Mobile music discovery provider Shazam, famed for the ability of its Sound Audio Recognition Advertising (SARA) technology to solve many a pub and club “who sings this one?” dispute, has appointed Evan Krauss as executive vice president for advertising sales. Krauss joins Shazam from mobile advertising agency JumpTap, where he served as senior VP for global ad sales & business development.
His move coincides with Shazam’s current expansion within the marketing sector, hot on the heels of a number of high-profile advertising campaigns this year, both with music industry clients and clothing manufacturers, such as jeans giant Levi’s.
“Evan joins Shazam at a pivotal time,” comments Andrew Fisher, Shazam CEO. “[His] experience in fast-growth digital companies, creating and implementing innovative advertising solutions and driving revenue, combined with his skills at managing and motivating teams to succeed, will prove a powerful combination for both Shazam and our media clients.”
Over the past 15 years, Krauss has headed up marketing campaigns at the likes of Excite, AOL, Looksmart and Yahoo!, having spent six and a half years serving as MD of the latter company’s Connected Life Business unit. He says: “Whilst Shazaming a song is already established behaviour for millions of people, now, marketers are also realising that they can deliver tailored, measurable marketing campaigns into people’s hands, with the ability to Shazam television programming, radio shows and commercials.”
Shazam estimates that some 75m mobile users, including more than 20m iPhone and iPod touch users, have utilised its technology worldwide, and that more than 1m new users are drawn to the service every week.