Showing posts with label digital. Show all posts
Showing posts with label digital. Show all posts
Saturday, January 1, 2011
Thursday, March 25, 2010
MySpace/Imeem Deal Leaves Thousands of Artists Unpaid
Independent artists who sold their music through imeem’s Snocap music storefronts on MySpace and other sites won’t be paid what’s owed even after MySpace Music’s acquisition of some — but not all — of imeem, Wired.com has learned.
MySpace Music bought “certain assets” from imeem, and they do not include imeem’s liability to more than 110,000 independent artists with Snocap storefronts, according to a source with inside knowledge of the deal. Those artists’ contracts mandate they be paid each month if they’re owed more than $20. Some artists have been owed money for more than a year, and the chance of them seeing any money now is, for all intents and purposes, zero, the source says.
Artists attempting to get paid for songs sold through Snocap stores — many or most of which were on MySpace itself — must get in line with imeem’s bank and other creditors. MySpace Music paid less than $1 million for imeem, so it’s doubtful much will remain for the artists.
“MySpace Music bought a limited set of imeem’s assets including the domain name and certain technology and trademarks,” a MySpace spokeswoman said in an e-mail to Wired.com. “The asset sale to MySpace Music was part of a foreclosure process which resulted from the lien certain secured creditors had on all the assets of imeem. MySpace Music did not acquire imeem’s outstanding debts, including the money imeem owed to artists under the Snocap relationship. Upon closing, users trying to access the Imeem website were redirected to MySpace Music. We did not acquire imeem’s contracts or relationships as we have our own in place. MySpace Music has its own distribution platform, which includes relationships with prominent aggregators and indie labels, that provides indie artists ways to monetize their music on our site.”
One source with inside knowledge of the deal said MySpace Music’s rushed purchase of imeem’s assets forced it to “leave behind anything that either had explicit liability or potential liability,” including Snocap and its debts to thousands of independent artists and bands.
Napster creator Shawn Fanning co-founded Snocap in 2002 to let artists sell their music through an embeddable storefront widget. At one point, the service was marketed as the exclusive way for artists to sell music on MySpace. Imeem bought Snowcap last summer. But because MySpace left most aspects of Snocap out of its acquisition of imeem’s assets, all 110,000 or so of those storefronts are gone. The server that hosts them is offline and so is the Snocap website.
Possibly the last band to be paid by imeem for music sold through a Snocap store embedded on MySpace was Javelin, which happens to be my brother’s and cousin’s band. After they inquired about money listed as owed in its online account, imeem sent them a check for about $400 for approximately a year and a half of sales.
That may not be “a princely sum,” as Tim Quirk put it. But for growing bands — many of whose income trickles in from a variety of sources — it matters, especially when you consider that imeem’s payments to major labels helped drive it out of business in the first place.
There’s nothing technically wrong with MySpace Music only acquiring certain assets from imeem, and teams of lawyers scrutinized the deal before it was done. Regardless, in this latest round of digital musical chairs, independent artists who set up music stores in good faith have been left holding the bag.
MySpace Music bought “certain assets” from imeem, and they do not include imeem’s liability to more than 110,000 independent artists with Snocap storefronts, according to a source with inside knowledge of the deal. Those artists’ contracts mandate they be paid each month if they’re owed more than $20. Some artists have been owed money for more than a year, and the chance of them seeing any money now is, for all intents and purposes, zero, the source says.
Artists attempting to get paid for songs sold through Snocap stores — many or most of which were on MySpace itself — must get in line with imeem’s bank and other creditors. MySpace Music paid less than $1 million for imeem, so it’s doubtful much will remain for the artists.
“MySpace Music bought a limited set of imeem’s assets including the domain name and certain technology and trademarks,” a MySpace spokeswoman said in an e-mail to Wired.com. “The asset sale to MySpace Music was part of a foreclosure process which resulted from the lien certain secured creditors had on all the assets of imeem. MySpace Music did not acquire imeem’s outstanding debts, including the money imeem owed to artists under the Snocap relationship. Upon closing, users trying to access the Imeem website were redirected to MySpace Music. We did not acquire imeem’s contracts or relationships as we have our own in place. MySpace Music has its own distribution platform, which includes relationships with prominent aggregators and indie labels, that provides indie artists ways to monetize their music on our site.”
One source with inside knowledge of the deal said MySpace Music’s rushed purchase of imeem’s assets forced it to “leave behind anything that either had explicit liability or potential liability,” including Snocap and its debts to thousands of independent artists and bands.
Napster creator Shawn Fanning co-founded Snocap in 2002 to let artists sell their music through an embeddable storefront widget. At one point, the service was marketed as the exclusive way for artists to sell music on MySpace. Imeem bought Snowcap last summer. But because MySpace left most aspects of Snocap out of its acquisition of imeem’s assets, all 110,000 or so of those storefronts are gone. The server that hosts them is offline and so is the Snocap website.
Possibly the last band to be paid by imeem for music sold through a Snocap store embedded on MySpace was Javelin, which happens to be my brother’s and cousin’s band. After they inquired about money listed as owed in its online account, imeem sent them a check for about $400 for approximately a year and a half of sales.
That may not be “a princely sum,” as Tim Quirk put it. But for growing bands — many of whose income trickles in from a variety of sources — it matters, especially when you consider that imeem’s payments to major labels helped drive it out of business in the first place.
There’s nothing technically wrong with MySpace Music only acquiring certain assets from imeem, and teams of lawyers scrutinized the deal before it was done. Regardless, in this latest round of digital musical chairs, independent artists who set up music stores in good faith have been left holding the bag.
Sunday, April 19, 2009
Wednesday, February 25, 2009
Making the Most Out of Online Resources
Written by Daylle Deanna Schwartz
Author of "Start & Run Your Own Record Label" and "I Don’t Need a Record Deal!"
© 2009 All Rights Reserved. Used By Permission
Indie artists often complain about not having the budget they’d like to market and promote their music. Nowadays, digital marketing offers a plethora of opportunities for marketing yourself and your music that doesn’t cost anything in dollars. But, it can be hard to know where to begin—and end. While much of it is good for those of you with small to no money budgets, there’s still a big expense for taking advantage of so many opportunities—TIME.
