SiriusXM and Pandora feedback

[Trevor1]

Sirius XM loses 94k subscribers to the Satellite Radio service and 109k Pandora subscribers.  I hate watching Pandora who was big part of the music streaming revolution slowly die and become more irrelevant by the day.  I fill there are such easy steps to help but at times it seems no one at Pandora is interested in listening.  Simple ideas are , 1. Improve the sound quality immediately, it doesn’t have to be lossless but at a minimum it should match Spotify which is, 320kbit.  That isn’t a big ask in 2024, in fact I can’t understand why it hasn’t happened, it seems inexcusable.  2. Remove dead playlist.  If I go to the For You tab, then to the playlist tab, I will see a number of playlist called, Your Playlist, all of these playlist stopped being updated in March of 2023. Why are they listed? These are dead playlists, they aren’t being updated, they use to be updated every week. If it’s no longer a thing, remove them. It makes it seem the app is being neglected. That is a bad vibe to give your paying subscribers. I could offer a long list of suggestions however, it feels useless anymore.  I love Pandora , if it’s going to survive it may be time to listen to your subscribers. 

Moderator Edit: Edited title for clarity

[Trevor1]

Just saw this headline: Pandora’s Users Are Shrinking. Here’s Why SiriusXM CEO Jennifer Witz Isn’t Worried.  

I had to do a double take and say, I think she should be very worried.   The article begins with this less than optimistic information: “There was a time that Pandora was considered a competitive threat by many in radio, but these days it is little more than an afterthought. Pandora’s user base continues to shrink, sliding to 46 million during the fourth quarter, or a loss of 1.7 million from a year earlier” 

That would make me worry if I was the CEO.  Her reason for not being worried seemed to be based on adds and making them more personalized. That seems to indicate they are focusing on the free service and not the premium subscription service. That is troubling.

The other area she focused on was Podcasting, another bad sign if you are more focused on music. 

I feel they should be worried and I think there are some serious issues that need to be addressed. I feel they have abandoned the Pandora app. It feels like a ghost ship drifting at sea. It needs some attention and they need to give an indication to everyone that they are working to make Pandora better and start making improvements and letting everyone know. Pandora isn’t the only music streaming service and consumers have many choices. 

 

[Trevor1]

“Audio entertainment giant Sirius Xm the home of Howard Stern, reported on Tuesday that it lost 359,000 self-pay subscribers in its satellite radio unit in the first quarter.

The decline from a year-earlier loss of 347,000 self-pay subs resulted from fewer trial starts in late 2023 and higher first-quarter churn. Paid promotional subscribers during the latest quarter fell by 86,000 customers, compared to a gain of 66,000 subscribers in the category last year.”

That information my not be too troubling for many here but the next number should be concerning if you love Pandora 

“SiriusXM, led by CEO Jennifer Witz, also reported self-pay subscribers of its Pandora Plus and Pandora Premium services fell by 64,000 during the first quarter, compared to a year-earlier loss of 7,000 subscribers.”

I have posted many times that I feel Pandora is slowly dying and no one in the company seems to care and unwilling to do anything to stop it. Many of us have offered countless suggestions but they fall on death ears. 

Some very simple and basic thoughts that I would think anyone could agree to, 

1. Sound Quality: It’s 2024 and Pandora still offers the lowest audio quality of any of the major music streaming services and yet Pandora increased the subscription price. Why pay the same or more for lower audio quality?  It’s just ridiculous that this is even an issue in 2024! Increase the audio quality or just continue to watch people cancel their subscription.

2. Bring back the weekly personalized playlist that were called, My Soundtrack, These updated weekly and provided subscribers weekly updated playlist focused on specific genres or moods. 

3.  Gapless playback. It’s 2024, this is a no brainer and available on all major streaming services.

4. Offer a subscription bundle for both Sirius XM and Pandora. That seems like a logical decision and another no brainer 

5. A Sirius Xm/ Pandora app. Why not combine the two services you own into one app or at least make that available as n option for those who subscribe to both.? 

6. Pandora app. Definitely needs an update, it’s been a long time and it seems dated, and in many ways feels as if it has been abandoned 

Pandora continues to lose subscribers and I don’t see it slowing down until some major steps are taken.  There are so many options today for music streaming services, you have to offer at least the same quality or better experience, simply raising subscription prices while offering a lesser quality service, is business suicide. 

[Trevor1]

Information released today indicates that Pandora lost 41,000 self pay subscribers in the April-June quarter.  I predict this trend will not only continue but increase until those in charge start paying attention and implement some changes and do so quickly.  The most obvious one is the improve the streaming audio quality. Pandora has the lowest audio quality of all major music streaming services. Spotify is now ready to offer lossless streaming possibly by the end of 2024. Pandora is being left behind in this area and honestly, the company should be embarrassed that with their massive head start against most of the other streaming services, Pandora has fallen completely behind. Bring back the weekly personalized playlist for subscribers. That was a great feature and made opening the Pandora app exciting because a new updated playlist was waiting for you almost daily. Offer a SiriusXm/Pandora combined subscription. There are many other things I could suggest but the bottom line is this, Pandora it’s 2024 and there are so many streaming services to choose from. You guys need to decide if you are serious about being a legitimate option for people to subscribe to or just a relic of the past that is slowly becoming more outdated and irrelevant as each day passes. 

[Trevor1]

More numbers were released yesterday. 

Pandora, the music-streaming service owned by SiriusXM, reported a decline in its user base as of June. Monthly active users dropped by 4.8% year-on-year to 45.1 million. The number of self-pay subscribers also fell by 5.1%, bringing the total to just under six million. Comparatively, a decade ago in Q2 2014, Pandora had 76.4 million monthly active users, indicating a loss of over 40% of its audience over the past ten years.

[t8ert0t]

Pandora seriously needs to do a better job at marketing. Anyone not in their 40s-30s has no clue it exists or what the platform can do. I wear a Pandora hat sometimes I got at event and had to explain to a cashier what it was and they said, "Oh, so like Spotify?" 

And I said, "Yes. Except it's not annoying as Spotify and doesn't jam a bunch of Concerts and half-assed playslists at you endlessly. You just get to your music quick and move right on. Or you can trust it go pull some good picks for you."

They actually seemed interested and said, "Oh, wow. I gotta try it then. Spotify is OK I guess, there's nothing really else out there besides Tidal, but their library is small and costs more."

I think Pandora could serve itself well to get back into the ad space and offer themselves as the better option when it comes to UI, the Genone (probably just call it AI at this point for relevance), and just a better experience. 

[Trevor1]

I definitely agree most people either haven’t heard of Pandora or think it died 7 years ago,  lol. However, Tidal dramatically dropped their price and is now the same as Pandora Premium. 

[alankomaat]

Decline in subscribers, where is the ambition?

The number of Pandora subscribers continues to decline. There are now just under 5.9 million. In the third quarter, 76,000 subscribers left. Compared to a year ago, there are 285,000 fewer subscribers.

How can Pandora stop this decline? I see nothing in the commentary on the quarterly results about improvements to the Pandora music service. It appears that the focus is mainly on content adjustments at SiriusXM (political and sports channels, podcasts).

As long as Pandora’s revenue stays reasonably steady, whether through price increases or not, it seems they are content with the status quo.

I hope for more ambition.