[12/4] ORICON "Secret" 1st Week Sales [See P.7 post 130]

[Cyria]

To look on the bright side, for one brief moment before viewing the other thread I thought the 38.6 in the title meant Secret had sold only 38 600 copies. Hopefully these sales will send the message that Ayu is a profitable artist for Avex, even if she's not as big as before, and she'll continue to get quality PVs/singles/treatment.

[ayu_fan929]

Originally Posted by immel

At least she'll have a chart position with the album. Can't imagine avex decided to release it the date they did. Maybe the charts doesn't matter too much.

Did ORICON end up extending the year?

I always thought it mattered to them, that's why their "big name albums" come out in December/Janaury = the beginning of the year. But then again, both LOVEppears and Secret came out 2 weeks before the end of the year.

Yep. Oricon 2006 is extended to 55 weeks.

Originally Posted by Terri

How horrible. An artist of her status and talent should at least go over 300k. Those sales can be implied to amature artists, which Ayu obviously is not.

Can't people just go out and buy the record? Her popularity in Japan alone is still outrageous, so I doubt she's loosing thousands of fans.

By the way, does anybody know which album (from Ayu) had the most sales? Although sales are basically irrelevant, I am curious...

Not that many artists can sell over 300k 1st week you know. The last female to do it was ayaka, which is even more amazing since it was her debut album.

A BEST (4.23m)
Duty (2.9m)
LOVEppears (2.56m)
I am... (2.32m)
RAINBOW (1.856m)
MY STORY (1.132m)
Memorial address (1.062m)
(miss) understood (0.87m)
Secret (0.386m)

[maumau.drop]

well, great no?! i guess, 'cuz nowdays is complicated sell over than 500.000 in the first week (except Koda Kumi).

I hope that this sell over than 1m

[immel]

Originally Posted by Terri

How horrible. An artist of her status and talent should at least go over 300k. Those sales can be implied to amature artists, which Ayu obviously is not.

It did sell over 300k copies, almost 400k.

Originally Posted by Cyria

Hopefully these sales will send the message that Ayu is a profitable artist for Avex, even if she's not as big as before, and she'll continue to get quality PVs/singles/treatment.

An artist doesn't need to sell very much in order to be profitable, Ayu's sales are out of this world even when they are "low", they could most likely still provide quality PV/material with even lower sales than this. The promotion is what costs the most money and is what would most likely be tampered by lower sales, especially since everyone already knows her name.

avex literally bought the entire Shibuya for this album, like for (miss)understood, I doubt that's needed.

[Joel]

But... But.... This is ,like, her BEST ALBUM.

[ayu_fan929]

I can sense someone is going to start a thread about why Secret "failed"....

[My Rainbow]

I think these first sales are a bit low, but i don't think it has failed hahahaha. She has made a GREAT album so we should enjoy it, and if the Japanese don't support ayu as she deserves, she could come to us! Hahahahaha

[immel]

Originally Posted by ayu_fan929

I can sense someone is going to start a thread about why Secret "failed"....

Sccch, don't give people ideas.

I should start one called "The Great Success of Secret" with all the arguments for why it's still good sales... .

[bluegie]

I think the sales are good enough. Let's focus on the second week sales now , we may get another disappointment or we may get a big surprise .

and yeah, immel should start "The Great Success of Secret" before someone making "The Failure of Secret" LMAO...

[jeffycue]

woohoo!!!!!! she still has it!! <3 ayu

[Coelacanth]

You guys have to remember, music artists are getting supported in various ways nowadays, and this isn't only happening in Japan. According to the RIAJ Yearbook 2006, the value of digital music delivery in Japan totaled 34.3 billion yen in 2005, compared to only 15 billion yen the year before that. 96.4% of the digital music delivery last year was with mobile digital contents, while only 3.5% was Internet downloads. I mean, there could be millions in value worth of Ayu's content on people's phones.

