Warner Music inks deal with Community text-messaging platform

Community is used by several famous individuals, including Ashton Kutcher and Barack Obama, and boasts more than 28 million members.

Using a 10-digit Community number, the app allows Warner’s artists to text their fans about their music releases, merch, ticket sales and more.

Warner says some of its artists have already begun using the messaging platform to engage with fans by sending them “personal birthday messages and exchanging selfies”.

“Community’s model helps us cut through the noise and gives us an authentic, personal, and unique way to reach the superfans,” Warner Music Group’s senior vice-president of global audience strategy, Scott Cherkin, said. “Some artists are already promoting their numbers at shows to really great reception and we’re excited to offer Community to even more artists in the Warner Music family.”

Community’s senior vice-president of growth, partnerships and revenue, David Ross, said: “Our partnership with Warner Music unlocks additional opportunities for artists to drive engaging conversations at scale with their fans. Deeper connections with fans ultimately result in increased sales, greater content consumption, deeper artist affinity and additional opportunities for Warner Music’s roster and brands.”

Community was founded by Matthew Peltier and Josh Rosenheck in 2019 and is headquartered in Santa Monica. The platform recently raised $40m from Salesforce Ventures bringing total funding raised to approximately $90m. Other Community investors include Sound Ventures, Live Nation and Sony Innovation Fund.

Last week, Amazon-owned livestreaming platform Twitch and Warner Music entered a “unique partnership”, which also marked the company’s first deal with a major music label. The partnership will see the launch of several WMG artist channels featuring exclusive and behind-the-scenes content. A separate WMG platform focusing on music programming will also be established, offering regularly updated “exclusive experiences”.