The good AND the bad news: the cost to break an independent act can be more in time than in dollars. It’s great to have free tools! But you could spend all of your waking hours going onto all the different social networking sites and other avenues of promotion and still not make a dent. With all the artists and labels vying for online attention, you must work to make your music stand out.
It’s important to brand your name online. The more people see it, the more curiosity can be generated, which leads to potential fans or clients checking you out. The more you respond to fans who write to you, the more loyal fans you’ll have. But so much of the efforts to find fans is one by one, which accounts for a lot of the time you need to put into it.
It’s not enough to just register on all the websites. While there’s unlimited space for everyone online, you can get lost in it all and not make any constructive progress. I know. I’m always getting links to sites I “should check out.” People email me both to my server and on the social networking sites. It gets overwhelming. Another day ends and I haven’t done any writing. So I must get tough with myself in order to function.
Time isn’t FREE when it costs you your sleep, your personal life and even your sanity. But you can take control of online activities to make the most of the best opportunities. Here are so DOs and DON’Ts for getting the most out of your online resources.
DON’T jump around to everything that seems interesting or the new flavor of the month.
DO force yourself to stay on track. Put aside things you want to check out for when you have some time or accept you can’t look over everything. Learn the benefits of hitting DELETE.
DON’T immediately answer emails when they come in or click when you get a link.
DO: Prioritize what most needs to be done at this point. I have a NEED TO ANSWER folder and put personal emails and those asking questions into it. Have a block of time set aside when all you do is answer emails. When time is up, leave the rest for the next block!
DON’T jump from one site to another and register with every one you can.
DO plan your direction carefully and prioritize your needs to work them properly. Social networking sites allow musicians to seek fans out and interact with them. But working one or two hard is strongly advised as opposed to doing a little bit on many. If you have too many, you don’t work anything well and you can spread yourself too thin. Decide which sites are best for you and concentrate your energy to build up relationships with fans on them.
DON’T try to do everything yourself. DO mobilize fans to help. Get volunteers to assist you in following up with online activities. Ask them to tell other musicians on the site about you, use your music as their default on their MySpace page and drive potential fans to your sites. If you have a budget, hire an online marketing specialist to direct your efforts and do some of the legwork.
DON’T register with any social networking site that you’re not prepared to follow up with.
DO answer every email and make your presence known. Respond to comments. Nowadays, when people hear an artist they like or see you perform, they’ll leave a comment on your MySpace page. It’s important to respond. Musicians who keep in touch with their fans religiously build the strongest communities and get the most support.
DON’T focus just on MySpace and Facebook.
DO diversify. While pure social networking sites are great to exploit, get your music in places where people can find it. Do as many things as you can that don’t require constant attention that give your music potential exposure. Create iMixes up in the iTunes music store. Get your music into streaming radio sites, such as Last.fm, Pandora, Launch, iLike, etc. Send it to MP3 bloggers who review your genre of music. Post videos on YouTube. And get yourself on wikipedia, the free online encyclopedia. These efforts often just require doing something once and can drive people to find your music.
DON’T think that selling and promoting your music online is all you need.
DO everything you can in real life too. Touring is still important for creating a strong connection with fans. People do live a good part of their lives off the computer so follow traditional promotion routes too.
DON’T put all your energy into inviting people you don’t know to be your friend or worry about having big numbers of them.
DO be more concerned with connecting to real fans. Successful artists say they don’t worry about how many friends they have on MySpace. What’s important is that they’re real fans who care about reading bulletin posts and getting invitations to your gigs. Of course you can invite people to be your friend if you want to know them. But do that with an email to introduce yourself so they know who you are and why you’re requesting them as a friend. Just inviting for the sake of upping your numbers is a waste of time these days. I don’t have thousands of friends on MySpace but every one of them came to me. I like that better! www.myspace.com/Daylle
Before you begin, make sure you’re ready to commit the time. Even with limits, you’ll spend hours a day keeping up. Find sites that are the likeliest to reach your audience and work them with a vengeance. Take advantage of every function they offer. Join relevant communities. Interact on them as much as you can so people get to know you. Eventually some will come to your page and hear your music.
Being online can be a full time job and you might only have a limited amount of time to devote. ReverbNation www.reverbnation.com has many helpful tools that can save you a lot of time and maximize your online reach. Some people hire a promoter to do it for them. If you don’t have a budget, I highly advise that you put aside time every day to work this new model for marketing and promoting music online, with a real plan.
Author of "Start & Run Your Own Record Label" and "I Don’t Need a Record Deal!"
© 2009 All Rights Reserved. Used By Permission
Indie artists often complain about not having the budget they’d like to market and promote their music. Nowadays, digital marketing offers a plethora of opportunities for marketing yourself and your music that doesn’t cost anything in dollars. But, it can be hard to know where to begin—and end. While much of it is good for those of you with small to no money budgets, there’s still a big expense for taking advantage of so many opportunities—TIME.
The good AND the bad news: the cost to break an independent act can be more in time than in dollars. It’s great to have free tools! But you could spend all of your waking hours going onto all the different social networking sites and other avenues of promotion and still not make a dent. With all the artists and labels vying for online attention, you must work to make your music stand out.
It’s important to brand your name online. The more people see it, the more curiosity can be generated, which leads to potential fans or clients checking you out. The more you respond to fans who write to you, the more loyal fans you’ll have. But so much of the efforts to find fans is one by one, which accounts for a lot of the time you need to put into it.
It’s not enough to just register on all the websites. While there’s unlimited space for everyone online, you can get lost in it all and not make any constructive progress. I know. I’m always getting links to sites I “should check out.” People email me both to my server and on the social networking sites. It gets overwhelming. Another day ends and I haven’t done any writing. So I must get tough with myself in order to function.
Time isn’t FREE when it costs you your sleep, your personal life and even your sanity. But you can take control of online activities to make the most of the best opportunities. Here are so DOs and DON’Ts for getting the most out of your online resources.
DON’T jump around to everything that seems interesting or the new flavor of the month.
DO force yourself to stay on track. Put aside things you want to check out for when you have some time or accept you can’t look over everything. Learn the benefits of hitting DELETE.
DON’T immediately answer emails when they come in or click when you get a link.
DO: Prioritize what most needs to be done at this point. I have a NEED TO ANSWER folder and put personal emails and those asking questions into it. Have a block of time set aside when all you do is answer emails. When time is up, leave the rest for the next block!
DON’T jump from one site to another and register with every one you can.
