How Spotify renewed Filipinos’ love for playlists on Valentine’s Day
Spotify wanted to create hype and more interest for its existing playlist feature through a Valentine’s campaign positioning playlists as a special love language. Near took an emotional storytelling route to create a KOL campaign that had Filipinos talking about and sharing their playlists.
*KOL = Key Opinion Leaders aka Influencers / Content Creators
Spotify is the world’s most popular audio streaming subscription service. It is a platform that gets to know its users and further invites them into a limitless journey of audio discovery.
As a trailblazer in the era of online streaming, Spotify is an eclectic hub that makes space for both listeners and creators to explore, interact, and share their love for audio in all its forms.
Spotify PH gets Filipinos to fall in love (with playlists)
Playlists are a normal part of every Spotify user’s listening experience. Spotify Philippines wanted to generate a renewed excitement for the feature and encourage Filipinos to make their own playlists through a local campaign. Noting Filipinos’ affinity for romance and anything love-related, Spotify chose to launch a Valentine’s-centered campaign through a combination of digital initiatives and on-ground campus activations.
Spotify partnered with Near Creative to head the KOL (key opinion leader) arm of its Valentine’s campaign to create awareness and maximize reach, positioning playlists as their own special love language for the love month.
The team handpicked both well-known couples and singles who had a knack for expressing their love through music and playlists. This helped keep the content natural, engaging, and emotionally resonant.
While Near wanted the content to integrate Spotify and its user interface, we also wanted to avoid a hard-sell or overly explanatory approach. The team put together content pillars from which KOLs could base their content ideas off of to encourage creative formats that also felt right for every KOL’s branding. From heart-fluttering couple content to relationship status reveals, the diverse mix of KOLs and content styles kept things fresh while reinforcing Spotify as the perfect platform to express and experience love through music.
Featured KOLs: @allianadolina, @sol_santiago
Near celebrates all kinds of love through KOL collabs
Filipino audiences love love as much as they love a good story, so blending Spotify into these exciting content formats drew results that went above campaign targets for all relevant metrics. Since Near had already worked with Spotify Philippines for Daylist and 2024 Wrapped, the team was able to take learnings from these campaigns and streamline KOL categories. This delivered a highly focused campaign with the highest engagement rates (compared to earlier KOL campaigns) across a more curated set of posts. The updated content strategy sparked conversations and encouraged playlist sharing on and off the streaming platform.
The team also had the opportunity to work with today’s most sought-after celebrities such as Gabbi Garcia, Alexa Ilacad, Heaven Peralejo, and Marco Gallo, who posted sentimental content about and with their significant others that drove strong organic reach and engagement.
Featured KOLs: @heavenlyanperalejo, @alexailacad_
Near’s learnings for campaigns people will fall for
Audiences love sincerity. The highest-performing content were those that took an emotional storytelling route. These KOLs made playlists feel like a soundtrack to their honest and unfiltered stories and experiences, which connected with Filipino audiences.
People love to (over)share. Sincere content does not just make people watch. It also invites them to share their own experiences – in this case, even their own playlists. Some comments showed audiences sharing links to their own Spotify playlists and expressing an interest in making a playlist for their crushes or significant others.
The internet loves simplicity. Near saw that straightforward videos are best for boosting, as their simple formats make them digestible for viewers. These organic-looking videos generate significant reach when boosted.
Featured KOLs: @gabb, @marcogalloc, @evalequeen, @lallainashley,