2014 Q3: Hot Off the Press
Welcome to Sugo Music Group! The 2nd Quarter of 2014 is coming to a close and so far it has been an exciting half-year in the music industry! Please take a moment to read our SMG Industry Update section below for many new trends, announcements, music sales opportunities, and market share updates that are affecting and influencing all musicians throughout the world.
Here in 2014, Sugo Music Group has expanded its "artist to market" music distribution portfolio and offers the largest, most comprehensive global music distribution solution services in the industry!
SMG NEWS UPDATE!
Apple Buys Beats! Yes, you've probably already heard that Apple purchased Jimmy Iovine and Dr Dre's Beats Electronics and Beats Music for a shocking $3.2 billion. Everyone's asking the perfunctory question, "What does this mean for my music?" SMG has got you covered as we are already working with distribution execs to provide a seamless ingestion process!
Digital Music 2013 Summary! The IFPI Digital Music Report was just released showing that music revenues grew in Europe and Latin America, stabilized in the United States and experienced a sharp 16.7% decline in Japan, bringing global revenues down 3.9% to an estimated US$15 billion. Not including Japan, global music revenues were only down 0.1%. Digital revenues worldwide grew by 4.3% in 2013 to US$5.9 billion. Digital now accounts for 39% of total industry global revenues. Revenues from music subscription services grew by 51.3%, exceeding US$1 billion. Performance rights income more than doubled in 2013, reaching US$1.1 billion globally, an estimated 19% rise (our Publishing & Collections services can help you tap into some of that). Synchronization income declined by 3.4%, now accounting for 2.1% of total industry revenue.
Sound Exchange and Sugo Music Group! During the past decade, digital radio (including satellite radio and non-interactive streaming) has grown into a substantial revenue source for artists and record labels alike. Data released by the RIAA reveals the rapid growth and significance of Sound Exchange distributions. Specifically, Sound Exchange payments represented 8.4 percent of the total $7 billion in U.S. music industry revenues in 2013. That number is up from 6.7 percent in 2012, and was only 1.1 percent as recently as 2008. Our team works with SX on a daily basis, ensuring that your music is thoroughly formatted and protected from infringement & double claiming in over 35 countries around the world! Contact us and we'll get you set up for collections and broadcast performances.
Pandora Wins a Battle, but the War Over Royalties Continues! In the increasingly bitter dispute over royalties for online music, Pandora Media won an important battle in court earlier this year. But the state of the larger war is far from clear when the court ruled that Pandora (the leading Internet radio service) must pay ASCAP to use its music the same rate (1.85 percent of Pandora's revenue). Based on the royalty rate alone, the decision appeared to have split the issue down the middle. Pandora had wanted the slightly lower rate that radio broadcasters pay (1.7 percent of revenue). ASCAP, envious of the (much) higher royalties that record companies make from Pandora, had wanted the rate to gradually increase to 3 percent. So neither side got what it wanted. What does this mean for musicians and distributors? Well, you can rest assured that you'll be making the same royalties from the Performance Rights Organizations (ASCAP, BMI, etc.) that you are registered with. If you are not registered with worldwide PRO's and/or if your music is not currently being broadcasted by Pandora, SirusXM or any of the other leading streaming sites, contact SUGO Music Group immediately and we will set you up!
YouTube In New Territories! YouTube has expanded its reaches and is now monetizing music in Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia!
Spotify Is Growing At the Speed of Sound! Spotify is now launching in Brazil (the eighth largest market in the world and the biggest South American market). which has thus far been dominated by streaming platforms Rdio and Deezer. Brazil will be Spotify's 57th market. Another bit of news is that Spotify has recently purchased music data platform The Echo Nest, which will help refine the streaming service's discovery and recommendation tools. This will generate more streaming revenues for our label partners!
Rdio in India! Rdio has also gone on a shopping spree and acquired the Indian music streaming service Dhingana. Keep your eyes peeled for Rdio India, coming soon.
Bye Bye Muve Music! Farewell, nice to know you, and adieu toMuve Music, which was axed following Cricket Wireless' re-launch under AT&T.
Samsung's New Streaming Service! In more signs that streaming is the future, Samsung has just launched an ad-free radio streaming service by the name of Milk Music. Powered by Slacker Radio, Milk Music is currently only available in the U.S. and on Samsung Galaxy devices.
Nokia in China! Nokia is bringing MixRadio and its catalogue of 30 million tracks to China, where more than 80% of internet users access the net through a mobile device. We're on it!