DO plan your direction carefully and prioritize your needs to work them properly. Social networking sites allow musicians to seek fans out and interact with them. But working one or two hard is strongly advised as opposed to doing a little bit on many. If you have too many, you don’t work anything well and you can spread yourself too thin. Decide which sites are best for you and concentrate your energy to build up relationships with fans on them.
DON’T try to do everything yourself. DO mobilize fans to help. Get volunteers to assist you in following up with online activities. Ask them to tell other musicians on the site about you, use your music as their default on their MySpace page and drive potential fans to your sites. If you have a budget, hire an online marketing specialist to direct your efforts and do some of the legwork.
DON’T register with any social networking site that you’re not prepared to follow up with.
DO answer every email and make your presence known. Respond to comments. Nowadays, when people hear an artist they like or see you perform, they’ll leave a comment on your MySpace page. It’s important to respond. Musicians who keep in touch with their fans religiously build the strongest communities and get the most support.
DON’T focus just on MySpace and Facebook.
DO diversify. While pure social networking sites are great to exploit, get your music in places where people can find it. Do as many things as you can that don’t require constant attention that give your music potential exposure. Create iMixes up in the iTunes music store. Get your music into streaming radio sites, such as Last.fm, Pandora, Launch, iLike, etc. Send it to MP3 bloggers who review your genre of music. Post videos on YouTube. And get yourself on wikipedia, the free online encyclopedia. These efforts often just require doing something once and can drive people to find your music.
DON’T think that selling and promoting your music online is all you need.
DO everything you can in real life too. Touring is still important for creating a strong connection with fans. People do live a good part of their lives off the computer so follow traditional promotion routes too.
DON’T put all your energy into inviting people you don’t know to be your friend or worry about having big numbers of them.
DO be more concerned with connecting to real fans. Successful artists say they don’t worry about how many friends they have on MySpace. What’s important is that they’re real fans who care about reading bulletin posts and getting invitations to your gigs. Of course you can invite people to be your friend if you want to know them. But do that with an email to introduce yourself so they know who you are and why you’re requesting them as a friend. Just inviting for the sake of upping your numbers is a waste of time these days. I don’t have thousands of friends on MySpace but every one of them came to me. I like that better! www.myspace.com/Daylle
Before you begin, make sure you’re ready to commit the time. Even with limits, you’ll spend hours a day keeping up. Find sites that are the likeliest to reach your audience and work them with a vengeance. Take advantage of every function they offer. Join relevant communities. Interact on them as much as you can so people get to know you. Eventually some will come to your page and hear your music.
Being online can be a full time job and you might only have a limited amount of time to devote. ReverbNation www.reverbnation.com has many helpful tools that can save you a lot of time and maximize your online reach. Some people hire a promoter to do it for them. If you don’t have a budget, I highly advise that you put aside time every day to work this new model for marketing and promoting music online, with a real plan.
Thursday, February 19, 2009
Beatport Imposes New Rules That Hurt Indies
Indie artists are getting a real surprise from Beatport. They have increased their sales quota to a mandatory $500.00 quarterly in sales. This means many artists will be cut and dropped from Beatport.
The explanation is as follows:
That is about 300 to 400 songs per quarter, per artist. If I was selling that many tracks a month from just 1 site, not including making that from iTunes and so on, I would be selling it all myself from my own site. I only use these places for exposure. Not profit.
I have always felt with Beatport, it was all about the money. They never cared about the artists. They have the money to dominate the market, so they can set the rules as they please.
I do not think that Beatport should dictate who "indie artists" are by the amount of money they have or make. What they are saying is that you are not an artist that creates unless you have money.
It is no surprise to me in this world. For a long time, many talented artists have been silenced and kept down because they had no money. The Internet leveled that playing field giving indies a more affordable way to promote.
I know a quote that says, "It is a flawed society that causes art to be created within a financial means..." - the author is unknown.
So the Beatport fad will end and most probably the site will lose out. I think it is a major mistake to turn your backs on the indies.
There is always iTunes and the other 1000 digital shops to sell your stuff on...
www.504productions.com
The explanation is as follows:
The reasoning behind this new, higher benchmark is for several reasons. We wantI am an indie artist that does every thing by myself plus this is my profession and how I make my money. I am not a hobbyist. I also though am not a machine.
to keep the quality and the relevancy of content available on Beatport as high
as possible. We acknowledge and understand that labels do take some time to
build a brand, but we also feel that a higher income minimum serves to separate
the ‘hobbyist’ from the serious professional (or aspiring professional) producer
and/or label manager.
That is about 300 to 400 songs per quarter, per artist. If I was selling that many tracks a month from just 1 site, not including making that from iTunes and so on, I would be selling it all myself from my own site. I only use these places for exposure. Not profit.
I have always felt with Beatport, it was all about the money. They never cared about the artists. They have the money to dominate the market, so they can set the rules as they please.
I do not think that Beatport should dictate who "indie artists" are by the amount of money they have or make. What they are saying is that you are not an artist that creates unless you have money.
It is no surprise to me in this world. For a long time, many talented artists have been silenced and kept down because they had no money. The Internet leveled that playing field giving indies a more affordable way to promote.
I know a quote that says, "It is a flawed society that causes art to be created within a financial means..." - the author is unknown.
So the Beatport fad will end and most probably the site will lose out. I think it is a major mistake to turn your backs on the indies.
There is always iTunes and the other 1000 digital shops to sell your stuff on...
www.504productions.com
Tuesday, February 17, 2009
iTunes Success in 12 Steps
How Indie Artist "Making April" Systematically Went from 0 to 1,000 Sales a Week on iTunes in One Year
by Ariel Hyatt, Ariel Publicity
© 2009 All Rights Reserved
I recently was having lunch with my dear friend, music attorney extraordinaire Dan Friedman, who was in town to showcase a band he represents who he mentioned was selling 1,000 singles a week on iTunes.
My jaw almost hit the table. 1,000 singles a week on iTunes?
Who is this band? And how are they doing this? And he coughed up the answer (and luckily for me their phone number).
A few days later, I cold called Greg from "Making April", who it turns out are an emo/piano rock band (kind of like Ben Folds Five), and we spent an hour and a half on the phone. Greg generously spilled the beans as to how Making April got to where they are today: selling 1,000 CD singles a week on iTunes and signed to a record deal.
