TuneCore Trending Reports and how to find out what songs are selling?

[Bobsax]

Does anybody know how to figure out what songs are selling with TuneCore?

Do you have to buy the Trending Report?

The accounting report just says $.70 from iTunes, $.14 from Napster etc.

The Trending Report costs $3 and that's an intro price.

It would be helpful to know why this costs $3 and what the regular price is.

I have heard that some folks have digital deals for cover songs that allow them to pay their royalty fees per sale. How can you do this without knowing what song sold?

This doesn't seem right , if you have to pay to know what particular song on an album is selling?

 

This is the Trending Report info page from TuneCore

Get your daily iTunes sales Trending report each week, and see sales by artist, band, song and even city, state, country and Zip Code!

No more waiting 45 days after the end of each month to see how your music is selling on iTunes. Now you can download a weekly Trending report every Wednesday that shows the previous week's sales from iTunes stores throughout the world.

For a special introductory price of only $2.98, you can download one week's Trending Report file and put it into your favorite spreadsheet program (MS Excel, Lotus, the file will work with all spreadsheet software or any text reader). It's a whole week's worth of data just days after the sales activity happened.

Get Your Trending Report

You'll be able to find each week's Trending Report on your My Account page. Simply LOG IN to your TuneCore Account and click "My Account" from the top of any page.

See a Sample Trending Report

To see what a Trending Report looks like, click here.

Fast Facts

Everything you need to know about Trending Reports is on our Frequently Asked Questions. Click here to learn more. Meanwhile, here are some important facts:

Always keep in mind tending reports are NOT royalty and sales statements. Royalty and sales statements, along with payment for your sales, will continue to be reported by the digital stores within 45 days of the end of an accounting period (for more information, click here).

Here is a brief rundown of some key differences between Trending Reports and accounting reports:

Trending Report Accounting Report

Not 100% accurate 100% accurate

Available weekly (each Wednesday) Available monthly (each 15th, 45 days after month's end)

Shows sales from previous week, by day (Mon-Sun) Shows sales from month that ended 45 days earlier

Period is always 7 days Period is an iTunes accounting month

No money included Money placed into your account

May not reflect returns, "Complete My Album" or other activity Reflects all activity

Includes CITY, STATE, COUNTRY, ZIP/POSTAL CODE and specific day of sale Month of sale only (no city, state, country, zip/postal code or day of sale)

Available only as a downloadable file Available for download and for review online on your My Account page

Costs $2.98 (introductory price) per Trending report Free

 

What does a Trending Report show?

The Trending Report you download has many columns. Here are the column headers and their meanings, left to right:

Date: The song or album was purchased on this day (Pacific time).

City: The person who bought your music has an iTunes account with a billing address in this city (see note below).

State: The person who bought your music has an iTunes account with a billing address in this state (see note below).

Country: The person who bought your music has an iTunes account with a billing address in this country (see note below).

Zip: The person who bought your music has an iTunes account with a billing address in this zip/postal code (see note below).

Units: This many songs or albums sold on this day in this zip/postal code (see note below).

Album: This is name of your album that sold; if a song sold, this column is "N/A"

Song: This is the name of the song that sold; if an album sold, this column is "N/A"

Artist: This is the name of the band or artist that sold.

Label: This is the name of the label of the song or album that sold.

 

NOTE: Non-U.S. postal codes won't show city or state: these columns will be "N/A". The country code itself is a 2-character international code. Shortly, the full name of the country will be displayed.

[johnbegone]

So I'm assuming you're viewing your statement, in that case scroll down and click "view sales by album". That should bring up a page with however many albums you have on there, then underneath each album there is a link that say "view detailed album and song sales"

 

That will show you each track and how many times each has been downloaded or streamed. Hope that helps!

[Bobsax]

That's the ticket. Now I'm happy with TuneCore.

Thanks for helping me John

[Bobsax]

Update

I just finished another album with TuneCore and I've got a few gripes.

1) I've been working on a Halloween album and I wanted it out a few weeks before Oct.31 so I've been busting my balls to get it out today (Aug.31).

In the TuneCore FAQ's they write"On average it takes about 4-6 weeks to go live on all stores". After I paid I get a message that it will take 8 to 10 weeks to go live. This screws me.

 

2) It ended up costing me $44 and I don't remember the other album costing that much. It would be nice to be able to go back and deselect some of the stores to bring down the charges a little. So far all my sales have been iTunes and Napster streams.

I was shown the price breakdown and asked to pay. I didn't want the Trending Report but when I deselected it I was taken to another page and couldn't get back to the billing page. All I could do was use the back button and go ahead and pay. I am not thrilled with the heavy and deceptive marketing involved with these Trending Reports.

 

3)I would like to be able to see a breakdown of the charges for this album (and the last one} but I can't seem to find it in my account. Perhaps it's just hard to find? I hope the information is available? I was immediately emailed a spam from TuneCore about a free offer and PayPal sent me a receipt of the total cost but no detailed receipt from TuneCore.