Of course, I haven't recorded a sale since last week (my last recorded sale was from my Mom. Thanks Mom!). So I'm wondering how is it that my tracks keep climbing the charts?
Obviously one answer could be that perhaps there is a "timeout" on how long the sales count. In other words, if the sales for the other songs on the chart are older, maybe they "drop off the board," hence rising the chart position without any actual sales. Obviously I'd prefer it if I got real sales, of course (even breaking even, which I haven't done yet, would most certainly inspire more albums in the near future). But I'm still very happy with this, as the CDBaby style page is where I get most of my web hits, outside of "direct reference" (which is how my web traffic report classifies it when you click a link in an email or directly enter it into your browser).
I actually emailed CDBaby today to ask about how they calculate their charts to get to the bottom of this. Its possible that they have sales they haven't reported to me yet, or their partners via their digital distribution program (iTunes, Napster, Verizon VCast, among many many others) have sales too. Now, I know I don't get paid from those services for awhile after purchase (for iTunes its supposed to be a couple of months of turnaround), but I don't mind that; I get a big cut out of those sales, so while "all things being equal" I would prefer you go to the CDBaby page and order there, I don't mind at all if people buy tracks from iTunes or other places.
Maybe CDBaby factors in *all* sales, even ones not on their site, which is possible since music submitted to CDBaby is digitally encoded (I think those are called "ISRC" codes or something), so they do show up in music industry sales charts. So something sold on iTunes would register as a sale on those charts, probably instantly, way before iTunes pays out the actual money from those sales.And, happily, I do know of folks who bought the album on iTunes (huge thanks to you folks... especially one who is a "great catch.").
In any event, I'm very grateful for the success the songs have had on the charts so far. Please do continue to support my efforts! I'd love to be able to make more Pitch to Pixel for you guys!
Update: Just heard back from the folks at CDBaby. They said that the chart is determined by a combination of sales and how many times the song is listened to. What isn't perfectly clear is by "listened to" they mean the sample you get when you go to the artist page. I'm thinking that's what it is (how can it be anything else?). Of course, that means lots of people are sampling the song, which is good... but more of you need to BUY IT!!! :-)
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