Local Indian music streaming firm Gaana has announced its streaming service has over 100 million monthly active users.
Gaana claims that it is the first Indian platform to achieve that milestone.
Gaana’s Chief Executive Officer Prashan Agarwal revealed the news during a press conference earlier today. He says Gaana expects to see 200 million monthly active users within the next two years. That sounds feasible, given that the service has apparently added 20 million active users since December of 2018.
Spotify launched in India at the end of February and at least count had 1 million monthly active users in India. Spotify’s global MAU number hovers around 207 million, though India represents an extremely difficult marketplace.
To celebrate the occasion, Gaana launched two new features yesterday for users. Gaana Video and a new Artist Dashboard are now available and designed to increase engagement rates from users. The Gaana CEO says the company’s move into video will help increase retention, too.
The Artist Dashboard is exclusively for artists and is designed to help identify which songs are hits. The data is automatically available for all artists and displays up-to-date statistics on their music.
Spotify faces stiff competition from local Indian music streaming services like Gaana, Wynk Music, and Jio Music, to name a few.
YouTube Music, Amazon Prime Music, and Apple Music also present competition in the Indian market. Local competitors like Jio, Wynk, and even Spotify offer a free ad-supported listening tier.
Spotify’s premium tier is heavily discounted at less than $2 a month, though others are similarly cheap.
More than 150 million users access music streaming services in India. In 2017 the Indian music market generated $130.7 million in revenue. The Indian recorded music business is estimated to be worth $300 million in 2019.
Accordingly, Indian music streaming giants are trying to secure exclusive content to differentiate themselves from the competition. Gaana has focused on offering a broader library of regional songs, with tracks in more than 30 Indic languages.
In terms of user interaction, Gaana estimates around 24% of its listeners use the voice assistant feature to help find songs. In India, most people search for songs by looking up the names of actors who appeared in the movie with the song.