American Songwriter » Mike King

Direct to Fan Marketing: Building Your Base

Mike King — Mon, 31 Aug 2009 05:00:00 +0000

Anyone that has been following music business trends for the past few years is likely familiar with the high profile direct to fan campaigns (campaigns that focus on the monetization of an artist’s fan base directly) that Nine Inch Nails, Radiohead, Imogen Heap and others have been involved with recently. As Mike Masnick put it in his 2009 NARM Keynote, the recipe for effective direct to fan campaigns can be boiled down to: Connecting with Fans (CwF) + Providing a Reason to Buy (RtB) = $$$. Makes sense, right? The difficulties arise when you consider that there are 5 million bands on MySpace, all of which are vying for the consumer’s attention. It’s easy for NIN and Radiohead to connect with fans, the skeptics’ note, as they have had years of major label support and hundreds of thousands of existing followers to work with. How can a developing artist in this climate differentiate themselves from all the other bands out there? The answer can be slightly more nuanced than Masnick’s formula above, and to me, is based on a four key elements: 1) setting up an effective offer page on your site that is tailored to your marketing goals and where you are in your marketing cycle, 2) expanding your digital touch points through creative fan acquisition techniques, 3) integrating your online and offline marketing towards the same goal, and lastly 4) once you’ve created your groundswell of support and fans, integrating effective 3^rd party digital and physical marketing, sales, and distribution outlets into the mix. Let’s illustrate these elements with two examples. Example 1: Fanfarlo Creating an Effective Offer Page Tailored to Acquisition Although they were supported by NME in their hometown of London (who have called their release “a carefully orchestrated treat”), and have some high profile fans in the members of Sigur Rós, Fanfarlo found that they were having a tough time breaking into the US market. Fanfarlo’s music is undeniably great (aside: the first step, of course, in any marketing campaign is to have great music. Without this, any DTF marketing campaign will fail), and as such, the plan for breaking Fanfarlo relied a lot on getting as many folks to experience their music as possible, with the end goal of gaining enough interest to pack the Metro Lounge in NYC (300 capacity). The band initiated their acquisition-based campaign by looking at what assets and connections they could leverage. Fanfarlo developed a low-cost video, dug up some unreleased tracks and recorded new acoustic versions, and of particular note, the band’s management reached out to Sigur Rós, who agreed to mention Fanfarlo in one of their emails to their fans. Prior to any outreach from Sigur Rós, the band knew it was crucial for them to create an offer on their site that would make their music as accessible as possible, while at the same time create a degree of urgency. Again, as monetization was not the driving force behind their campaign at this stage in their marketing process, Fanfarlo decided the best course of action for building up their base was to provide curious potential fans with the opportunity to purchase their record for $1.00 (for a limited time), in exchange for an email address (which provided the band with permission to engage with these fans directly at a later date). The band adjusted their site accordingly, employing best practices with SEO and Web IA, and created an offer page dedicated to highlighting their music and making it easy to purchase via one click off the offer page. This was the result: Along with the redesigned offer page on their site, the band adjusted all of their social media pages (visibility on MySpace, Wikipedia, Facebook, Last.fm, iLike, YouTube) with appropriate offer copy / images, and links to the offer on their proper site. Once all the backend was done and Fanfarlo was ready for the traffic, Sigur Rós hyped the band in an email to their fans and Fanfarlo essentially had an “offer you can’t refuse” waiting for them. In exchange, the band built up their email list, created a viral buzz on their new record, and not only had enough interest to pack the Metro Lounge in NYC, they had to upgrade to the larger Bowery Ballroom! Example 2: The Lights Out Expanding Your Digital Touch Points through Social Media & Integrating Your Online and Offline Marketing All marketing campaigns are different, and not everyone has the luxury of having support from major bands like Sigur Rós. But no matter where you are at in your career, core marketing principals hold true, particularly when it comes to effectively using social media to engage your fans and building up your base. The best example of social media campaigns are creative ideas that leverage the viral nature of social media to engage fans and effect change in not only the digital world, but in a band’s physical campaign as well (which of course is still incredibly important to any overall marketing campaign). The Lights Out is a Boston-based band working to raise their hometown visibility and acquire new fans to positively impact their touring base throughout the Northeast. On the heels of an oppressive heat wave in Boston in mid August, the band initiated a Slush Puppie “flash mob” online marketing campaign. The band found the appropriate location for the event via polling their Twitter followers: Once the location was chosen, the band set up a Facebook event, which allowed them to update the status of the Slush Mob, get an idea on who was coming, and communicate directly with those that expressed interest. The band then set up a Twitter hashtag (#), which organized all messaging around the event into a single live channel on Twitter search. The hashtag use also had the all-important added benefit of becoming a “viral generator” for the event, piquing the interest of the band’s follower’s fans, and influencing activity at a level outside of what the band could do with their fanbase directly. Once the existing fans were engaged in the event, Boston based bloggers picked up on it, the market’s alternative weekly featured info on the event, and popular Boston-based event and social media Twitterers did the same. The band continued Tweeting from the event and after, and shared photos of the turnout using Twitpic: So, what did all this mean to the band’s stated goal of raising their visibility and acquiring new fans? The data: • 20% increase in unique web site visitors • 24 times increase in daily twitter followers • 3,352 impressions from media coverage • 66,160 impressions from Tweets and Retweets • 195 impressions from Twitpics • Approximate Total: 70,000 impressions New fans also direct-messaged the band, telling them how much they enjoyed the idea/their music and expressing interest in attending future gigs. And because this social media campaign included an offline component, new fans were able to bond with the band in a more personal way. Again, all marketing campaigns are different, and should be employed in a way that focuses on the strengths and opportunities of the respective band. The specific tools will certainly continue to change as we move forward, but the principle of determining your core goal and engaging / developing your fan base to reach this goal will not. What’s particularly exciting to me is that artists have the option to market and distribute their music directly, with less gatekeeper involvement, than ever before. We’re in the early stages of direct to fan campaigns, but I think it's undeniable that there is a tremendous amount of growth potential in the segment – and is an area that artists, managers and others (forward thinking, artist-serviced based companies, for example) have to look at very closely. Mike King writes and teaches online music business courses for Berkleemusic.com, Berklee College of Music’s online school. He is also the author of the book Music Marketing: Press Promotion, Distribution, and Retail, out now on Berklee Press. Get it on Amazon.com.

