File sharing driving sales
File sharing, more commonly known as downloading music, is quite a hassle actually if you’ve ever tried it. You can never be sure that you are actually downloading what you wanted to in the first place. That aside, the people who do so, are more likely to BUY music as well. On top of that they visit more concerts, and they buy more merchandise related to the music they buy and download. As a result file sharing has a positive effect on the music industry as a whole. In the survey, it was also asked, what would change if it would no longer be possible to download. As you might have guessed: less CD’s would be sold at the current price point.

I’m not sure if you all would have guessed this dynamic. But, I have always wondered about the ‘truth’ to declining sales of CD’s and the reasons for it. As it appears from the survey, the risen price of CD’s might be to blame much more for it. It seems, that the consumer is no longer willing to pay those prices. Perhaps it is time to reinvent that product, not by putting the blame on the consumer, but by looking at the business itself. THE question should be: how can we attract the people that don’t buy our products anymore, instead of how can we convince the people who don’t buy our products to buy our products anyway. There’s a nuance in that question that is often not considered. It’s not a marketing issue, but a product development issue.

Blurring boundaries
The results of the survey show that the money is shifting from the CD, to other elements of the music industry (even though the people who download music buy more music) as well. That fits the theme of blurring boundaries, where CD sales or retail is blurring with that of live events.

The question then becomes: would this apply to the movie industry as well? And if so, which parts of the movie making industry could blur with other industries related to it?

Link to the report (in Dutch)