Music Finance Playbook: Valuation, forecasting and income tracking

Music Finance Playbook: Valuation, forecasting and income tracking

Some of the most consequential decisions in music are financial ones. Investments, mergers and acquisitions, catalog sales, and other financial activities can send ripples throughout the entire industry. In a high-stakes, fast-paced field, responsible decision making requires good data.


CONNECT is an essential tool for investors, banks, valuation firms and others looking to understand market activity and unlock value within the music business. Our data informs catalog purchasing, financing, securitization, royalty income tracking and revenue forecasting. 

Case study: Duetti

Music fintech company Duetti recently used our data to improve their forecasting accuracy and optimize their acquisition strategy. The CONNECT platform helped Duetti identify emerging catalogs — artists and songs outside the top 1% — with long-term revenue potential. 


Read the full case study on our website.
 

This playbook contains strategies to help financial professionals get the most out of CONNECT.





Back to Solutions 

Catalog valuation

Dashboards | API and data sharing


As global music streaming continues to grow, music IP has become more valuable. Headline-grabbing catalog sales from major artists are only part of the picture. Musical rights create revenue for labels, publishers and rights management companies at every level of the business. 


CONNECT helps rights holders, investors and analysts plan, price and validate their music catalog transactions.


In the UI, Dashboards provide a snapshot of performance (and potential value) for artist discographies, albums and songs. Meanwhile, the Luminate Music API and data share products can retrieve raw data programatically.






Dashboards

CONNECT Dashboards aggregate and visualize performance data at the artist, album or song level. Use them to dive deep on a discography, gut-check an artist’s recent activity or compare activity across time periods and regions.


Finance applications 

With Dashboards, you can…

  1. Track streaming and sales trends over time
  2. Compare 60+ countries to better understand global payouts
  3. Access market level data in the U.S. and Canada

  4. See metadata and details, plus all the IDs we have for an entity

  5. Check musical rights (Imprint, Owner and Distributor)

  6. Analyze performance across an artist's discography

  7. Export lists of songs, albums, recordings (ISRCs) and products (ICPNs)



Get started 

Browse CONNECT or use Search to explore Dashboards.


Go to: Dashboards: Visualize key data and performance



Tips and tricks

Dashboard controls let you filter and analyze data in real time. If you apply the right filters, you can pull relevant performance data without running a report or querying the API.

See daily and weekly trends with Activity Over Time

Every Dashboard includes an Activity Over Time display that charts performance within your selected date range. 


Activity Over Time can show growth and decay rates for albums or songs. On Artist Dashboards, Activity Over Time tracks combined activity for all releases in the artist's discography. 

Click the three dots ... at top right to switch to a Grid View. You can also export Activity Over Time in grid form. 
​

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Compare country-level data with Activity By Location
Activity by Location breaks out global activity across more than 60 countries. Hover over the global heat map to see detailed data for each country. 

Search for and add up to 6 locations from the left menu to create your own focused comparison.

Opt for a Grid View (top right ... menu) to see a list of all countries. 

Change Activity Type and Breakout View to refresh displays
Dashboards are dynamic. Data and visuals change based on the parameters you choose.

Use the top menu bar to change the Time Frame, Location, Activity Type and Breakout View. (Breakout menu options differ by Activity Type).


Activity Over Time and Activity By Location will update automatically based on your selections.
​
Fine-tune Data Controls for added precision
Open the Data Controls menu from the top menu bar to fine-tune Dashboard data. 


Learn how to apply most Data Controls here.

Include Activity to Date (ATD) and Year to Date (YTD) aggregates
ATD and YTD figures can be a useful valuation benchmark.

Open Data Controls, scroll to Aggregates & Comparisons, and select Activity to Date and Year to Date.



This adds rows to all Grid Views and exports. Here's how an Activity Over Time grid looks with combined overall ATD and YTD values added:


Note that ATD values currently start in 2014 (at earliest). Read more here.
​
Export and compare artist discographies
Artist Dashboards compile performance across an artist’s catalog.
​
Scroll to the bottom of the Dashboard to see the Discography pane. 


Choose ALBUMS, VIDEOS, SINGLES or SONGS to compare releases in each category. Export any discography grid using the ... menu at top right.

 



API and data sharing 

The Luminate Music API and Luminate Data Share offer additional possibilities. The Music API lets you run and automate custom queries using a wider variety of filters and endpoints. Data sharing grants access to the entire CONNECT database. 


Finance applications 

With API access and/or data sharing, you can…

  1. Understand macro trends and streaming patterns within music consumption 
  2. Retrieve streaming data broken out by country (API & Data Share) 
  3. Export all songs, ISRCs and albums affiliated with an artist (API & Data Share)
  4. Set thresholds to include only artists with “between X and Y” number of streams (Data Share)
  5. Run Ranking Reports with custom parameters and unlimited depth (Data Share)


Get started 

API access and data sharing both require separate subscriptions. Talk to your Luminate Account Representative or inquire on our website.



Tips and tricks

If you're an API or Data Sharing subscriber already, visit the Luminate Developer Hub for guides, tutorials, sample code and all other documentation.

Sample output: Country-level daily streaming
Data Share can retrieve daily consumption figures for multiple countries and display them in one table. Here's how that output might look:


Data Share tables offer dynamic views and customization options. For instance, you can change the time frame, aggregate quarterly and yearly data or add more artists.

Sample output: Album Equivalent consumption mix
Data Share allows you to "manually" calculate Album Equivalent consumption and break it out across Activity Types.


The above can be refined further: you can change the time frame, see more locations or filter by genre, release age and other attributes. 
 




