artists’ entrepreneurial nature.

“[Artists are] building multifaceted brands and businesses, and now we’re making it easier for them to meet fans where they are.

“By bringing entrepreneurship to Spotify, we’re empowering artists to think beyond the traditional merch table with new ways to monetizse, and to experiment with their brands through commerce.”

The link-up was hinted at earlier this year when their CEOs – Spotify’s Daniel Ek and Shopify’s Tobi Lütke — joined a Clubhouse session to discuss how creators today were diversifying their monetisation strategies.

“Almost every successful creator now is omni-talented and omnichannel,” Ek said at the time.

“They’re really just doing a multitude of different things and connecting with their fan bases across many different platforms.”

According to Shopify, the creator economy numbers 50 million worldwide and is worth over US$100 billion.

A record $30.8 billion of venture capital was invested across 657 fintech deals globally in Q2 of 2021 alone – breaking the previous quarter’s record by almost a third.