Deezer exec sheds light on unique U.S. strategy in interview

Deezer’s unusual arrival into the U.S. market has captured our attention over the past several weeks. First an Elite plan only for Sonos owners, then a Premium+ one for the only marginally less costly Bose speakers? In an interview with CNET, North American CEO Tyler Goldman explained that audiophiles were just the first of many demographics that Deezer planned to target. He said the streaming service would be launching products for other U.S. segments over the next year.

Goldman said the best way to tackle the vast population and range of musical tastes in the U.S. was to target small segments, one at a time. He observed that Deezer’s competitors have all gone for a blanket approach in the U.S., but said that most of them have not been able to translate interest into a good percentage of paying customers. “Instead of saying ‘I’m going to figure out how to do that for 3 billion people’ … I’m going to figure it out in groups of hundreds of millions,” Goldman said.

In other markets, Deezer has typically sought out a telecom partnership to help reach a large audience. But in the U.S., those deals have not always been successful in yielding subscriptions. Goldman didn’t offer details on how Deezer might approach working with that industry, but we can probably expect any efforts on that front to also be out of the ordinary.