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MIKE KING’S BLOG: iTunes Drops DRM – So What Does it Mean?

Mike King — Fri, 09 Jan 2009 21:19:28 +0000

It just got a whole lot harder for online music retailers to compete with iTunes. Although I stop purchasing music from iTunes years ago and buy only DRM-free music (I settled on a monthly subscription with eMusic – which will still be my jam for more obscure left-of-the-dial music for the time being), the announcement by Apple on Tuesday that they are immediately dropping DRM (Digital Rights Management) from 8 million tracks changes things slightly. It just got a whole lot harder for online music retailers to compete with iTunes. Although I stop purchasing music from iTunes years ago and buy only DRM-free music (I settled on a monthly subscription with eMusic – which will still be my jam for more obscure left-of-the-dial music for the time being), the announcement by Apple on Tuesday that they are immediately dropping DRM (Digital Rights Management) from 8 million tracks changes things slightly. Here’s what this announcement means to me: A) Labels are continuing to relinquish more control over their product (which is a good thing). B) It’s likely that iTunes market share will increase over and above their already commanding 70%+ of the legal online download market (which is not a good thing for competition). C) Other players (like the leap year bug plagued Zune) will be able to play music from the Apple store (only after it is converted from AAC to MP3 though, which iTunes can do but is not ideal). The truth is, aside from folks that are deep in the music business, how many consumers are really going to notice a difference? Do many casual music fans with an iPod know that iTunes had DRM files to start with? Overall, the fact that Apple is removing DRM is definitely a step forward for the music industry. But I do tend to think that the real game changer for online music will be some sort of collective licensing model along the lines of what the EFF proposes. According to the IFPI, the ratio of unlicensed tracks downloaded to legal tracks sold is about 20 to 1. There are extreme opinions on both sides of the very complex collective licensing model discussion, but finding a way to monetize this traffic in a way that positively affects artists will have a much greater impact to the music industry than Apple’s DRM announcement. Baby steps!

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MIKE KING’S BLOG: Warner Music Fights YouTube At The Expense Of The Artist

Mike King — Wed, 07 Jan 2009 15:14:24 +0000

Warner’s demand that thousands of videos featuring their music be removed from YouTube gives artists another reason to think twice about signing with a major label. Warner’s demand that thousands of videos featuring their music be removed from YouTube gives artists another reason to think twice about signing with a major label. Two years ago, all four major labels signed a licensing agreement with YouTube that provides them with a per-stream fee for each video viewed (whether it is a video created by the majors, or one which is user generated), as well as a share of YouTube’s advertising revenue. The existing deal is nothing to sneeze at. While it is unclear how much revenue Warner has taken in from YouTube, Universal has brought in “tens of millions of dollars” from their relationship with YouTube, according to Rio Caraeff, executive vice president of Universal Music Group's eLabs. The problem is that Warner Music is not seeing the forest for the trees. In their quest to max out all their possible revenue streams, Warner is overlooking the fact that their music business is built on the backs of artists who need this connection with their fans to grow their base and further their career. Inserting a barrier into this process, where fans cannot add the music of their favorite artists to their homemade videos, or send around a new video to their friends, is not a good way to draw in new fans. And again, unlike traditional marketing outlets like commercial radio, YouTube is an emerging revenue stream as well. “It's growing tremendously,” says Caraeff. “It's up almost 80 percent for us year-over-year in the U.S. in terms of our revenue from this category." As Amanda Palmer from the Dresden Dolls writes on her blog “it’s abSURD. they are looking for money in a totally backwards way. money that, i should point out, i would NEVER see as an artist. if they got their way and youtube decided to give them a larger revenue share of the videos, it’s very unlikely it would ever make it’s way into the artists’ bank accounts. i loved my videos. now they are gone. why is life so hard? did i mention that being on a major label is starting to seem like…..not such a grand idea?”

