With average sales of over 200,000 tracks per month, mobile media company 3 today announced that its audio provided over 53% of mobile audio track downloads since the start of 2006. The numbers come from the Official Charts Company (OCC), the body responsible for compiling the UK charts. OCC figures also show that 3’s audio sales already account for 3.7% of the combined singles chart and 7.5% of the digital download chart this year.The findings come as 3 celebrates 1m audio downloads in just four months. Graeme Oxby, Marketing Director of 3, said: “These figures show that 3 is dominating mobile music and punching way above our weight. Every one of our 3.5 million customers has a music shop in their pocket, and their choices now have as much impact on the charts as a traditional music store.”It’s not all good news: over 10% of James Blunt’s “Goodbye my Lover” single sales have been downloaded through 3. Other artists that did well with 3 include Hard-Fi (7.4% of all single sales for Cash Machine); Kaiser Chiefs (5.5% of I Predict a Riot sales); and Gorillaz: (4% of Dare sales).And 3 reckons it is making history by helping an Anglo-Italian band called Planet Funk to launch the world’s first single to be released exclusively as a mobile phone download. It’s a pleasant enough technopop number called Stop Me, vaguely reminiscent of New Order (which is no bad thing – and Planet Funk have recently remixed a New Order track, as it happens). The band obviously hopes that the publicity boost and 3’s marketing – including a dedicated microsite for the band and promotion on the Today on 3 portal – will help it to follow Gnarls Barclay into the charts. Stop Me will be available on 3’s “dual download” service, allowing customers to transfer the song to a PC as well as a phone for just 99p.