How They Did It…
Greg explained that they decided to make a full time business out of their band. Everyday at 9 AM, three of the four members met in what they called "The War Room," which was a room reserved in one of their homes. They took it seriously, just like a job, and every day they would set simple goals.
“In the beginning we really did not know what we were doing,” Greg recalls. “The daily goal was to make the maximum amount of friends on MySpace, which is 400 a day. Between three of us, that was 133 each.” Here’s how it went from there.
Step 1: Find sound alikes – famous bands similar to you. - They started by looking at similar bands in their genre that had large friends lists at MySpace. Dashboard Confessional, for example. They would go and they would ping each and every friend in Dashboard Confessional's friends list…
Step 2: Ping each person. And then they would go to the comments and post:
"Hey if you like Dashboard Confessional, you're probably going to like Making April. Would you please come check us out and leave a comment?" Then, people would check them out and leave comments.
Step 3: Get personal. The band would then personally respond and personally thank everyone that left a comment. And they always signed their name using a sig file, which included their IM address.
Step 4: Instant Messenger bonanza. Then they would get their new fans’ information through Instant Messenger, and they would sit all day long on Instant Messenger chatting back and forth with their new friends, and according to Greg it was crazy. They actually couldn't turn on their IM because the minute they would open it up, they’d get thousands of people trying to ping them. So they had to post their status as “Away” on their IM because their buddy list was insane.
TIP! Give your music away. The whole time, they were giving away their music for free to build their audience.
Step 5: Run contests. After several months making thousands of personal contacts, a new marketing idea struck them: Making April decided to create a contest to run for their fans. They asked fans to add them to their “Top 8” friends. This success of the contest manifested in the band getting even more MySpace traction.
Each of the 20 people in the contest got points for convincing others to add their video and/or song. According to Greg it got completely out of control.
After this successful contest, a company called Brickfish took notice and offered to help them launch a second contest. Entrants had to design a T-shirt, and in return the band would write a song for the winner.
So, out of a well planned T-shirt contest they got an additional 100,000 hits to their page in two weeks, and the winner got a shirt, a personal call from the band, and an original song written about them. “It was unbelievable.”
Step 6: Engage your audience consistently. Another of their strategies was to send out a bulletin every single day. Not a hypey bulletin pushing themselves, but a simple one that would engage their fans by asking a question like, “Should we get chunky peanut butter or smooth”
They felt that there was no reason to blog because they weren't really on the road, and they didn’t have a lot of news to report, so they just kept asking questions on their bulletins, day in and day out. And they had a call to action: They would ask everyone on the bulletins to comment back on their pages. They would get hundreds of responses from people, which then would add a track play and a front page hit to their MySpace page. Just due to the question, they would get 500 messages instantly, and 600+ comments a day.
Step 7: MTV action. After their wildly successful Brickfish contest, they got a song placed on MTV’s “Laguna Beach.” They don't really know how they ended up on that show – they think a fan probably e-mailed the track to MTV – but the episode aired three times, and all of a sudden they noticed people started to buy the download.
Step 8: Get ready to charge for tracks (after a solid fan base is built). It was only after all of this traction and attention that Making April started pushing their iTunes page. This was after a full year of solid online promotions. They took the free MP3s off of their MySpace page and they started seeing their sales pick up.
Step 9: Repeat and repeat and repeat… and repeat. They put a big wall-mounted dry erase board on the wall of the war room, and every day they each had a goal to make 150 friends and comment back personally.
Step 10: Measure your goals and write them down. Then they laid out a weekly plan to hit their goals and numbers at iTunes, which were 200 plays and 400 friends a day. They also went after the friends of another a band called Secondhand Serenade (who blew up after becoming the number one unsigned artist at MySpace).
Step 11: Be masterful at one thing. I asked Greg if they did blogging, podcasting, Twitter, or other social networking sites, and to my surprise, he said “no.” They did this all on MySpace alone. The goal for MySpace was to consistently add 200 friend requests and 400 plays to the traffic they were already generating.
Step 12: A record deal. Because of all of their solid dedicated focus, Universal Republic Records took notice and offered them a deal. The moral of the story and the end result of all this work: Making April got a deal.
Was this process easy? No. It took solid dedication, trial and error, and a hell of a lot of time invested, but Making April managed to be one of the top selling bands at iTunes in 2007 and they beat a vast majority of artists signed to major labels.
I think this is a phenomenal and an inspirational story and one that teaches us lots of lessons. From my experience, musicians tend to give up too easily and lose focus, and then become defeated and give up. Making April proves that with a plan and some dedication, you can get very far with the tools available to anyone who wants to give it a go.
Check them out here: www.myspace.com/makingapril
by Ariel Hyatt, Ariel Publicity
© 2009 All Rights Reserved
I recently was having lunch with my dear friend, music attorney extraordinaire Dan Friedman, who was in town to showcase a band he represents who he mentioned was selling 1,000 singles a week on iTunes.
My jaw almost hit the table. 1,000 singles a week on iTunes?
Who is this band? And how are they doing this? And he coughed up the answer (and luckily for me their phone number).
A few days later, I cold called Greg from "Making April", who it turns out are an emo/piano rock band (kind of like Ben Folds Five), and we spent an hour and a half on the phone. Greg generously spilled the beans as to how Making April got to where they are today: selling 1,000 CD singles a week on iTunes and signed to a record deal.
How They Did It…
Greg explained that they decided to make a full time business out of their band. Everyday at 9 AM, three of the four members met in what they called "The War Room," which was a room reserved in one of their homes. They took it seriously, just like a job, and every day they would set simple goals.
“In the beginning we really did not know what we were doing,” Greg recalls. “The daily goal was to make the maximum amount of friends on MySpace, which is 400 a day. Between three of us, that was 133 each.” Here’s how it went from there.
Step 1: Find sound alikes – famous bands similar to you. - They started by looking at similar bands in their genre that had large friends lists at MySpace. Dashboard Confessional, for example. They would go and they would ping each and every friend in Dashboard Confessional's friends list…
Step 2: Ping each person. And then they would go to the comments and post:
"Hey if you like Dashboard Confessional, you're probably going to like Making April. Would you please come check us out and leave a comment?" Then, people would check them out and leave comments.
Step 3: Get personal. The band would then personally respond and personally thank everyone that left a comment. And they always signed their name using a sig file, which included their IM address.
