Taylor Swift’s '1989' not on Spotify but Microsoft is selling it for $0.99
Taylor Swift’s ‘1989’ has only been out for a couple of days but it is already being pegged as the biggest release of 2014. Critics are being largely positive about the release and fans are out to buy it in droves, confirming that Swift has gone in the right direction by finally cutting her ties with the country music world.
The album appears to be on track to break the one million sales barrier during its first week of release in the United States alone. ‘1989’ would be not only the first release of 2014 to sell a million copies in its first week, but also the first artist album of 2014 to sell a million copies period.
As always when it comes to such a huge release all eyes are on the marketing and distribution strategy. For example, Swift decided to avoid streaming services once again in order to drive more album sales. This ‘windowing’ tactic has been been adopted by a number of leading pop acts such as Adele and Coldplay over the past couple of years, attracting its fair share of criticism as it could be argued that those who choose to spend $120 per year on music through an Rdio or Spotify premium subscription may rightfully feel a little short-changed by the absence of such major releases, which could hurt the music ecosystem in the long term.
In addition Microsoft has decided to mimic Amazon’s 2011 strategy for Gaga’s 'Born This Way', capitalising on Swift’s popularity by introducing a very special offer as part of the Microsoft Music Deals app that was launched last week. Users purchasing the album through the app are able to get their hands on it for just $0.99, which is a hefty discount compared to iTunes’ price which is over $12. Like with Amazon in 2011, Microsoft will still have to pay the normal “wholesale” price and will lose money on every sale made.
Microsoft has kept pretty quiet about the offer other than promoting it on its own Twitter feed - possibly to minimise the losses - and given that Microsoft Music Deals app is only available to Windows 8 and Windows phone users this promotion is likely to have a much more limited impact than Amazon’s Gaga stunt, which was credited for a good chunk of week-one sales of the album.
We'll be following Swift’s release as the week progresses, and will report on international sales figures that could push the album close to two million sales by the end of the week.
(Andrea Leonelli)