Essay
CMO vs PRO: What's the Difference?
A PRO is one kind of CMO. What each collects, why the US splits the job across three bodies, and which societies actually owe you money.
CMO means collective management organization — any society that collects for a class of rights holders. A PRO is the subset that collects public performance royalties for compositions.
The US splits the job: ASCAP/BMI/SESAC/GMR for performance, the MLC for streaming mechanicals, HFA for many physical/download mechanicals, SoundExchange for digital performance of recordings.
Most other countries house performance and mechanicals in one society. That is why a single foreign filing can cover more than a single US filing.