Hasta la Vista Last FM! Last.fm is closing down its radio streaming service, moving towards a replacement player that will source its music from YouTube, VEVO and Spotify. We'll keep you posted.
SMG PARTNER SERVICE UPDATE!
Your Music Streaming Presence! Streaming music services now generate a major share of distributions. Download stores do not always have the built-in discovery provisions that digital radio streaming services offer, and the search ability within most download stores is limited. With streaming services, who boast millions of tracks for users to browse and listen to, the game has somewhat changed. Most of these radio streaming services make heavy use of algorithms to populate their recommendations or browse sections, limiting pure search ability of your music tracks. To help increase your visibility, despite these obstacles, Sugo Music Group intricately formats, reviews and monitors the information and quality control of your track's metadata and mood descriptors, and stays abreast of the ever-changing music industry's style guides & metadata requirements to ensure that your music is searchable, discover-able and positioned throughout the world - allowing your music to become a requisite part of listeners' playlists.
Maximizing International Performance Royalties!
The value of revenues from performance rights is increasing steadily, and shows no sign of declining. In the U.S., these rights are managed by SoundExchange, while overseas the options are more complex. What if your track is getting airplay in the UK or Europe, Australia, Japan or elsewhere? There are over 30 international performance rights organizations that collect on your master's sound performances (digital broadcasts). Sugo Music Group has an executive enterprise relationship with Sound Exchange and their international affiliates. Everyday we aggressively negotiate counter claims with all sorts of companies such as Sony, Universal, Word and more. Counter claiming is an essential part of protecting your catalog of masters and requires expertise, constant focus, an experienced team and meticulous attention to detail. For example, this past week Sugo Music Group settled claims on one of our partner's master tracks through Sound Exchange for over $10,000 dating back to 2007 and last month we resolved over $25,000 of false claims for our partners. We are currently negotiating counter claim releases on thousands of othertracks dating back to 1999. Take a moment to contact us so that we can review if there are any of your tacks being mistakenly or illegally claimed by companies around the world.
Be Prepared for Growth and Increased Royalties!
To grow the music business in a world of only 300 million music buyers, we must tap the 5 billion who do not buy music. How do we do this? The only way is to include all of the world's music in every connected device, mobile phone, car, TV and game console and monetize the artist/fan relationship wherever possible. These and other new revenue centers can grow the music business fourfold in the next decade. Learn how to lead the charge to new revenues that will drive more distributions for artists, and a more profitable music industry. Send us an email describing your current music distributions and we'll see if we can add more services and distributions to your current distribution portfolio!
Get It Right! Listen Up! This Is Important!
As streaming continues to grow, so does the number of tracks ingested by services like Spotify, Deezer, Rdio and more. That means your metadata needs to be up to spec to ensure your music is delivered to the service accurately and with no issues. In addition, there are several new policies on content infringement (always a good thing to know), especially for rules concerning Public Domain content, Performance Rights Organization, Mechanical Rights Agencies, and a plethora of international territory policies. No worries! As complicated as this actually is, Sugo Music Group specializes in precise, up to date, industry-required metadata standards. We've noticed that this is not the case for most automated music distributors - you know who they are! Sugo Music Group analyzes, prepares and monitors your metadata for the ever-changing, global, music industry landscape - and yes, we do it by hand... manually, one track at a time! Contact us and we'll review if your metadata conforms to the industry benchmark here in 2014.
Music Distribution:Grow, Grow & GROW!
Sugo Music Group is the only distributor to integrate global digital distribution & streaming, newly licensed music compilation albums, publishing, film & TV licensing, YouTube & Internet synchronization & monetization, Content Identification (CiD), global song registration, performance rights organizations, in-store & business broadcasts, and CD manufacturing & distribution services. We understand the importance of selling and marketing across all formats & channels with superior supply chain management. Whether it's a full length album on iTunes, an EP compilation on Spotify, a single on our various YouTube radio channels, a ringtone through Telefonica, or a one-at-a-time manufactured "on demand" CD via Amazon in Germany, we supply hundreds of outlets around the world through our unparalleled distribution supply chain & asset management system!
From San Francisco to South Korea, Chile to China, and from India to Indonesia, your music will be distributed the right way... oh, yes, and by real people who will listen to your music and not just shove your tracks into an automated system!
Sugo Music Group's distribution platform stems from 30 years of strategic partnerships which will connect you to more listeners & more paying customers!
Thanks for your time and interest.
We're here to help get you plugged-in to your Complete Distribution Portfolio,
Stevan Pasero
CEO/Founder