Step 4: Instant Messenger bonanza. Then they would get their new fans’ information through Instant Messenger, and they would sit all day long on Instant Messenger chatting back and forth with their new friends, and according to Greg it was crazy. They actually couldn't turn on their IM because the minute they would open it up, they’d get thousands of people trying to ping them. So they had to post their status as “Away” on their IM because their buddy list was insane.
TIP! Give your music away. The whole time, they were giving away their music for free to build their audience.
Step 5: Run contests. After several months making thousands of personal contacts, a new marketing idea struck them: Making April decided to create a contest to run for their fans. They asked fans to add them to their “Top 8” friends. This success of the contest manifested in the band getting even more MySpace traction.
Each of the 20 people in the contest got points for convincing others to add their video and/or song. According to Greg it got completely out of control.
After this successful contest, a company called Brickfish took notice and offered to help them launch a second contest. Entrants had to design a T-shirt, and in return the band would write a song for the winner.
So, out of a well planned T-shirt contest they got an additional 100,000 hits to their page in two weeks, and the winner got a shirt, a personal call from the band, and an original song written about them. “It was unbelievable.”
Step 6: Engage your audience consistently. Another of their strategies was to send out a bulletin every single day. Not a hypey bulletin pushing themselves, but a simple one that would engage their fans by asking a question like, “Should we get chunky peanut butter or smooth”
They felt that there was no reason to blog because they weren't really on the road, and they didn’t have a lot of news to report, so they just kept asking questions on their bulletins, day in and day out. And they had a call to action: They would ask everyone on the bulletins to comment back on their pages. They would get hundreds of responses from people, which then would add a track play and a front page hit to their MySpace page. Just due to the question, they would get 500 messages instantly, and 600+ comments a day.
Step 7: MTV action. After their wildly successful Brickfish contest, they got a song placed on MTV’s “Laguna Beach.” They don't really know how they ended up on that show – they think a fan probably e-mailed the track to MTV – but the episode aired three times, and all of a sudden they noticed people started to buy the download.
Step 8: Get ready to charge for tracks (after a solid fan base is built). It was only after all of this traction and attention that Making April started pushing their iTunes page. This was after a full year of solid online promotions. They took the free MP3s off of their MySpace page and they started seeing their sales pick up.
Step 9: Repeat and repeat and repeat… and repeat. They put a big wall-mounted dry erase board on the wall of the war room, and every day they each had a goal to make 150 friends and comment back personally.
Step 10: Measure your goals and write them down. Then they laid out a weekly plan to hit their goals and numbers at iTunes, which were 200 plays and 400 friends a day. They also went after the friends of another a band called Secondhand Serenade (who blew up after becoming the number one unsigned artist at MySpace).
Step 11: Be masterful at one thing. I asked Greg if they did blogging, podcasting, Twitter, or other social networking sites, and to my surprise, he said “no.” They did this all on MySpace alone. The goal for MySpace was to consistently add 200 friend requests and 400 plays to the traffic they were already generating.
Step 12: A record deal. Because of all of their solid dedicated focus, Universal Republic Records took notice and offered them a deal. The moral of the story and the end result of all this work: Making April got a deal.
Was this process easy? No. It took solid dedication, trial and error, and a hell of a lot of time invested, but Making April managed to be one of the top selling bands at iTunes in 2007 and they beat a vast majority of artists signed to major labels.
I think this is a phenomenal and an inspirational story and one that teaches us lots of lessons. From my experience, musicians tend to give up too easily and lose focus, and then become defeated and give up. Making April proves that with a plan and some dedication, you can get very far with the tools available to anyone who wants to give it a go.
Check them out here: www.myspace.com/makingapril
Sunday, February 1, 2009
Are You Wired for Tomorrow?
The information age is at hand. This is a great video that has some really interesting facts. These facts can be considered and used to help advance your art. Call it a better understanding...
Saturday, January 10, 2009
Digital Boom Creates Music Sales Record
British music sales are booming as young fans increasingly buy songs online rather than illegally downloading them, the country's industry body said Wednesday.
The BPI, formerly known as the British Phonographic Industry, said big-selling releases by artists including Leona Lewis, Coldplay, the Killers and Take That also helped drive sales to record levels last year.
The industry has struggled in recent years to adapt to rapidly changing technologies, and has been hit hard by illegal downloading of music via peer-to-peer (P2P) file-sharing websites.
But download sales grew by 33 percent last year, while 2008 was the biggest sales year on record in terms of singles sales in all formats, with 115 million single tracks sold.
The deepening recession has hit some retailers -- notably Woolworths and high street music retailer Zavvi, formerly Virgin Megastore -- but in other ways it could even be helping the industry, said BPI boss Geoff Taylor.
"Every business and consumer in the UK is having a tough time, and these difficult trading conditions make the resilience of the UK's music market all the more notable," he said.
"During a recession, people look for purchases that are excellent value for money and bring a lot of enjoyment, and music does just this," he added.
While downloads of single tracks have soared, the market for albums has also been helped by growing online sales: some 10 million albums were sold, a 65 percent increase on 2007.
Kim Bayley, head of the Entertainment Retailers Association, said traditional high street music sales were also holding up. "Music performed better in UK stores in 2008 than anyone had expected.
"The big lesson of 2008 is that if the music is strong enough and retailers work well with suppliers to get that product in-store, music fans will respond and buy in their droves."
The upbeat British music news came a day after US technology giant Apple said that every song in its iTunes library will be available without anti-piracy software by April.
The BPI, formerly known as the British Phonographic Industry, said big-selling releases by artists including Leona Lewis, Coldplay, the Killers and Take That also helped drive sales to record levels last year.
The industry has struggled in recent years to adapt to rapidly changing technologies, and has been hit hard by illegal downloading of music via peer-to-peer (P2P) file-sharing websites.
But download sales grew by 33 percent last year, while 2008 was the biggest sales year on record in terms of singles sales in all formats, with 115 million single tracks sold.
The deepening recession has hit some retailers -- notably Woolworths and high street music retailer Zavvi, formerly Virgin Megastore -- but in other ways it could even be helping the industry, said BPI boss Geoff Taylor.
"Every business and consumer in the UK is having a tough time, and these difficult trading conditions make the resilience of the UK's music market all the more notable," he said.
