[Ted] No, Foreigner's not my band. But MTV fans sure loved them (or loved to hate them in my case) back in the 80s when the band's videos were in heavy rotation. Thankfully, music has moved on from there (though Elvis, Neil, Bruce, and Edge are still doing okay), but MTV along with Rollingstone is still the biggest brand in music promotion. So can MTV do what Napster, Yahoo!, and Real have so far failed to do -- dethrone Apple as King Digital Tunes?
With Microsoft’s help -- don’t forget that Microsoft has invested $1 billion in digital media technology already -- MTV Networks will add digital music retail to its portfolio. I spoke with Van Toffler, MTV Networks president, Blair Westlake, Microsoft VP of Digital Media, and Jason Hirschorn, MTV Network’s new “chief digital officer” (guess that title had to show up eventually) about its forthcoming URGE services.
What it means (WIM) #1. Young promoters will get a new place to find, buy, and recommend music. Today, 35% of young online consumers never buy music online, 6% buy only, and 15% both buy and share. It turns out that this last group, promoters, is the most valuable music customer. (You can get all the data in this report.)
WIM #2: Music subscriptions will finally get the marketing it deserves. Napster, Yahoo!, and Real have been struggling to get consumers to understand and sign up for their subscription (“all you can eat for one monthly price”) services. MTV has a chance, through its pervasive television and online promotions to change this. Everybody wins if subscriptions take off.
WIM #3. Music discovery will get a chance online. Today, finding new musicis a hit or miss thing -- if you know somebody or if you find a blog or MySpace friend with your tastes, you’re all set. Otherwise, fuggedaboutit. URGE has the opportunity to change all that by bringing programming wizards, consumer recommendations, and band recommendations to URGE.
WIM #4. MTV will have to staff up the call center. If URGE music sales or subscriptions take off, then MTV will inherit the customer service complaint the Napster is plagued with: “My songs won’t play on my iPod.” Yup, Apple doesn’t support Microsoft’s DRM and won’t let Microsoft support theirs. To head off buyer’s remorse, MTV should put an “iPods not supported” warning label in big letters on the URGE site. Because 80% of online young consumers listen to their music on a PC and only 25% own an MP3 player, that warning won't keep everybody away.
Ted...I am not sure if you have checked out Pandora.com--one of the best music discovery services in the market. It is a product of the Music Genome Project.
Posted by: Ash | December 15, 2005 at 12:56 PM