For those of us who really are interested in perusing
careers in the music industry, we have to pay attention to the associations
that are working on our behalf. RIAA is one of those associations. RIAA
stands for Recording Industry Association of America. The members are the record
labels that produce, create, manufacture and distribute most of the music
produced in the US. The RIAA supplies lots of information about the music
industry to professionals, fans and parents as well However for this post we
will focus on the area of statistics and what that means to the music industry
professional.
The key research for RIAA is called “shipment statistics.”
Shipment statistics is a way that RIAA describes net sales of recordings
including digital transactions. These stats can be very helpful to any of us
who want to take a deeper look into the industry and discover some details that
may help us to maximize marketing and production dollars spent. The statistics
show net number of units shipped and the dollar value accumulated for those
sales. The numbers are compared to the previous year and a % change column
shows the increase or decrease in shipments and retail dollar value between the
two.
Here are some key components that I believe will be helpful
to all of us. You can check out the stats here: http://76.74.24.142/FA8A2072-6BF8-D44D-B9C8-CE5F55BBC050.pdf
Component #1: You still need actual CDs for your albums.
Although there was a 4.8% drop in shipments between 2010 and 2011, which
resulted in an 8.5% drop in revenue, CD sales still had revenue of almost 3
times the revenue of downloaded albums. Make no mistake digital is the future
and must be embraced as it has increased 22% from 2010 to 2011, but we still
have to give people something to put in their hands.
Component #2: When it comes to singles get it to iTunes
ASAP. Although it seems that people still rather buy albums as CDs, when it
comes to singles, digital is the way to go. CD singles do show a 28% increase
between the two years, however when compared to the numbers of shipments, CDs
singles don’t stand a chance. Digital singles had 1.3 billion shipments in 2011
compared to 1.3 million CD singles shipped that same year. Also digital single
downloads show an increase of almost 11% in 2011 from 2010. The lesson here is
to get your finished projects to the sites to be digitally downloadable as soon
as possible because people don’t seem to mind paying a little money for 1 song
online.
The RIAA is a great resource for music industry people. You
can view that last two years of compared data for free on the RIAA website. You
can access more information as a due paying member.
All information for this post has been from data supplied on
the RIAA web pages located in the following links.
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