How Do Streams Turn Into Sales

I’ve had to explain to several clients of mine that one million streams does not equate to having a platinum single and then shared with them.

Album-equivalent streaming units are a way of measuring the popularity and consumption of music in the digital streaming era. It combines both album sales and individual track streams into a single equivalent unit, allowing a more comprehensive representation of an artist’s or album’s success.

Here’s how it works:

• Track Equivalent Albums (TEA): A certain number of individual track downloads or streams are considered equivalent to one album sale. For example, 10 track downloads or 1,500 track streams may be equivalent to one album sale.
• Streaming Equivalent Albums (SEA): The total number of on-demand audio and video streams of both tracks and albums is converted into the equivalent of album sales. This typically involves dividing the total number of streams by a specific number to determine the SEA figure.

Once TEA and SEA are calculated, they are added together to get the total album-equivalent streaming units for an artist or album. This total is often used to determine chart positions and certifications, reflecting the modern music consumption landscape where listeners often stream individual tracks rather than buying entire albums.

Album-equivalent streaming units provide a more accurate reflection of an artist’s popularity in the digital age, where streaming services play a significant role in music consumption alongside traditional album sales. This approach helps adapt music industry metrics to the changing landscape of music distribution and consumption.

Another question that I often get is how much money is generated per stream.

The payouts vary per streaming service; below is a link to explaining what each streaming platform pays out compared to one another:

https://www.manatt.com/Manatt/media/Media/PDF/US-Streaming-Royalties-Explained.pdf