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MIKE KING’S BLOG: Diversifying Your Revenue Streams and Niche Marketing

Mike King — Mon, 01 Dec 2008 17:39:22 +0000

Some really interesting comments in the New York Times recently on Atlantic Records' statement that their digital sales are surpassing their CD sales. What really struck me was how Atlantic is going about increasing their digital sales. Good quote here:

“I think we’ve figured it out,” said Julie Greenwald, president of Atlantic Records. “It used to be that you could connect five dots and sell a million records. Now there are 20 dots you can connect to sell a million records.” I really think the same can be said for developing artists. A common thread in my course (as well as the other online business courses at Berkleemusic.com) is that diversifying your revenue streams and engaging in niche marketing is a big part of making it work for musicians these days. Check out what Atlantic is doing: Replacing compact disc sales are small bits of revenue from many sources: Atlantic Records’ digital sales include ring tones, ringbacks, satellite radio, iTunes sales and subscription services. At the same time, record labels — Atlantic included — are spending less money to market artists. In the pre-Internet days, said Ms. Greenwald, “we were so flush, we did everything in the name of promotion.” Among the cutbacks are less spending to produce videos and to support publicity tours when a new album is released. The same principles can be (must be) applied to developing artists. Get your music out to Pandora (who accept indie submissions), start selling ringtones, start selling merch off of your own site, use TuneCore or CD Baby to get your music up on iTunes. Be aggressive with your outreach, and targeted with your outlets.

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MIKE KING’S BLOG: Using uStream to Host a Webcast

Mike King — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 16:04:08 +0000

I talk a lot in my course about the fact that touring “kickstarts” (I need a better phrase here, I think, one that does not make me think of Mötley Crüe every time I write it) all the other marketing efforts: press, retail, merch, radio (some form), and Internet. It not only gives press a reason to write about you, a reason for radio to spin your record, and retail a reason to stock your music, but it’s the best way to forge that all important “emotional connection” with your fanbase. I talk a lot in my course about the fact that touring “kickstarts” (I need a better phrase here, I think, one that does not make me think of Mötley Crüe every time I write it) all the other marketing efforts: press, retail, merch, radio (some form), and Internet. It not only gives press a reason to write about you, a reason for radio to spin your record, and retail a reason to stock your music, but it’s the best way to forge that all important “emotional connection” with your fanbase. My friend and colleague George Howard talks about the importance of having a foot in both the online and the physical marketing realm (he calls it the Straddle). I think uStream does a great job of providing a platform to accomplish this (bringing what you do offline, online) via their free webcasting tool at www.ustream.com. Similar to the most successful online ventures, uStream is extremely user friendly. The setup is simple: once you create an account, you can embed their video player on your site, use your webcam or plug in a firewire camera to film your live event, let folks know about the show through the scheduling tools on your uStream page, and you are off to the races. You can record and archive past live events as well. All for free. uStream has some community based features that allows fans who are watching your Webcast to chat in real time with one another (hopefully positively) about your show. Superfans can embed the player in any social networking site, too. Take a look at the player in action www.rendtheheavens.com

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MIKE KING’S BLOG: Online Marketing, Don’t Forget About The Personal Connection

