The In-Crowd: Week 7 – The Third Half

Posted on August 10, 2010 by phil in Blog, The In-Crowd: Crowdfunding In Action

“The In-Crowd” is an inside look at crowdfunding, with Ariel Publicity Artist Phil Putnam and RocketHub.com co-founder Brian Meece.  Each Monday, the boys are giving us an honest look at a crowdfunding project in action and dish on how things are going each week.

What is crowdfunding?  Find out here.

What does it look like?  See here.
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WEEK 7:

44 days in, 31 days remaining.  $3,753 raised (38% of the $10,000 goal), $6,247 needed.

Phil Says:

Songs About You is at a point that has felt far off and surreal up until this moment: there’s one month left until the deadline.  This snuck up on me, mostly because I’ve been thinking of the timeline in thirds and I know that the middle third always feels the longest and most difficult.  Well, it was difficult, but it just flew right by and now I’m on the precipice of the last leg of the journey.  I’ll be honest, there is a sense of relief due to seeing the light at the end of the tunnel.  This experience has worn on me more than I anticipated, in ways I didn’t imagine it would.  The relief isn’t the lone sentiment in my heart, though.  I’m excited by the possibility that this could still work, that all the money could be raised.  It feels like a long shot, but it’s still in the realm of reality.

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Beyond Direct-to-Fan

Posted on April 1, 2010 by Christopher Gesualdi in Blog, SoundAdvice

Brooklyn, NY. April 1, 2010 – Everybody is talking about direct-to-fan, and how it is changing the way musicians can sustain themselves. Never before have musicians had so much direct communication with their tribes.

Sometimes I look at this progression and think, “What could possibly be next?” Boundaries are often pushed so far so fast that it is difficult for us to even forecast a possible next step, let along carry one out.

If you too are stumped by this question, look no further than UK duo, Rob and Kal.

Rob and Kal (click on the photo to access their Twitter account)

They are allowing the entire world to be involved in their creative process. I think that bares repeating: they are allowing the entire world to be involved in their creative process.

Dubbed “Mubla 2.0” (album spelled backwards), their interactive project is allowing any and all music lovers to see, hear, and most importantly, take part in the recording of an album from start to finish.

Never before have I seen a band put so much trust in their fans.

I could continue to talk about it, but I’d rather you head over to http://www.robandkal.com and experience the ingenuity. My blabbering will not do this justice.

I truly respect these guys, and hope you too will see the brilliance in what they are attempting to do.

Christopher Gesualdi is currently the Marketing Director at Ariel Publicity

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SoundCtrl: Video Recap of Artist Disruptor’s Event

Posted on August 14, 2009 by Ariel Hyatt in Where's Ariel?

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Artist’s SUCCESS Salon, NYC 6/2/2009

Posted on May 24, 2009 by Ariel Hyatt in Where's Ariel?

Tuesday June 2, 2009
6PM-9PM

New York City

With Ariel Hyatt, of Ariel Publicity & Cyber PR
And Debra Russell, Artist’s EDGE Success Coaching Get ready for a fascinating evening with two Experts in the Music Industry.  Debra and Ariel will interview each other to discover what you need to truly succeed in the Music Biz!

We will talk about how to break through fears and things that may be stopping you from getting what you want and we will look at ways that you can connect more effectively to communities of fans who will support you, help you get where you want to be and Buy your music.

Ariel has spent the last several years studying both Social Media and Internet Marketing and she has a clear understanding of what artists can do to increase their fan bases and make more money using the Internet. Her company Cyber PR manages online PR and social media campaigns for over 50 musicians and her book Music Success in Nine Weeks is swiftly selling.

Debra Russell, Certified Results Coach, works with professionals in the Arts and Entertainment Industry to help shape their success in their chosen field.  As a business coach, Debra specializes in the performing arts working with performers, composers, venue owners, agents/managers, producers, engineers, and executives.  In addition to working with private clients, Debra, owner of Artist’s EDGE, has developed several innovative programs for entertainment industry trade conferences including Folk Alliance, Western Arts Alliance, ArtsNW Booking Conference, TAXI Road Rally, and West Coast Songwriter’s Conference.

We look forward to spending time with you at this special event

Schedule:

6:00-7:00 Networking, Schmoozing and Making Contacts
7:00-7:30 Debra interviews Ariel Hyatt
7:30-8:00 Ariel interviews Debra Russell
8:00-8:30 Q&A from the audience
8:30-9:00 More Networking, Schmoozing and Making Contacts!

