Michael Jackson Music Sales Surge Could Last For Months

Digital sales surge

Meanwhile, Jackson's catalog did brisk business at digital retailers, which don't have to worry about supply and already enjoy lower wholesale pricing than brick-and-mortar stores. Digital vendors were also helped by the fact that many physical retailers sold out of Jackson albums during the weekend.

In the week before his death, 64 key Jackson tracks sold a combined 30,000 copies at iTunes, the dominant U.S. digital vendor and the largest overall music retailer, according to sources. During the week ended June 28, sales of those same 64 tracks skyrocketed 60-fold to reach 1.8 million copies at iTunes, the sources say. Similarly, iTunes sales of 16 Jackson solo albums and compilations went from slightly more than 1,000 copies in the week before his death to 225,000 copies for the week ending June 28, sources say.

Sales at iTunes surged immediately. On June 26, Jackson commanded the top seven slots on iTunes' best-selling albums list. "The Essential Michael Jackson" ($16.99) ruled at No. 1, followed by "Thriller" ($9.99), "Number Ones" ($9.99), "Off the Wall" ($9.99), the 25th-anniversary reissue of "Thriller" ($13.99), "Bad" ($9.99) and the digital boxed set "Michael Jackson: The Ultimate Collection" ($34.99).

In total, Jackson albums took 10 of the top 15 best-selling album slots and 21 of the top 100 on the day after his death. His singles represented 13 of the top 25 songs sold on the same day, with "Man in the Mirror" (99 cents), "Thriller" ($1.29), "The Way You Make Me Feel" (99 cents), "Don't Stop 'Til You Get Enough" ($1.29) and "Smooth Criminal" (99 cents) all making the top 10.

By June 30, those totals began to slip. His top album ranking fell to six of the top 15 and 16 of the top 100, but he held onto the top two spots with "The Essential Michael Jackson" and "Number Ones," respectively. Singles, however, fared better, with 11 staying in the top 25, including the No. 2 spot with "Man in the Mirror."

Jackson's sales also jumped at Amazon's MP3 store. The day after his death, he was the No. 1 artist of the day and had 13 of the top 25 songs sold and 11 of the top 25 digital albums. On June 30, Jackson's singles share increased to 15 of the top 25 songs, while album sales fell to seven of the top 25 titles. Amazon posted a tribute to Jackson on its home page during the entire time.

At Verizon Wireless, the largest mobile operator in the United States, Jackson's songs took five of the top 10 downloaded songs through the weekend, with "Wanna Be Startin' Somethin'," "Thriller," "Beat It" and "Billie Jean" holding down the top four spots, respectively. "P.Y.T. (Pretty Young Thing)" and "You Are Not Alone" were the top two ringback tones sold during the same time, and five of the top 20 ringtone sales were Jackson tracks, including two in the top 10: "Thriller" and "The Way You Make Me Feel."

Meanwhile, daily search volume for Jackson's music at peer-to-peer file-sharing networks jumped nine times above the level seen the day before his death (June 24), according to the P2P measurement firm BigChampagne.

But downloads and P2P traffic don't tell the full digital story. Virtually every major digital music service reported unprecedented spikes in volume and activity surrounding Jackson's music as fans flocked online to pay their respects.

On YouTube, Jackson's music videos generated heavy traffic. "Beat It" was viewed nearly 1 million times from 10 p.m. June 25 to noon the next day. "Don't Stop 'Til You Get Enough" registered 800,000 views in the same time frame, followed by "Billie Jean" with 750,000 and "Thriller" with slightly more than 700,000.

The online streaming music service Pandora says registered users created more than 500,000 custom radio stations featuring Jackson songs June 25-27. Microsoft offered a free copy of the "Thriller" video to all Xbox 360 users, resulting in 50,000 downloads during the two days after his death. The Internet radio tracking firm Ando Media says Jackson songs represented 5% of all radio plays from more than 5,600 U.S. webcasters, six times more than the second-most-popular artist Taylor Swift.