By Hannah Stewart (Comm鈥�19)
Spotify recently announced that the company would put more resources into improving its customers鈥� experience listening to audiobooks.听Earlier this year, five students from the College of Media, Communication and Information at the University of Colorado Boulder won a top听award for their concept of what that might look like.
Imagine walking around a college campus or downtown neighborhood when you suddenly see a massive book erected just off the path, with people scanning a QR code to listen. Doing so gets you access to a curated playlist to accompany your book鈥攁 hypothetical new feature called Spotify Booktracks.
Dreamt up by five senior strategic communication students, the Booktracks team sought to find a new way to engage Gen Z users with audiobooks. After learning that as little as 36.6% of listeners in that age group completed audiobooks, they thought that creating personalized playlists鈥攍ike film soundtracks鈥攚ould make the experience more emotionally moving.
鈥淎 lot of us like movies, and since Spotify is so integrated, we thought, why not combine the two?鈥� said Tim Pham (Stratcomm鈥�23).
Their ad explained that the curated playlists would 鈥渁ccentuate the energy of the book.鈥� But they also wanted to give users options, which is why they came up with the ability to toggle the book鈥檚 soundtrack on and off.
This project was born out of the Portfolio course, in which students are given multiple brand briefs throughout the year and are tasked with creating campaigns. By the end of the course, students have multiple examples of work to show future employers, especially in professional creative departments, said teaching associate professor Dan Ligon.
Spotify and eBay鈥檚 briefs, among others, came from organizations like and , which host national and international advertising competitions, respectively.
At the national level, Booktracks won a merit award from the Young Ones. After graduating in the spring, the students submitted their projects to competition and were recognized at the 2023 award show. Spotify Booktracks won gold and best of show in the student category.
鈥淚t was really cool to be there with my teammates and the staff of CMCI who came out to support us,鈥� said Daniel Girten (Stratcomm鈥�23), who was part of the Booktracks team.
In addition to the Spotify campaign, Girten also worked on a brief for eBay that earned a silver award at the Denver competition. That project became known as Rebay and aimed to make online reselling more fun, accessible and personal, especially for Gen Z. Girten and his team leaned into the idea that belongings often have a sentimental element, and that the younger generation cares about sustainability.
鈥淥ne of the things we thought eBay could benefit from was personalization鈥攕o that you know when you鈥檙e buying or selling something, it鈥檚 to and from a person just like you,鈥� Girten said.
To accomplish this, team Rebay proposed pop-up stores, made of repurposed shipping containers, on college campuses. Customers could bring their clothes to be repaired, photographed and ultimately posted to the website for resale. After the pop-up鈥檚 time on campus ended, the shipping containers could either be removed or left behind to create new community spaces.
鈥淓very winning advertising campaign needs a concept鈥攁n idea with an insight鈥攁nd both of these campaigns demonstrate the real communicative power of a big idea,鈥� Ligon said. 鈥淚鈥檓 so proud of these students, after all the work and effort they put in, to bring these concepts to life. It鈥檚 gratifying to see them celebrated outside of campus by the professional community.鈥