Location:

Gordon & Carole Hyatt’s Home (Ariel’s parents)

7 West 81 Street – Apt 6A
New York NY 10024
(between CPW & Columbus)

Early Bird Registation – $15
Register online by June 1, 2009 for the discount
http://artists-edge.com/2009/05/artists-success-salon/

Cash only at the door – $25

Subway Directions:
Take the B or The C train to 81 Street
or the 1 to 79th & Broadway

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Basic Marketing Principles For Artists – Part 1 of 3: Increase Your Fanbase

Posted on May 14, 2009 by Ariel Hyatt in SoundAdvice

As many of you know Cyber PR is a hybrid of Internet Marketing, Social Media and PR. I am an avid Internet Marketing student and I gather the nuggets I learn from my studies for musicians.

I recently spent two intense days in Los Angeles, where I attended an Internet marketing retreat led by my mentor, Ali Brown.  I belong to her mastermind group and participate in her yearlong program.

It was a whirlwind, and the core principles I learned were both basic and critically important.

There are three ways to increase your income:

1. Increase your number of clients (fans).

2. Increase the frequency of purchase, how often your fans buy from you. (and you’d better have more than just music to sell).

3. Increase the amount of money that you charge.

Okay, none of these three things is brain surgery, but from a musician’s perspective, it brings up some interesting points.   In my last article about Internet marketing, I point out that music sold online cannot be treated like a diet product. So, marketing music from a straight-up traditional Internet marketing approach is, in my opinion, not entirely possible. The reason why I think this is: Products that sell very well online tend to solve people’s problems.  (Like Losing weight or making more money). I am captivated by how musicians can use some of these basic principles, to increase their own bottom line in the digital space. I’m going to break each one of the three principles down from a musician’s perspective, and my next three posts here will focus on each one.

This issue of sound Advice / blog post will focus on #1.

So How Do You Increase your number of clients (fans)?

I am always shocked when musicians I work for at Cyber PR, are desperate to reach more and more potential fans without really focusing on the fans that they already have. These fans don’t need to be found, because they are already your fans.

Studies have proven that it is much harder to make a new client and get them to purchase something than it is to get a client that already knows you and trusts you to purchase from you over and over.

I always suggest that, in measuring fans, the best place to look is at your social networks and at your mailing list.

Your newsletter list is the only place where you can directly engage with your fans on your own terms. Not Facebook’s terms, and not Myspace’s terms, and this is a key cornerstone to what I have been studying with Ali Brown.

Here are 10 fail-safe ways to increase / engage with your fanbase by pulling from fans that you already know and have who trust and like you!

1. Get serious about your newsletter.  Use BandLetter.com or ReverbNation.com and send your newsletter one time per month.  Track your effectiveness by monitoring your open rates.

2. Mine your inbox and outbox for names and addresses to add.  Ask all of your friends if it’s OK to add them to your list, otherwise you might be considered a spammer.

3. Bring a clipboard to each and every live appearance.  Invite people onto your mailing list with a raffle or giveaway from stage, and collect e-mail addresses.  During your performance, hold the CD up on stage and than give it away, you’ve just inserted a full commercial into your set without feeling “salesy” and you’ve excited one of your fans by giving them a gift.

4. Include a special offer on your home page with a free exclusive MP3 or video. Use the Reverb Nation Fan Collector or  Free Download widgets to deliver it.

TIP: Make sure this download is not available anywhere.  Not streaming on your MySpace page, and nowhere else on your Facebook widgets.  Only on your website.

And of course it can also be available for purchase on your CD, but make sure that no one can get it anywhere else online. This will motivate people to sign up to your mailing list!

5. Follow 25 new people a week on Twitter.

6. Send out e-mails to your most engaged fans through MySpace and ask if you can have their e-mail addresses for your newsletter.  This is a bit arduous but the results will pay off.

7. Do the same with Facebook.

8. Start a blog and start sharing photos and stories and thoughts.

9. Start a podcast or a vodcast and interview other artists with big followings.  Ask them to share your podcast with their fans and followers.  It doesn’t have to be a big production.  It can be a small, informal video at YouTube.  Click here to see mine.   http://www.youtube.com/arielpublicity

10. Ask your fans to review your music at CD Baby, iTunes, and Amazon.  Ask them to make iMixes and Amazon Listmania! lists, and include your music on them.

My next blog post will attack principle number two, increasing the frequency of purchase.  I would love to hear how you build your fan base.

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Nettwerk CEO, Terry McBride, Shares Insight on the Future of the Digital Music Business with Berklee Students

Posted on March 5, 2009 by Ariel Hyatt in SoundAdvice

Gems of Wisdom

Written by Ceanté Winston, Ariel Publicity

After complete demolition and renovation of the old-minded business model in 2002, McBride pioneered Nettwerk into the digital age and beyond, utilizing crowd-sourcing and putting the fans in control, even allowing them to remix entire albums before they are released. It’s this progressive way of thinking that has led Nettwerk, whose exclusive client roster includes Avril Lavigne, Barenaked Ladies, Dido, Stereophonics, Sara McLachlan, Sum 41 and Jars of Clay, to count for over 80% of the company’s 2008 income from digital and alternative revenues.

