Business is hard. The digital music business is really hard. Or is it? On paper at least, you need to create an easy user interface, have a wide selection, and offer unique features. There's one other part of the equation everyone seems to keep forgetting though: advertising.
Amazon has a decent mp3 store. It has a fine selection of tracks, and the best way to get your music into your iTunes library without using the iTunes music store. So why then, isn't it more popular? No one knows/remembers it exists! Other than the promotion with Pepsi, (which didn't have the same ad support as the previous Pepsi deal with Apple) have you ever seen an ad for the service?
Now Amazon is expanding to the UK, where we're told most digital downloads are in a protected Windows Media format. What a great opportunity for Amazon to expand their marketshare, but if the y make the same mistake as in the U.S., they will be a very distant second place at best.
The only digital music competitor to sink any real money into advertising was the failed buy.com music store. Maybe the failure of Buy caused everyone else to be gun shy. The problem with Buy was never the advertising though, it was a clunky store with a small selection, of wildly varying price points. Any company serious about taking on Apple will have to match ad for ad with them just to make any impact. Think about all those Coldplay commercials from Apple, who easily has the #1 position. There's no magic wand to make your music store competitive with Apple. People need to know the store exists, and then be reminded of that at every turn. It's a simple business principle
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