By Hannah Karp
Starting next week there will be new ways for artists to climb
the Billboard 200 album chart: selling singles and racking up
streams on Spotify, changes that could complicate the ways record
labels time the release of big new albums with chart-topping
potential.
Instead of simply tabulating album sales, Billboard, the music
trade magazine, and its data provider, Nielsen SoundScan, will use
a new formula to rank the country's most popular albums, counting
1,500 song streams as the equivalent of one album sale. To qualify,
the streams must occur on on-demand, subscription services such as
Spotify AB, Apple Inc.'s Beats Music, and Google Inc.'s All Access,
which charge about $10 a month. Streams on ad-supported radio
services such as Pandora Media Inc. won't count, nor will YouTube
views, according to a person familiar with the matter.
The 1,500-streams-per-album-sale formula is one that is already
used by many record labels to make other business calculations.
The new ranking system will also count the sales of 10 separate
songs from an album as equivalent to one album sale, also a
long-standing equivalent in the music business.
The album-chart moves follow Billboard's makeover of its Hot 100
songs chart in 2012. Last year Billboard added YouTube views to the
Hot 100 calculation as well.
The new formula poses a conundrum for artists and record labels
when it comes to the timing of new releases. It typically takes
several weeks for songs to peak on streaming services, some label
executives and managers say. But sales are usually highest in an
album's first week, so getting both metrics to peak at the same
time to optimize chart position requires making the music available
on streaming services several weeks ahead of Apple iTunes
Store.
At the same time, though, many artists and labels are reluctant
to release to streaming services first, at the risk of souring
relations with Apple, a valuable marketing partner. Withholding
music from streaming services may also drive sales for the biggest
artists. Most notably, Taylor Swift sold nearly 1.3 million copies
of her new album "1989" in its first week--the biggest sales week
for any album since 2002--without making it available for
streaming.
The changes to the album chart were reported earlier Wednesday
afternoon by the New York Times.
Write to Hannah Karp at hannah.karp@wsj.com
Access Investor Kit for Apple, Inc.
Visit
http://www.companyspotlight.com/partner?cp_code=P479&isin=US0378331005
Access Investor Kit for Google, Inc.
Visit
http://www.companyspotlight.com/partner?cp_code=P479&isin=US38259P5089
Access Investor Kit for Google, Inc.
Visit
http://www.companyspotlight.com/partner?cp_code=P479&isin=US38259P7069
Access Investor Kit for Pandora Media, Inc.
Visit
http://www.companyspotlight.com/partner?cp_code=P479&isin=US6983541078
Subscribe to WSJ: http://online.wsj.com?mod=djnwires