(UPDATED) 98.9% of all digital music tracks in existence in 2011 have sold fewer than 1000 copies. That's 7,931,408 out of 8,020,660 songs. This and other "fun" music industry facts from a new book by Harvard Business School Professor Anita Elberse's new book Blockbusters: Hit-making, Risk-taking, and the Big Business of Entertainment
. Here are more (Aspiring artists, brace yourself…) :
- 73.9% of all digital music tracks sold fewer than 10 copies in 2011
- 97.1% of all albums available sold fewer than 1,000 copies in 2011
58.4% of all albums in existence sold fewer than 100 copies in 2011 – 513,146 out of 878,369 - 400 albums released in 2011 accounted for 35% of all music sales
- 514 songs out of 8,020,660 available in 2011 accounted for 40% of sales
And all of this was before Spotify and streaming music took off.
Forget the 80/20 Rule. Music Is 80/1
According to Eleberse's reading of the stats:
"For music albums, it is close to an 80/1 rule – if we can speak about a rule at all. Even if we take a conservative estimate of what would be on offer in a bricks-and-mortar store at any given point in time, [predictions] that long-tail sales will rival those in the head are far off
Read more in: Blockbusters: Hit-making, Risk-taking, and the Big Business of Entertainment
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