"During a recession, people look for purchases that are excellent value for money and bring a lot of enjoyment, and music does just this," he added.
While downloads of single tracks have soared, the market for albums has also been helped by growing online sales: some 10 million albums were sold, a 65 percent increase on 2007.
Kim Bayley, head of the Entertainment Retailers Association, said traditional high street music sales were also holding up. "Music performed better in UK stores in 2008 than anyone had expected.
"The big lesson of 2008 is that if the music is strong enough and retailers work well with suppliers to get that product in-store, music fans will respond and buy in their droves."
The upbeat British music news came a day after US technology giant Apple said that every song in its iTunes library will be available without anti-piracy software by April.
Free PHP Script That Sells Your Beats and Music!
504 Productions (www.504productions.com) will help you install this script for 25 bucks.....customization is extra though! But check it out if you want to sell your tunes. They have a mini flash player plus many many many more features.......
Maian Music
Introduction:
Music is my first love, so its a surprise its taken me so long to develop something music based. I had the idea for this script in 2006 when someone mentioned adapting Maian Cart into an .mp3 system. This script enables you to preview and sell your music in .mp3 format. In the live demo you`ll find some of my own music from a few years ago. Some of you may remember it from M-Dream a while ago. Enjoy the script!
Script Features:
- Easy to use mp3 music store to sell/preview mp3 tracks
- Add unlimited albums
- Group tracks into albums
- XHTML/CSS public layout
- Premium Beat flash music player for mp3 previews
- Store mp3 files outside of web root for security
- Store album mp3 files in their own folders
- Expiry limits for downloads and download page for track protection
- Built in check to prevent linking to download page
- Option for discount if whole album is purchased
- Supports 15 currencies
- Paypal IPN test mode available via Sandbox
- Optional mod_rewrite for search engine friendly urls
- Structure albums as parent/child association. ie: Sub categories
- Optional SMTP send mail option
- RSS feed to show latest albums
- Option to include artwork download link with full album purchase
- Graphical stats to view most popular track/album purchases
- Search engines for both public and admin interface
- Simple cart system
- Option to add smaller mp3 file for previews
- Template driven for easy HTML editing
- Auto installation file
- Public interface contact option
- Option to contact buyers from admin interface
- View sales in admin area with album/track purchase details
- About and Licence pages updateable via settings
- Option to re-send download link to buyer
Requirements/Testing Environments:
PHP v4.3.0 or higher.
Paypal Business or Premier Account
CURL support enabled for Paypal IPN system
GD graphics library with Freetype support for captcha
Browser Testing: IE7, IE6, Opera 9.2.5, Firefox 3.0
Local Server Testing: Apache server (2.2.4) running PHP v5.2.5, MySQL v5.0.45-nt
Production Server Testing: Apache server running PHP v5.2.4, MySQL 4.1.22-standard
Error Reporting Level for Development: E_ALL
http://www.maianscriptworld.co.uk/free-php-scripts/maian-music/free-mp3-music-store-system/index.html
Friday, January 9, 2009
Monday, December 29, 2008
Music Industry Looks to Internet for Revival
A generation after the launch of MTV, major record labels are hoping to revive the music video business online by creating a single digital destination for their artists’ output.
Plans under discussion include: a partnership with Hulu, the online television and film joint venture between News Corp and NBC Universal; the creation of a premium service on YouTube, Google’s video sharing site; or, a standalone venture between some or all of the four largest recorded music groups.
Industry members had hailed deals struck with YouTube last year as a new way of driving profits from the popularity of professional music videos and the soundtracks to amateur efforts on such user generated content sites.
However, some are now questioning whether either side has made much money from arrangements which require YouTube to share advertising revenues and, in many cases, pay a few tenths of a cent to the music company each time a video is streamed, regardless of how much advertising is sold.
Universal Music, the industry leader, has said that it makes “tens of millions of dollars” from YouTube.
Warner Music failed last week to agree a new deal with the site, however, saying it was not being adequately compensated and demanding that the site take down its artists’ videos and amateur content using songs from its publishing arm such as “Happy Birthday To You”.
Representatives of two music companies, who would not be named, said they were in discussions with Hulu, adding that no partnership announcement was imminent but that the site appeared to be the favoured partner. “If it happens at all it will be with Hulu,” one said.
Both added, however, that any such deal to create a standalone music video service would not replace existing deals with YouTube, and that there was interest in supplying content for a potential premium service on YouTube, which has begun to offer high definition videos.
Warner may yet return to YouTube should it agree new terms.
Screen Digest, a media research group, estimated last month that Hulu and YouTube would make about $70m and $100m respectively in US advertising revenues in 2008, but that Hulu would draw level with YouTube next year because advertisers are more comfortable with its professional content.
The industry’s search for new digital income comes amid collapsing compact disc sales, which have not yet been offset by digital revenue growth. Warner, the only quoted music company, reported 39 per cent growth in digital revenues for 2008 to $639m, or 18 per cent of total sales.
EMI, owned by Terra Firma, the private equity group, said full year digital revenues rose 29 per cent to £166m, while Universal, owned by Vivendi, reported 33 per cent growth in digital revenue for the first nine months of its financial year, saying in September it believed digital initiatives could soon return the music industry to growth.
Plans under discussion include: a partnership with Hulu, the online television and film joint venture between News Corp and NBC Universal; the creation of a premium service on YouTube, Google’s video sharing site; or, a standalone venture between some or all of the four largest recorded music groups.
Industry members had hailed deals struck with YouTube last year as a new way of driving profits from the popularity of professional music videos and the soundtracks to amateur efforts on such user generated content sites.
However, some are now questioning whether either side has made much money from arrangements which require YouTube to share advertising revenues and, in many cases, pay a few tenths of a cent to the music company each time a video is streamed, regardless of how much advertising is sold.
Universal Music, the industry leader, has said that it makes “tens of millions of dollars” from YouTube.
Warner Music failed last week to agree a new deal with the site, however, saying it was not being adequately compensated and demanding that the site take down its artists’ videos and amateur content using songs from its publishing arm such as “Happy Birthday To You”.
Representatives of two music companies, who would not be named, said they were in discussions with Hulu, adding that no partnership announcement was imminent but that the site appeared to be the favoured partner. “If it happens at all it will be with Hulu,” one said.
