Vevo is a website for music videos but you probably watch their videos on YouTube or on your smart phone. The company started two years ago with content from three of the big four music companies and has produced some impressive numbers since then.
Vevo clocked 3.6 billion video views globally in October and is expected to have reached 3.7 billion views worldwide in November. In December 2009, that number was at 341 million views.
The average Vevo viewer watches 14.5 videos on the site a month, spending 66 minutes to do so.
Via Janko on GigaOm
Even more interesting are the royalties they are paying out for the first time.
Vevo has paid out more than $100 million in royalties since December 2009 to songwriters, recording artists, record labels and other music copyright holders.
That’s a princely sum considering that music videos, even in their MTV heyday in the 1980s, were given away for free to promote record sales.
via Pop & Hiss
And, the site is doing so well that they want to get back onto television.
Vevo is in talks with cable carriers to become a TV channel.
To develop the service, Vevo wants to become something akin to what MTV was in its earlier days: a channel that will show music videos as well as other kinds of pop-culture entertainment.
It could create a cable channel of its own, or make deals with existing content companies, according to two people with knowledge of the company’s negotiations, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the talks are said to be in the early stages.
via Media Decoder
Interestingly, MTV has decided to continue to stay out of the music video business altogether. Instead, partnering with the last remaining big label, Warner Music, to sell advertising for their videos.
I’m not too sure about this business model.
Warner appears to be charting a different course with its MTV alliance. Instead of pooling the videos into one online destination, Warner wants to keep the stuff on its artists’ individual websites.
All told, Warner’s music videos garnered 26.3 million unique visitors in May.
via Pop & Hiss