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News
Apple’s New Role in Dictating a Band’s Success
Thursday, March 8th, 2007 at 2:00 PM - by John Martellaro
Each day, about a million visitors come to the iTunes store and about five million songs are sold. How Apple promotes certain bands and how Apple presents the iTunes home page was examined by the Wall Street Journal on Friday.
"Apple has jettisoned some of the conventions of traditional music retailing -- notably, the practice of selling prime promotional spots to recording companies willing to pay for better visibility for their acts. But behind the scenes there's plenty of horse-trading going on that influences which songs are seen and purchased by iTunes customers," Nick Wingfield and Ethan Smith wrote.
In fact, the decision a relatively small number of Apple employees makes can put an unknown band on the map or relegate others to the depths of iTunes.
While this power has upset a few artists, it's been good news for the music industry as a whole. Several bands that have caught the attention of Apple staffers, after some negotiations, have had spectacular sales. "In January, iTunes executives approached several record labels to set up a promotion in which they would slash the prices of 20 greatest-hits albums to $7.99, and Apple in turn would flag the entire group on the home page....[The album which] normally sold on iTunes for nearly $34, zoomed to No. 1 on the site's album-sales chart. It stayed in the top 10 for the entire 10 days of the promotion," the authors reported.
Apple likes to believe that they've developed a closer rapport with their customers. Instead of simply accepting money for prime placement, Apple has hired music enthusiasts who work like small town retailers of old. In those days, customers believed that the advice "was coming from someone who really liked it versus someone who was paid to say they liked it," said Eddy Cue, the Apple vice president who oversees iTunes
Despite Apple's down home enthusiasm for music, sometimes it does take some effort to get in Apple's face. Josh Deutsch, CEO of Downtown records, had to actually bring one of hits artists to Cupertino to perform. While that kind of effort is sometimes required, "The flip side is, when they do step out on a new artist, it's that much more meaningful," Mr. Deutsch said.
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