It needs to be said that most of the stores that were opened by music labels have struggled and had to be closed. One of the main reasons for their failure to attract subscribers is the lack of diversity in their music catalogues. They only offered a small range of full-length albums by the artists that have signed to their label, and it have led to numerous problems. It is imperative to understand that the industry has changed dramatically over the last few years.
People in the modern society want to have the access to everything at once, and those stores were not able to provide it. Individuals that wish to buy music from different artists would have to be subscribed to multiple services at once, and it seemed unreasonable. Apple was able to utilize the strength of its brand to create a store that would be extremely successful.
The stores that were established by labels, on the other hand, did not have the necessary piracy protection technologies or a trendy product such as an IPod that would help them to attract customers (Sadeghi 2012). Also, labels were not ready for such drastic changes because they have focused mostly on CDs, and other music formats were viewed as a significant threat. It was too late to open such stores at that time. Nowadays, they cannot offer the music only in one place because it will significantly damage the sales of the artists.
A dramatic shift towards digital music should have been noticed by record labels, and it would help them to address this problem. They could have cooperated and created a platform with all the available resources that would allow them to dominate the market. A single store similar to Itunes or Amazon Music would have most likely become extremely successful.
However, it would not be an easy task because of all the copyright issues that could occur, and it would be extremely hard to change the whole process of distribution. An alternative music format could also be developed, but it is not as easy as it sounds. Also, it can be seen that music albums do not sell as well as they used to be. It would not have been surprising if an artist sold more than one million copies over a period of just one week few years ago.
Nowadays, the situation is entirely different. Also, it is highly likely that the sales will continue to decline with increasing popularity of streaming services (Tschmuck 2012). It can be seen that Spotify and Apple Music currently hold leading positions (Burgess 2014).
Nowadays, it is not an easy task to get into this business. Tidal is one of the best examples because the service currently struggles to retain subscribers. It offers unique content, and the audio quality is significantly better. However, some of the issues that were present during the launch were viewed as a significant problem by most customers. Also, it does not have such a huge brand and library of music.
In conclusion, it is extremely necessary to keep track of trends in the industry to make sure that the company can get an advantage over competitors. New technologies are always developing, and this fact should not be disregarded. Music labels could have addressed current problems if they were able to predict the popularity of digital music.
Reference List
Burgess, R 2014, The history of music production, Oxford University Press, Oxford, UK.
Sadeghi, S 2012, Defensive strategy – Apple’s overlooked key to success, Epubli, Berlin, GE.
Tschmuck, P 2012, Creativity and innovation in the music industry, Springer Science & Business Media, New York, NY.