TV viewership of the The 2018 Grammy Awards may have dropped 24%, but the show was a huge success on social media, and for those artists who got to perform on the Sunday broadcast. Those songs earned a collective 328% gain in download sales in the U.S. on the day of the show, according to initial sales reports.
All together, the songs performed (and original versions of songs covered) sold 74,000 downloads, up from 17,000 on the previous day.
Additional music sales & social insights from Nielsen:
Sales lifts reflect a comparison from Saturday (1/27) to Sunday (1/28)
- Winning six Grammys (out of six nominations), including Record of the Year, Song of the Year and Album of the Year, Bruno Mars was the big winner of the night among voters. His success translated through to fans as sales of his songs and albums surged. The Album of the Year, 24K Magic rose 157% (over 2100 units) vs. prior day, while the title song, winner of Record of the Year lifted by 176% (nearly 2300 units). His song “That’s What I Like,” winner of Song of the Year, jumped by 186% (nearly 2000 units).
- Kendrick Lamar opened the show with a powerful performance and took home five of the seven awards for which he was nominated, including Best Rap Performance and Best Rap Song for “Humble” and Best Rap Album for DAMN. “Humble” sales increased by 71% (nearly 900 units), while DAMN. rose by 92% (over 800 units) over the day prior to the Awards. Kendrick also won best Rap Performance for his song “Loyalty” featuring Rihanna, which lifted by 273% (nearly 1200 units) over prior day.
- Childish Gambino performed his song “Terrified”, and won Best Traditional R&B Performance for his song “Redbone”. He also saw sales of his Grammy nominated album Awaken, My Love! increase by 526% (over 1500 units). “Redbone” rose by 588% (over 4000 units) as well.
- A performance that had everyone talking (*see social insights below), was Kesha‘s stirring song “Praying”, which was performed alongside some of the biggest female voices and most respected women in music. Sales of the song rose by over 8,000 units (the biggest unit increase of any performed song), or 720%, while sales of her album Rainbow lifted by 289% (nearly 500 units).
- Country superstars Little Big Town performed their song “Better Man” which won the award for Best Country Duo/Group Performance. Sales of the song increased by nearly 7,000 units over the prior day, a gain of over 2100%.
- Chris Stapleton took home three big awards in Country, with Best Country Album, Best Country Song and Best Country Solo Performance. His album From A Room: Vol. 1 increased by 132% (over 1000 units), while his nominated songs “Either Way” (+132%/+200 units) and “Broken Halos” (+36%/+1000 units) also experienced gains.
- Lady Gaga experienced significant lifts from the performance of her hits “Joanne” (+41%/+600 units) and “Million Reasons” (+662%/+3500 units).
- Bruno Mars performed “Finesse” with Cardi B, driving sales of the song up 53% (+3400 units).
- SZA, nominated for five awards, performed “Broken Clocks”, driving the song up 364% (+600 units).
- Logic, Alessia Cara and Khalid gave us the final performance of the evening with the important “1-800-273-8255”, which was also nominated for Song of the Year. Sales of the song rose by 436% (over 4000 units).
- Jay-Z proved that winning and performing isn’t everything. The hip-hop and business mogul was nominated for eight awards and was acknowledged and celebrated throughout the entire Grammy weekend, including a memorable shoutout from Kendrick Lamar. Sales of his album 4:44 increased by 55% (+300 units), while songs “4:44” (+143%/+180 units), “Story of O.J.” (+135%/+180 units) and “Family Feud” (+118%/+100 units) all enjoyed increased sales.
- DJ Khaled, Rihanna, and Bryson Tiller performed “Wild Thoughts” driving sales of the song up 739% (up over 2100 units).
- One of the most talked about songs of 2017 was “Despacito”, which was performed and nominated for three awards. Despite not winning, the song grew by over 7,000 units (263%).
- Eric Church, Maren Morris and Brothers Osborne delivered a touching performance of Eric Clapton’s “Tears in Heaven” as a tribute to the victims of the Las Vegas shootings. Sales of Clapton’s original version increased by 1178% (1,200 units).
- U2 braved the cold to perform with the Statue of Liberty and the Manhattan skyline as a backdrop on their song “Get Out of Your Own Way”. Sales of the song increased by over 3300% (nearly 2,200 units).
- Elton John and Miley Cyrus performed John’s hit “Tiny Dancer”, which enjoyed a sales increase of 208% (770 units).
- P!nk performed “Wild Hearts Can’t Be Broken”, which drove the song up over 20,000% (+4800 units) to become of of the biggest gainers of the night.
- Sting’s “Englishman in New York” lifted by nearly 6,300% (1500 units).
- The In Memoriam segment was opened with Chris Stapleton and Emmylou Harris performing Tom Petty’s “Wildflowers”, which drove the song up 536% (nearly 400 units).
Social media played a major role in the 60th Annual Grammy Awards
- There were 41.5M total interactions across Facebook, Instagram and Twitter about the 60th Annual Grammy Awards on CBS (Source: Nielsen Social Content Ratings, linear metrics. January 28, 2018).
- The Grammys were the #1 most social program on 01/28/18 (Source: Nielsen Social Content Ratings, linear metrics, ranked on total interactions).
- Of the 41.5M total interactions measured
○ 15% occurred on Facebook
○ 59% occurred on Instagram
○ 26% occurred on Twitter
- The most social moment on Twitter occurred at 9:47 pm EST with 42K interactions as fans Tweeted during Kesha’s star-studded performance of ‘Praying’
- The top hashtags on Twitter were: #grammys, #grammys2018, #grammy and #timesup
