How May Streams Make A Hit Song? It's A Few Zeros More Than You Think
Thinking of a hit record in terms of sales numbers doesn't cut it in the new music business, and requires a whole different mindset when it comes to streaming numbers.
www.forbes.com
A reader complained to me the other day that he only received $5 from his 10,000 streams. While that figure seems a little low, it's dependent upon the service, the tier and the kind of royalty stream (artist, copyright owner or publishing - the differences left for another post). While the royalty payment is one thing, the fact of the matter is that 10,000 streams isn't even a rounding error in today's digital music business. It means nothing in the grand scheme of things to a label, publisher, or anyone with any clout in the industry.
In fact, today a song with a million streams doesn't really get you on the industry's radar - you need at least 10 million for that.
A very minor hit now comes in at around 50 million.
Real hits start at around 100 million, but most blockbusters are in excess of 500 million.
Of course an elite few reach a billion, and some of them now go to 2 billion and beyond. Who has the most? It's still PSY with "Gangnam Style" at 2.88 billion, but it picks up around a million per day and will be the first to 3 billion soon (according to my colleague at Forbes Hugh McIntyre).
