STUDY: Mac Users More Likely to Pay for Music than PC Users

Apples iTunes and ubiquitous iPod to blame.

Market research firm NPD Group revealed in a new study the other day that consumers who own Apple Mac computers are much more likely than PC users to pay to download music. According to NPD’s quarterly Digital Music Monitor, in the third quarter of 2007 half of all Mac users had paid to download music tracks from sites like iTunes, but just 16% of PC owners had done so. And while Mac users were more likely to pay to download digital music than their PC-using counterparts, they were also more likely to purchase CDs.

“There’s still a cultural divide between Apple consumers and the rest of the computing world, and that’s especially apparent when it comes to the way they interact with music,” according to Russ Crupnick, vice president and entertainment industry analyst, The NPD Group. “Mac users are not only more active in digital music, they are also more likely to buy CDs, which helps debunk the myth that digital music consumers stop buying music in CD format.”

According to NPD’s consumer panel data, unit-volume sales share for Apple computers increased from nearly 6% in 2006 to almost 9% this year (January through October). “Apple’s growing share in the personal computing environment – and continued success with iPod sales – is a potential harbinger for the continued growth of digital music,” Crupnick said.

Overall, more than 32% of Mac users report purchasing CDs in the third quarter of 2007, compared to just 28% of PC users. In addition to purchasing CDs and downloading music, Mac users are also more likely to listen to music and watch videos on their MP3-players and computers. While 34% of Mac users had uploaded music to their MP3 players, just 16% of PC users had done the same. Mac users are also much more likely to listen to music files on their computers (56%) than are PC users (31%).

“While the market for digital music is growing, it’s growing slower than many would like it to – CD sales are still declining and digital music has not replaced those lost sales,” Crupnick said. “The more consumers become comfortable paying for digital music, the more chance they will evangelize to others. And at this point in the game, it’s the growing base of Apple consumers that are the industry’s low-hanging fruit when it comes to converting from physical to digital music.”

With PC users having no similar iTunes/iPod, digital music and digital music player, system in place it’s obvious that PC users would have to seek out alternatives, even if they aren’t always legal ones.

Either way, I think the bigger story here is that 84% of PC users and 50% of Mac users HAVE NOT paid to download music. Now certainly all of them aren’t into music, but even a conservative half of them are I’m sure meaning that there’s a huge number of people out there getting their music for free. These are figures that record labels should sit up and take notice of and really cause to reconsider other music distribution models like the ad-supported kind.

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