Resource: Music Industry Statistics 2011

For full statistics and industry reports, please go to the Resource page.

Selling your music is very much about understanding your music market: who they are and how they behave. Did you know these facts about the music-buying youths in South East Asia?

They are:

• Born in 1980s onwards
• Between the ages of 18-29
• Main music consumer (purchaser and/or listener), a trend that is observed worldwide as well as in ASEAN with 63% describing themselves as passionate about music.
• Embrace multiple modes of self-expression: online, offline, visual, spatial, copy, installation, movement. [Photo source (c) camuna]

Their profile:

• 75% have at least one social networking site.
• 1 out of 5 have posted videos online.
• 88% uses mobile phones to text.
• 54% believes technology brings family and friends closer; with 62% using wireless technology.
• 41% have voted for contestants on televised talent competitions.
• 16% of their income is spent on music; which is third after food (40%) and paying mobile phone bills (21%), and ranks higher than film, video games and sports.

In the last 24 hours:

• 34% watched a video online
• 32% updated their online profile or posted a message
• 28% played video game
• 56% sent or received an email
• 85% listened to music

In the last month:

• 64% watched music videos (TV, online & mobile)
• 21% stream music directly from 0nline sites (Spotify, MySpace)
• 8% paid for mobile music apps
• 12% paid to download full music track from online or mobile stores

In the last 365 days:

• 42% attended a live concert
• 16% bought a live tour/concert DVD
• 16% bought ringtones/wallpaper via mobile phones
• 11% bought a music/artist merchandise

WORLDWIDE INDUSTRY NUMBERS 2011 

(source: International Federation of the Phonographic Industry)

13 million	Tracks licensed by record companies to digital music services
USD4.6 billion	Trade value of the digital music market worldwide
USD5 billion	The estimated amount record companies invested in artists in 2009
USD67.6billion	Worldwide music industry revenues
USD7.3billion	is from mobile
USD7.5billon	is from online
USD19.9billion	is from physical sales
USD12.1billion	Worldwide concert ticket revenues
400+	Licensed digital music services worldwide
6%	Growth of global digital music revenues in 2010
29%	The proportion of record companies’ global revenues from digital channels
1000%	The increase in the value of the digital music market 2004-10
30%	The percentage of their revenues record companies invest on A&R and marketing
-31%	The decline in the value of the global recorded music industry 2004-10
-77%	estimated fall in debut album unit sales in the global top 50 2003-2010
-12%	The fall in revenues of the global top tours in 2010
29%	of industry revenue today is digital

Related articles

• The Future of the Music Business: video update by Futurist and Speaker Gerd Leonhard (gerdleonhard.typepad.com)
• How Fast Do You Type? [MakeUseOf Poll] (makeuseof.com)
• 5 Industries That Steve Jobs Helped Change Forever (mac.appstorm.net)

The Shoe Doesn’t Fit Every Foot

Ladies in High Heels - source: TheBerry.com

Earlier this year I received an unusual request that simply said: please submit to me your one-year proposal for my ***** project.

In fact, a couple of days ago, while having a conversation over coffee, my companion asked me something similar. We were talking about start-up businesses and how to best promote the product and services to its intended target market when I got asked again: so, what is the best proposal to market this product?

The problem with both request/question is the assumption that there is a specific formula or a one-size-fits-all solution to market or promote a product. This is actually very common. Whenever I explain that a large portion of my job is to put on a strategic hat and conceptualize a marketing communications strategy for clients, I am always asked to come up with on-the-spot ideas.

Unfortunately, it doesn’t work that way.

While marketing communications objectives are almost always universal, the how’s and why’s can be very different from one product to another. Marketing a high-end mixed-development that is targeted towards rich foreigners who are considering Malaysia as their second home is different from a residential project that targets the mid-high level income DINKs. A lot of research, thought and assumptions go into formulating the plan. Yes, it is a bit of science and a lot of intuition but one thing for sure, there isn’t a generic solution that I can pull out of the hat and recommend.

Through this blog I hope to share case studies for projects that I have undertaken in the past. It will outline the methodology and thought process, as well as key achievements (or failures, in some cases) and hopefully will give you some ideas or spark a discussion on how to market products and services more efficiently and effectively. Due to sensitivity and confidentiality, the name of products and companies would be changed, but the nature of the products and results achieved will be disclosed.

I also would like to invite you to challenge me. One of my niche is to write business proposals and conceptualize start-up ventures, which is really something that I enjoy doing. So if you have an idea that you want to see fly-off, but you don’t know where or how to start, challenge me with it. Don’t worry, it will not cost you a thing and the intellectual property for the project remains yours.

Write to me at business@cliquecreative.int.tc and we can start. I look forward to hear from you soon!

~IA