Both added, however, that any such deal to create a standalone music video service would not replace existing deals with YouTube, and that there was interest in supplying content for a potential premium service on YouTube, which has begun to offer high definition videos.
Warner may yet return to YouTube should it agree new terms.
Screen Digest, a media research group, estimated last month that Hulu and YouTube would make about $70m and $100m respectively in US advertising revenues in 2008, but that Hulu would draw level with YouTube next year because advertisers are more comfortable with its professional content.
The industry’s search for new digital income comes amid collapsing compact disc sales, which have not yet been offset by digital revenue growth. Warner, the only quoted music company, reported 39 per cent growth in digital revenues for 2008 to $639m, or 18 per cent of total sales.
EMI, owned by Terra Firma, the private equity group, said full year digital revenues rose 29 per cent to £166m, while Universal, owned by Vivendi, reported 33 per cent growth in digital revenue for the first nine months of its financial year, saying in September it believed digital initiatives could soon return the music industry to growth.
Saturday, September 13, 2008
Digital Distribution for the Indie Artist
I get many emails asking how I have my music available on many download websites such as iTunes and Beatport. I use 2 different services and will go over them for you now.
The first service is offered through CD Baby. Now at this time, you cannot upload a single track to CD Baby. I have read they are moving in that direction. For what they do offer, it is worth it and from a business perspective is a bit more sensible.
Any CD that you sell through CD Baby you can sign up for their digital distribution. The best thing about their program is they take nothing from you ever. The only thing that is required is a bar code. If you have a bar code for your CD, then you can sign up your CD for free with them. If not, a bar code is 20 bucks. Not a bad deal when you see the digital stores you will be submitted too.
- Apple iTunes
- Amazon
- BuyMusic
- GreatIndieMusic
- GroupieTunes
- iSound
- Last.fm
- Mix And Burn
- MP3tunes
- MSN Music
- MusicNet
- PayPlay
- Rhapsody
- Txttunes
- Verizon
- Zune
The only deal with CD Baby is that you must submit your CD to them to sell to be able to enroll in their digital distribution program. To me, I feel it is worth it. You get your tunes on the bigger websites that are for the consumer or fan. Sites like iTunes & Amazon alone are worth it.
From a business point of view, it is smarter to get the CD out before you start to sell your Mp3s of the CD. Milk your CD sales for what you can for at least 60 days. Then get those mp3s listed and promote it as "Now Available on iTunes!"...
The second service I use to distribute to the DJ consumer would be Symphonic Distribution. They deal with labels only. They supply a wide range of websites that cater to the DJ. Here is a list of some of the stores they distribute too.
- Beatport
- Breakbeat Alliance
- Breakbeat Online
- DJ Download
- DJ Mag.com
- DJ Mr
- Juno Download
- Mixmag
Now Symphonic Distribution does distribute to stores that CD Baby also distributes too. Stores such as Apple iTunes, Amazon, and Rhapsody. You can choose from each service what stores you want them to distribute too. Just tell Symphonic Distribution not to distribute to stores that would be a conflict. Most major stores do not appreciate your music being submitted from more than one source.
Now if you are an independent artist, you will not be able to use Symphonic Distribution. They only cater to labels. The only way to get your tunes on Beatport is to find a label that would submit your music to Beatport. Beatport has strict rules and is one of the hardest stores to get your music on. It is also one of the ones with the strictest rules.
Sunday, August 10, 2008
Bands Favoring Web Over Major Labels
Thousands of fans. A jam-packed tour schedule. A CD for sale. And no record label behemoth behind it all?
That’s today’s music business, according to Chris Bowes, the drummer for the Connecticut band Columbia Fields. And such independent success is fast becoming music industry standard for up-and-coming musical acts trying to build a brand, a following and a sound.
Columbia Fields, whose sound Bowes describes as a sort of Dave Matthews Band meets John Mayer, is among a growing number of musical groups making music independently, without a record label.
All on its own, Columbia Fields has amassed more than 14,000 fans on Myspace.com, booked shows in venues across the state and landed airtime on local radio stations WTIC 96.5 FM and KISS 95.7.
Over the past decade, the music industry has changed. It used to be that a band needed a record label to hit it big. Labels had the power to finance, distribute and promote new music.
New Opportunities
But starting with the days of Napster, technology has given emerging acts new opportunities. Now, artists can amass a substantial following through Internet music downloads, social networking sites like Myspace.com and individual artist Web sites. They can produce CDs in the comfort of home and sell them through online record stores like Cdbaby.com.
“I’m one of those guys who, when I was a kid, always saw myself up on stage, playing in front of thousands of people,” said Bowes, who’s been with Columbia Fields for about two years. The band’s first CD, “When the Night Falls,” has sold about 750 copies at shows and through online distribution with Cdbaby.com.
“The industry’s a little different now,” he added. “Bands don’t necessarily need labels to get in front of large audiences.”
“The heart of all the [industry] changes is definitely technology, bottom line,” said Adam Gootkin, co-owner of the recording studio Onyx Soundlab in Manchester. Half of his studio’s business is with major labels, artists and corporations, like Dell; the other half is with independent artists.
Gootkin’s latest project is a new track for R&B artist Brandy.
Marketing Tools
The music industry is going all digital, said Gootkin. Album sales are down, he added, and that means less income for labels, which are set up to sell CDs. Without the need for distribution, record labels become little more than banks, he said. Large labels have yet to adjust their business model to fit the digital times.
Declining revenues from CD sales has had one immediate impact on the industry, namely that labels are becoming more selective in whom they choose to sign, Gootkin said. That means musicians who are looking for the financial backing of a major record label need to come to them prepared, pre-packaged with an image, a brand and a following, he said.
“The closer you are to helping them see the vision, the closer you are to getting a deal,” Gootkin said.
Part of that challenge for young musicians is marketing, said Sheri Ziccardi, public relations manager for The Hartt School, the arts school at the University of Hartford. Ziccardi has spent years helping students in creative fields market themselves. The tools certainly have evolved, she said.
“Thinking about marketing and promoting themselves can be a challenge for creative types, who do not necessarily want to think about the ‘business’ side of the industry they choose to enter,” Ziccardi said in an e-mail. “Fortunately, today’s students have been raised in a techno-heavy culture and are comfortable with utilizing technology for self-expression and communication, so marketing themselves may become easier for them in some ways than it was for their predecessors.”
