KomodoPR PR london agency

Back in the old days of independent record shops, the staff behind the counter would earn their pocket money by recommending records to the customer. Having spotted you come in, they would ask what you liked and then pull out a selection of records for you to listen to and buy. Today, listening to music can be a socially isolated experience. Top of the Pops and Smash Hits have disappeared. Spotify doesn’t allow people to discover new music. It can be challenging to find out about new music unless you make time to turn on the radio or go out of your way to seek it out. But what’s cool? What’s your cool friend listening to that you’re missing out on?

Enter a new service called mflow. Basically, one creates a profile like on Facebook, finds their friends or people they’d like to connect with (radio DJs for example), then browses their recommendations. Users can listen to their friends’ recommendations in full and if they decide to purchase a track, the person who recommended the track earns cold hard cash. 20% of the sale fee, no less!

What we like about mflow is the putting back of social recommendations. The incentive to provide recommendations provides social fuel for music fans. We’ve always maintained that peer-to-peer influence is the strongest type of advocacy that a brand, organisation or product can receive and mflow’s seemingly meritocratic approach to new music discovery creates a whole world of opportunities. What happens if you change the incentive rate for certain tracks? What happens if a record label decides to invest heavily in engaging with one particular super-influencer (like a musician). How will musicians choose to support other acts?

Whatever happens with mflow, we’ll be watching this social model of influence and commerce as it evolves to see how other markets can learn from it and to try to catch a glimpse of the future of consumer behaviour in a digitally socially connected work. Top of Pops isn’t dead. Now, you’re presenting it to your friends.