Despite all the hype over the entry of Apple Music into the streaming music arena, people are still hesitant to spend money not only on Apple Music, but any streaming service. That’s the conclusion of the latest edition of Nielsen’s annual Music 360 report.
While every day there are new articles regarding the growth of streaming music, it turns out that good old fashioned radio not only refuses to die but is actually growing in importance in regards to consumers discovering new music. Music 360 found that 61% of people say they discover music that way, which is up from 57% in 2014.
On the other hand, only 27% of consumers said they discovered new music via a music streaming service (and that includes YouTube).
This shows that the much talked about migration to subscription music isn’t the exactly the flood that was expected by now.
One of the major reasons for the slow start is price, an opinion that industry analysts have long held and was born out again in Music 360. According to the study, the top three reasons that consumers gave for not subscribing was that services are too expensive (46%), they can stream music for free elsewhere (42%), and they didn’t think they’d use a service enough to justify the spend (38%).
Although the current $9.99 per month seems like an ideal number in terms of the music industry’s wants and needs, that figure doesn’t seem to correspond to what consumers have in mind.
The general feeling among industry analysts is that $3.99 to $4.99 is a much better ballpark for a monthly price. It’s an easier psychological barrier to breach, and addresses two of the three objections sited in the report. You might feel that your 10 bucks a month is being spent unwisely if you only listen for a few hours during that time period, but it doesn’t hurt nearly as much at half that price.
The chances of getting just about any music licensing body to sign off on a $4.99 per month price seems to be somewhere between slim and none at the moment though. Even the mighty Apple couldn’t negotiate a reported $7.99 per month price, which signals that it’s going to take some time before a continued low adoption rate causes a re-think of that position. Read more on Forbes.
1 comment:
Either music lovers have become so self-entitled to getting something for next to nothing, or simply blatantly ripping off their favorite artists for free, or can one be so blindly optimistic in hoping people have grown a collective conscience and realize how their favorite artists are still being ripped off with abysmally poor monetary compensation for their hard work, etc. by the unfair concept of streaming?
It's another addition to the cannibalistic self-perpetuating downward spiral of the degeneration of all that's been good and decent about music. This only continues the current trend of McDonald's-like junkmusic force fed to the public that passes for it.
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