Staying Independent
If musicians can grasp the ins and outs of the industry, staying independent can be a viable option.
Music industry veteran and songwriting instructor Bill Pere maintains that it only takes a band about 10,000 fans to be able to make music full-time and remain independent of a label. He’s seen it happen, when musicians are industry-savvy.
“A person is now able to get their material to a wide audience,” said the Mystic-based Pere, who has put out 16 CDs but makes most of his royalties from digital downloads. “The trade-off is that in the old school … the record label basically does everything for you,” he added. “And all you have to do is your music.”
But artists attached to a label get a small piece of the pie, if anything at all, he said.
For example, a band signs a contract with a label and gets a $500,000 advance to make an album. Any royalties that come from the sale of the resulting album must first go to pay back that advance, Pere said.
“If you don’t sell enough, you don’t get anything,” Pere said. “It takes a heck of a lot of sales to make any money.”
Keeping Profits
The independent market doesn’t offer the connections or the budget. “But you get to keep 100 percent of everything you make,” said Pere, who has remained independent throughout his musical career. “You are the one issuing contracts to other people to do work the way you want it done.”
Downloadable music has also created the need for a more strategic approach to songwriting, Pere said. Sometimes listeners only get to sample the first 30 seconds of a song before deciding whether or not to purchase it. Long intros won’t get a song downloaded; those first 30 seconds have to rock.
“It’s a totally transformed world, with its good sides and bad sides,” he added. “It’s not a matter or right or wrong. It’s about having your eyes wide open.”
That’s today’s music business, according to Chris Bowes, the drummer for the Connecticut band Columbia Fields. And such independent success is fast becoming music industry standard for up-and-coming musical acts trying to build a brand, a following and a sound.
Columbia Fields, whose sound Bowes describes as a sort of Dave Matthews Band meets John Mayer, is among a growing number of musical groups making music independently, without a record label.
All on its own, Columbia Fields has amassed more than 14,000 fans on Myspace.com, booked shows in venues across the state and landed airtime on local radio stations WTIC 96.5 FM and KISS 95.7.
Over the past decade, the music industry has changed. It used to be that a band needed a record label to hit it big. Labels had the power to finance, distribute and promote new music.
New Opportunities
But starting with the days of Napster, technology has given emerging acts new opportunities. Now, artists can amass a substantial following through Internet music downloads, social networking sites like Myspace.com and individual artist Web sites. They can produce CDs in the comfort of home and sell them through online record stores like Cdbaby.com.
“I’m one of those guys who, when I was a kid, always saw myself up on stage, playing in front of thousands of people,” said Bowes, who’s been with Columbia Fields for about two years. The band’s first CD, “When the Night Falls,” has sold about 750 copies at shows and through online distribution with Cdbaby.com.
“The industry’s a little different now,” he added. “Bands don’t necessarily need labels to get in front of large audiences.”
“The heart of all the [industry] changes is definitely technology, bottom line,” said Adam Gootkin, co-owner of the recording studio Onyx Soundlab in Manchester. Half of his studio’s business is with major labels, artists and corporations, like Dell; the other half is with independent artists.
Gootkin’s latest project is a new track for R&B artist Brandy.
Marketing Tools
The music industry is going all digital, said Gootkin. Album sales are down, he added, and that means less income for labels, which are set up to sell CDs. Without the need for distribution, record labels become little more than banks, he said. Large labels have yet to adjust their business model to fit the digital times.
Declining revenues from CD sales has had one immediate impact on the industry, namely that labels are becoming more selective in whom they choose to sign, Gootkin said. That means musicians who are looking for the financial backing of a major record label need to come to them prepared, pre-packaged with an image, a brand and a following, he said.
“The closer you are to helping them see the vision, the closer you are to getting a deal,” Gootkin said.
Part of that challenge for young musicians is marketing, said Sheri Ziccardi, public relations manager for The Hartt School, the arts school at the University of Hartford. Ziccardi has spent years helping students in creative fields market themselves. The tools certainly have evolved, she said.
“Thinking about marketing and promoting themselves can be a challenge for creative types, who do not necessarily want to think about the ‘business’ side of the industry they choose to enter,” Ziccardi said in an e-mail. “Fortunately, today’s students have been raised in a techno-heavy culture and are comfortable with utilizing technology for self-expression and communication, so marketing themselves may become easier for them in some ways than it was for their predecessors.”
Staying Independent
If musicians can grasp the ins and outs of the industry, staying independent can be a viable option.
Music industry veteran and songwriting instructor Bill Pere maintains that it only takes a band about 10,000 fans to be able to make music full-time and remain independent of a label. He’s seen it happen, when musicians are industry-savvy.
“A person is now able to get their material to a wide audience,” said the Mystic-based Pere, who has put out 16 CDs but makes most of his royalties from digital downloads. “The trade-off is that in the old school … the record label basically does everything for you,” he added. “And all you have to do is your music.”
But artists attached to a label get a small piece of the pie, if anything at all, he said.
For example, a band signs a contract with a label and gets a $500,000 advance to make an album. Any royalties that come from the sale of the resulting album must first go to pay back that advance, Pere said.
“If you don’t sell enough, you don’t get anything,” Pere said. “It takes a heck of a lot of sales to make any money.”
Keeping Profits
The independent market doesn’t offer the connections or the budget. “But you get to keep 100 percent of everything you make,” said Pere, who has remained independent throughout his musical career. “You are the one issuing contracts to other people to do work the way you want it done.”
Downloadable music has also created the need for a more strategic approach to songwriting, Pere said. Sometimes listeners only get to sample the first 30 seconds of a song before deciding whether or not to purchase it. Long intros won’t get a song downloaded; those first 30 seconds have to rock.
“It’s a totally transformed world, with its good sides and bad sides,” he added. “It’s not a matter or right or wrong. It’s about having your eyes wide open.”
Thursday, August 7, 2008
Tuesday, August 5, 2008
Thursday, July 31, 2008
July 2008 - 43 Places to Promote Your Music
This month's newsletter features the listings that were submitted to me this past month.
The contacts listed are sorted into FIVE sections.
- Publications that will REVIEW your music
- Radio Stations/Shows that will PLAY your songs
- Labels, Vendors and Promotional Services that will help you to SELL your CD
- Sites where you can UPLOAD your band's MP3s or videos
- A wide range of Helpful Resources for recording artists
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