Staggering Statistics

According to a study by Will Page, chief economist for the MCPS-PRS (a royalty collection service), more than 10 million of the 13 million digital tracks available on the internet failed to find a single buyer.  What's more, 80% of the revenue came from only 52,000 of those tracks.

And it gets worse for albums.  Of the 1.23 million available, only 173,000 were ever bought, meaning 85% did not sell a single copy all year. It's hard to believe that many artists have no friends or family.  

But seriously, one of the biggest problems of the music industry is too much product.  In the past, there were numerous filters set up along the pipeline from music creation to consumer that ensured some level of quality (the first being the record label and the last being the radio station program director).  Today, the old gatekeepers have far less influence, for better or for worse.  Given the ease of recording and distributing music today, quality of the product is far more of an issue than the quantity.

But what if you have a truly great product?  How do you get a great product in the first place? How do you get your hand higher in a sea of upheld hands?  We'll uncover some answers to these questions in future posts.