Jack In The Box has launched a Facebook app that lets viewers search for tunes and click through to Spotify—if they are signed up with the digital music service—to get a listen.
In the process, users can create "Jack's Late Night Munchie Mix" playlists and share them with friends within the social-music feature. The move marks a trend from recent months where brands are increasingly interested in attaching music-listening experiences to digital marketing.
The San Diego-based fast-food chain wasn't available to comment, but it's using one feature from a suite of new products from startup F# (pronounced "ef sharp"). Absolut just ended a test run using the Facebook music app that pushed a sweepstakes. Per F# reps, 32 percent who used the app entered the liquor brand's contest, and 36 percent created playlists.
Moving forward, another debuting F# product, called AdPlayer, entails musical display ads for publishing networks. Viewers click to play the tunes within a music player on major sites, theoretically. Think Pepsi potentially leveraging its relationship with Beyoncé via ESPN.com or NYT.com ads. It sounds cool, but the New York-based F# wouldn't disclose brands interested in the product.
Though AdPlayer's capabilities has the ear of pundit Alice Enders, Enders Analysis. "[It] solves a real problem of online marketing by allowing advertisers to mesh their brand with the music loved by the target of the ad, generating far superior yields and effectiveness," Enders said.
The AdPlayer function is just the latest in a string of music-minded marketing products. Just last week, nutritional supplement maker Mead Johnson started testing tunes in email campaigns from a service by DMI Music.
At the same time, it's unclear if viewers—whether at work, at home or on the go—will be willing to stop what they are digitally doing to listen to songs simply because a brand is pitching the idea. Yet with utility-centric branding plays like Nike's Fuelband being so wildly popular, expect more experimentation in the services-as-marketing space.