Apple Senior VP Eddy Cue says the company plans to rely on their recently launched iTunes Radio service to provide enhanced discovery to promote new albums which will make their debut on the new service.
Apple plans to leverage their new iTunes Radio service to make it easier for customers to discover streaming album debuts, iTunes boss Eddy Cue said to Entertainment Weekly on Monday. Cue was speaking to the magazine about the just-finished iTunes Festival in London.
When asked about he influence that streaming debuts have on iTunes Radio, he replied, “We certainly knew we would leverage it for iTunes Radio but the primary key to iTunes Radio was to create it custom for you. When you’re talking premiering song, what we’re doing iTunes Festival-wise, we knew iTunes Radio was a perfect place for that so it’s perfect alignment.”
Record labels are streaming albums ahead of their official release partially to combat leaks, but streams also have a significant effect on pre-orders. A music industry insider told Billboard the albums “often see a two-times to five-times bump in pre-orders during these campaigns. iTunes Radio has streamed two of the biggest album debuts this year, Justin Timberlake’s The 20/20 Experience and Daft Punk’s Random Access Memories.
Cue feels that iTunes Radio is a much more natural way to debut albums than the iTunes Store.
For his part, Cue feels that iTunes Radio is a much more natural platform for the debuts than the iTunes Store.
“I think when you go to a store and you go to the Justin Timberlake page and stream it from there, that’s great but that means you went to the store. iTunes Radio lets you discover it without you having to think about it.”
I’m just wondering when iTunes radio will come to Canada. I know the delay isn’t Apple’s fault, it’s our ridiculous copyright laws.
We’ll keep our ear to the ground and let you know when we hear anything. Our UK readers are chomping at the bit too.