Mike King — Mon, 24 Nov 2008 15:44:24 +0000

It takes about an hour for a musician to get started with basic online marketing. Setting up an account with MySpace, Facebook, Twitter, uStream, Flickr, Reverbnation, OurStage, Fanbridge, and the dozens of other options is simple, and an excellent first step. But I tend to think that some bands lose sight of the fact that online marketing is not an end on to itself. It takes about an hour for a musician to get started with basic online marketing. Setting up an account with MySpace, Facebook, Twitter, uStream, Flickr, Reverbnation, OurStage, Fanbridge, and the dozens of other options is simple, and an excellent first step. But I tend to think that some bands lose sight of the fact that online marketing is not an end on to itself. The most effective online marketing campaigns support the physical marketing efforts as well. Two examples from last week: 1) Don Bartlett, manager of Joe Pug (via the Lefsetz letter): “We decided to put an offer up on Joe's website and MySpace. We told any fan that if they knew anyone who might be interested in Joe's music that they could send us an email and we send them as many copies of a two-song sampler CD as they wanted. Free. We even cover the postage. To keep costs down, we invested in a CD publishing system that burns and prints them robotically. Each CD has two songs, contact info, MySpace, and a reminder that the full CD was at iTunes. If someone lived near a place where a show was scheduled, we printed that show info on there as well. People requested as few as 2 and as many as 50. We sent all of them. Requests continued to pour in, and the more we sent out the faster the new requests came in. We're at the point now where we get about 15 a day. Joe writes a thank you note in each and every one. And almost instantly, sales took off. [Show] attendance jumped noticeably and MySpace/website action began a steady upward arc. More importantly, we built an incredible database of his most hardcore fans. And after receiving a mailbox full of cds for free, they are willing to do anything to help forward the cause. And it is the ultimate in target marketing...you have people who already like your music passing it on to their friends, whose tastes they presumably know.” 2) Rock/Jam band Umphrey's McGee The band is organizing an online pre-sale campaign that gives their fans a reason to encourage others to buy the record pre-sale. They’re announcing it on their Website, as well as using banner ads on their social networking properties. Here are the details from their site: Much like an Umphrey's show, no one is exactly sure what will happen with Mantis, the upcoming release from Umphrey's McGee. The more fans that pre-order the release, the more bonus content we'll unlock for everyone. We are leaving the amount of additional content and the makeup of some of that content entirely up to you. There are 8 total levels of material that could be unlocked containing over 45 unique & unreleased audio tracks, including behind-the-scenes perspectives, videos, and plenty of quirky surprises. Bonus Material Part I available EXCLUSIVELY to those who pre-order. Great to see both of these bands nailing the online campaign to affect tangible change offline and facilitate a personal connection directly with their fans.

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MIKE KING’S BLOG: Top 20 Online Promotions for October

Mike King — Mon, 10 Nov 2008 18:09:04 +0000

">AC/DC EXCEL VIDEO

Music Ally has posted their thoughts on the best online promotions from October 2008. I was familiar with many of these (the AC/DC video in Excel being my favorite), but there’s some other really creative ideas in here worth looking into. Great iPhone app ideas from Snow Patrol, NIN and Pink, and a cool online distribution idea from Ben Folds that leverages iTunes and his live music.

Also: if you are not part of the Twitter train yet, I suggest you give it a look. Microblogging is another great marketing tool that should be considered as part of your overall community-building plan. Even Britney Spears is on board!

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MIKE KING’S BLOG: Mercury Rev Using Free Music to Connect with Fans

Mike King — Fri, 24 Oct 2008 20:24:49 +0000

Of course giving away a free record is nothing new – huge bands who’ve had major label support throughout their careers (Radiohead, Prince, Nine Inch Nails, etc) have the luxury of releasing free music to their massive fanbases with the understanding that doing so will fill the seats in the stadiums when they are on tour. But how does a band capitalize on free music when they don’t have this built in community, when they are not a household name? Of course giving away a free record is nothing new – huge bands who’ve had major label support throughout their careers (Radiohead, Prince, Nine Inch Nails, etc) have the luxury of releasing free music to their massive fanbases with the understanding that doing so will fill the seats in the stadiums when they are on tour. But how does a band capitalize on free music when they don’t have this built in community, when they are not a household name? Although Mercury Rev was signed to Columbia for their first two records, the bulk of their material was released by then-independent V2 (Richard Branson’s post-Virgin label). The band has fluttered close to mainstream success (1998’s Deserter Songs is a masterpiece), but has remained an indie favorite playing mostly mid-sized venues in the US. Indie Label Yep Roc (who signed Mercury Rev for their latest, Snowflake Midnight) has put together a great plan to leverage free music to build up the bands fanbase, and draw interest to their new release. Promotion for the new record draws folks back to their Website (not their Myspace!), where the band is giving away Snowflake Midnight’s companion release Strange Attractor, another full length record. Folks that sign up for the Mercury Rev mailing list get a link to download Strange Attractor as a high quality DRM-free mp3 that can be played on any device. The free release became available on the same day as their paid release hit the stores. I think this is good marketing: they’re providing a value add for old fans, giving new fans a reason to get on board, and most importantly, collecting a ton of email addresses that they can use down the line to announce tour dates, sell merch, sell tickets etc. And the fact that they are providing music that people can own outright, share, play at parties etc is huge. The fans are part of the action, and are playing a part in making the release of the proper record a true event (via word of mouth). There is SO much music out there, that it is easy for folks to get distracted. Bands need to take special care in keeping their existing fanbase interested, providing incentives for potential new fans, and above all continuing to build their community.

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