Royalty income tracking

Trend Reports | Music Data Encrichment


Looking to track your catalog’s streaming performance in order to forecast or audit royalty payouts? 

Use Trend Reports to track any artist, song, or album within a specific territory or time frame. Or ask us about Music Data Enrichment services for enhanced identification and monitoring. 

Sample output: On-Demand Market Share, Ex-U.S.
The below chart uses CONNECT consumption data to compare on-demand streaming market share among a list of priority countries outside the U.S. 


Country-level consumption data can be accessed via Dashboards and Data Share (see above) as well as Trend Reports (see below). 

 




Trend Reports

Trend Reports offer customizable performance snapshots for up to 500 entities at once. You choose what to include in a Trend Report; CONNECT compiles data on those items within your parameters.


Use Trend Reports to build and schedule data exports with custom parameters. Select any group of artists, songs or albums; set a time frame and location; and adjust filters and view options to highlight the activities, regions, date intervals and breakouts relevant to your analysis. 

Finance applications 

With Trend Reports, you can…

  1. Build your own portfolio of songs or releases to track
  2. Study existing sales and streaming figures to forecast future revenue
  3. Identify growth trends and decay curves 
  4. Analyze catalog performance in conjunction with marketing initiatives, release calendars, etc.
  5. Clone and schedule reports to compare performance over time or by location


Get started 

From the CONNECT sidebar menu, open Report Builder and choose Trend. Follow the steps in our guide to add items and generate a report. 


Go to: Build a Trend Report




Tips and tricks

Get more out of Trend Reports with our best music finance strategies.

Create a "portfolio" of artists, releases and/or songs to track
Click ADD ITEMS, then use the Search function to include up to 500 entities in your Trend Report. You can track:
  1. A list of all artists affiliated with a label or management company
  2. A priority album release + other new releases in the same genre (comps)
  3. Every song from an album + the album + the artist 
  4. All ISRCs and ICPNs for which your company receives royalty payouts
  5. An artist + every album in their discography + select comp artists and albums

Once you build a Trend Report, you don't need to add all the items again (phew). Instead, treat that report as a portfolio or template. Clone the report to preserve your list of items and adjust report options or filters as desired. 

See below for how to clone reports or create recurring schedules with the same parameters.
See combined artist data or break out priority items
Search by name or Luminate Artist ID to add an artist. This combines all data we have for that artist's discography as one entry in the Trend Report. 


Trend Reports permit different entity types (artists, songs and albums) in the same export. If you like, you can add an artist, then add multiple items from their discography, such as key albums and top songs.
If an artist you want to include isn't in our system yet, refer to the A&R Playbook for tips on how to track their releases.

Configure Report Format Options for more detail
After you finalize your list of items to compare + set report parameters, click CONTINUE. You'll see a Report Format Options pop-up menu.


Set Time View and breakout options as desired. Shorter Time Views add more rows to your report. Breakouts add more columns. 

Longer date ranges do not permit daily time views, only weekly. Run multiple Trend Reports (clone + change dates) to see daily data over long periods of time.

Clone and repeat Trend Reports for different locations
CONNECT automatically saves every report you run. Go to Report Builder > Management to see past reports in the Reports Manager grid.

Click the ... icon in the Actions column to open the Actions menu. From here, you can go to Details to see the parameters you used or choose Clone Report to create the same Trend Report again. 


Change Time Frame and Location to compare data across date ranges and countries. Export your cloned reports and add all the raw data in one table for easier comparison.

BONUS TIP: Use descriptive titles when cloning reports. Otherwise, you could end up like this: 




Schedule reports to re-run daily or weekly
Use the Report Scheduler to set recurring daily or weekly reports. Learn how to schedule a report here.


Scheduled reports run automatically; they'll appear in the Reports Manager when complete. 

Note that you can only schedule reports to recur for 12 weeks or 90 days. (Set a reminder to avoid missing a day or week). After that, you'll have to clone one of your report outputs to create a new schedule. 

 



Music Data Enrichment

Metadata inaccuracy can lead to reporting errors, missed claims and royalty payout discrepancies. Revenue forecasting (and revenue realization) requires a complete and accurate accounting of all musical works within a portfolio.

Luminate maintains the world’s largest database of musical IDs and uses advanced data science to map the links between them. Our Music Data Enrichment services can help ensure that artists, labels, publishers and other rights holders are compensated correctly.

Finance applications 

With Data Enrichment, you can...

  1. Add key ID types associated with musical works
  2. Match musical works to recordings to maximize publishing revenue 
  3. Identify and correct discrepancies that could lead to missed payments
  4. Enrich and update repertoires by adding ID types
  5. Disambiguate artist metadata with ISNIs (or register new ISNIs)
  6. Browse an interactive database of IDs for artists, recordings and compositions


Get started

Music Data Enrichment is a consultative service from Luminate. Read more in the link below or request a demo on our website.


Go to: Music Data Enrichment: Metadata matching, cleansing and management






A&R research

Ranking Reports and more


A&R (Artist & Repertoire) research can be an important component of financial analysis.

The strategies in our A&R Playbook are geared towards A&R pros at labels and management companies, but they can also apply to music finance. Visit that playbook to learn how to use Ranking Reports and other CONNECT features for emerging artist research and repertoire tracking. 


Go to: A&R Playbook: New artist discovery, tracking and insights








What’s next 


We're constantly building a better, more powerful CONNECT. Several upcoming features will have significant finance applications.

On the roadmap

  1. Additional Ranking and Trend Report filters
  2. New ID types and more artist metadata
  3. More countries 

See Platform for latest releases and product updates. 







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