Why Are My Sales Totals Off?

If your sales numbers look incorrect, don't worry - there's likely an easy fix. This guide will help you troubleshoot common issues.  

Situation 1: Incorrect "Sold" Numbers

Possible Problem: You tagged physical products or attached digital products to Shopify after they were already on sale.

Solutions:

  • Digital: If the album is still under pre-order, our system automatically picks up sales during the tagging process. If the album has been released and you want to include previous sales, turn on the "deliver to existing purchases" toggle.
  • Physical: We pick up existing sales only during a pre-sale. If your album is still under pre-sale, make sure to enter a release date when tagging for reporting. Existing sales should then be picked up within a few minutes.

Situation 2: Incorrect "Reported" Numbers

Possible Causes and Solutions:

  • Same-Day Sales: Sales made on the same day you're viewing the dashboard will be reported at 10 AM ET the next day.
  • Missing Emails: If the download email wasn't successfully delivered, it doesn't count as a sale. To check if all orders have associated emails, export your order list from the "Orders" page, import the .CSV file to Google Sheets or Excel, and sort the sheet by the "Email" column.
  • More than 1 purchase of a digital album during a chart week will result in any additional purchases being excluded.
  • Bulk Purchases of 5-9 Albums: If a purchase includes 5-10 copies of the same physical album, only 4 sales will count due to Luminate's bulk purchase rules. For digital sales, Nielsen only allows 1 sale to count per person.
  • Bulk Purchases of 10+ Albums: Orders that include 10+ copies of the same physical album won't count towards the charts due to Nielsen's bulk purchase rules.
  • International Orders: Physical orders shipped outside the US won't count towards the US charts.

Note: To get a complete and detailed overview of your sales data, click HERE.