And to be fair, Japan's music sales since 2001 have roughly been around the same area, and the country is still second in the global music market. Bottom line, there's competition. There's new marketing techniques, a widening of the way music is delivered, and a shift in the type of music that is marketable.

You guys should know that females can barely even sell over a million anymore. The only million selling females last year were Mika Nakashima, BoA, and Koda Kumi (which only did well because they were BEST-OF compilations). The rest of the million-sellers were older acts (Southern All Stars, B'z, Mr.Children) who really have nobody to compete with, boybands/Johnny's (Shuji and Akira), the influx of what can be described as rap/rock/reggae fusion bands such as ORANGE RANGE, Def Tech (2004, but okay), and Ketsumeishi, plus Ken Hirai and EXILE. Contrary to popular belief, females do not rule the Japanese music market.

Since most of us here do not live in Japan, we have, what is probably a misconception of what Japan as a whole thinks about Ayu's music. However, she's still a dominant figure in the Japanese recording industry as a whole as well as the concert tour industry, and everyone here should know better.

[Dark Eiri]

Horrible. But she only had two "so-so" singles to promote. If JEWEL\1 LOVE was released as a single before, I believe it would sell more.

[ayu_fan929]

I wouldn't say as early as 2001, I would say it's been pretty much the same since 2003.

[jeffycue]

LoL... but its the trend now... 300~400k.

[ayu_fan929]

People said (m)u didn't break the million because 4 singles were released which meant 8 "single songs" were featured on the album.

Now, are more people going to say Secret didn't sell well because only 2 singles were released which meant only 4 "single songs" were featured on the album???

[immel]

Very nice post there Coelacanth.

Originally Posted by Coelacanth

You guys have to remember, music artists are getting supported in various ways nowadays, and this isn't only happening in Japan. According to the RIAJ Yearbook 2006, the value of digital music delivery in Japan totaled 34.3 billion yen in 2005, compared to only 15 billion yen the year before that. 96.4% of the digital music delivery last year was with mobile digital contents, while only 3.5% was Internet downloads. I mean, there could be millions in value worth of Ayu's content on people's phones.

It's very true that sales nowadays are about as high, if not higher, than back in the days, a little depending on which days. Only that the sales are spread over a larger variation of media.

Contrary to popular belief, females do not rule the Japanese music market.

They do, the only ones who beat them are boy bands. Solo male artists are nowhere near the popularity of the female ones.

Originally Posted by ayu_fan929

People said (m)u didn't break the million because 4 singles were released which meant 8 "single songs" were featured on the album.

Now, are more people going to say Secret didn't sell well because only 2 singles were released which meant only 4 "single songs" were featured on the album???

Hey, people say anything in order to try to realize why it didn't meat the expectations in their dreams .

It's what the market supports, Ayumi is the most popular solo artist in Japan right now, only equaled by Utada and Koda sales wise, if this is how high she sells it's what the market can take due to several reasons, especially the one that she's been around for 8 years and a large portion of the Japanese population already have one or more of her CDs.

Remember most of the sales nowadays hang around in the digital downloads area.

[Coelacanth]

Originally Posted by ayu_fan929

I wouldn't say as early as 2001, I would say it's been pretty much the same since 2003.

The number of million selling records in 2001 than 2003 and beyond is certainly different, but it may be just creating that illusion for us to believe the market is in trouble.

I mean, it's still possible to have less million selling records a year and still generate a similar number of total sales which compare with those years with more million selling records, right?

[ayu_fan929]

The yearly TOP 50 sales have only been stabilizing since 2003.

Well I might add in ayaka in there since First Message will break the 700k mark soon.

[bluegie]

It's ayaka's debut album so it's likely that many people will buy the album. She may continue to sell well, or will have a situation similar to Mai K. Her debut album (Deilicious Way) was like over 3 million copies in Japan, yet her second album only sold about a million.

And yeah, ayu has been in the music industry for 8 years, it's good to see she's still popular today .

[[taskin.ayu]]

What terrible sales, I was hoping for more. D: That's how much her singles used to sell. ): At this rate, she wont even reach 800K )):