In the past few years, McBride has spoken at dozens of international conferences about advances in digital technology, intellectual property rights and the future of music distribution. McBride was most recently recognized at this year’s MIDEM conference as one of the ’10 MIDEM Masters’ and one of ten worldwide music executives who are driving the industry forward. So when I got wind that he was speaking about empowerment in the digital music business at the James G. Zafris Jr. Distinguished Lecture Series at Berklee College of Music, I jumped at the chance to attend.

McBride began by making no promises as to the stability of his predictions for the music industry in the next two years, joking that at any moment someone else’s brilliant idea might change everything as we currently know it, but if this isn’t the next step, I’m clueless as to what is.

McBride based his lecture on four premises. He credits Nettwerk’s success to the first premise.

A song is an emotion

They stopped releasing music they thought would sell and began releasing music they loved and felt emotionally connected to. The old school music business views a song as a copyright. McBride coaches that the music business is simply “the monetization of emotions” and that copyright as we know it will soon become irrelevant. Emotions move and are transferred freely. Nettwerk practices something called “collapsed copyright”. Nettwerk encourages its artists to record under their own label. Nettwerk will represent these artists, but the bands retain ownership of all intellectual property. The bands can expect to earn considerably more money and in turn can give away more free downloads. McBride calls this “cosmic karma” as studies show that albums containing songs that were offered free sell more than those with no free downloads. The free downloads allow fans to connect with a song as well as the artist as an emotional brand and are more likely to purchase the album.

Fans connect to a particular song because it evokes a certain emotion. That emotion grows an importance and eventually becomes a bookmark in their lives. We’ve all experienced a time when we heard a song from our past that we once played over and over and over again. We built an emotional connection with that song that instantly takes us back to the summer before junior year, or whenever. It’s that emotional connection that makes you feel the need to rave to a friend about a song or drag them to a concert. The emotional connection makes Nettwerk truly believe in their artists as an emotional brand and that millions of others will love their music as much as they do. Like it or not, love is contagious.

Music is social

Gatherings used to be centered around food and music but for a while music became somewhat elitist. You had to be some musical genius that was too cool and cared about nothing but the music or a wealthy socialite who could afford all the luxuries. Video games like Guitar Hero and the growing affordability of recoding programs and equipment have made music for everyone again. Remember that friend you dragged with you to a concert to show them how amazing that band was? As it turns out they loved them too and raved to their 20 friends who raved to their 20 friends and so on. Well now with the evolution of social media thanks to sites like Facebook, Myspace, Twitter, etc., the circle of friends has grown to 200 plus and by the end of the day with just the ease of a status update thousands of people have been reached.

Digital 2.0

As music returns to its emotional and social roots, McBride predicts a rapid change as we move from what he calls the “Digital 1.0” era into the “Digital 2.0” era where the accessibility of music and social media has grown legs and is now traveling with us on the train and down the street in the form of smartphones such as the iPhone.  But the iPhone is just a dieter’s slice of the pie. Different models of RIM Blackberry smartphones ranked #1, #3 and #5 in best selling phones in North America. Plus the Palm Pre and the anticipation of Dell launching a new smartphone means that mobile social networking in America will soon catch up to the estimated 12.1 million users in Western Europe.

In this “Digital 2.0” era McBride points to the success of Apple “Apps” store, which has over 15,000 original applications and over 500 million downloads.

“Apple has allowed us, [the consumers] to be the world’s largest developer and create apps based on our needs,” McBride explains, “And the explosion of imaginative apps like Shazham and Slacker has just started.”

McBride throws the idea out of a digital maid application that would clean and organize your digital library, saving you the time of having to dig through files. He also requests a digital valet that drives new music to you based on your preferences or a friend’s library and parks it in a suggested music garage. He anticipates that in the next 18 months there will be “apps to help create apps for those of us who are not programmers but have a great idea.” RIM plans to open up their app store this March to reach 150 countries and over 450 providers. Add the Google Android store, Google “Hero”, Microsoft “Skymarket” and Nokia “Opera” and you’ve got yourself a full-blown application revolution.

“Context is king”

McBride points us in a new direction from what was previously a “content is king” mindset to “context is king”. Meaning that our emotional connection to music is all based on the value of how we perceive something versus the actual content. The smartphone replacing the PC (or Mac if you will) is a foreseeable prophesy of McBride’s and could possibly leading to the demise of even, yes… your precious mp3 player. He explains how new apps will shift behavioral patterns of consumers in the same way CDs and online media ushered in the on-demand generation. Smartphones have already begun creating models that temporarily store the music files in the “cache” instead of the hard drive. McBride describes this process as “a gradual download, it’s not permanent because your Valet/Maid app is changing the selection based on your needs, thus helping solve issues such as memory, choppy streaming and draining of batteries.”

This means that the music business must create rich meta data behind our music files to work with apps in order to keep up with this new form of consumption. McBride highlights the opportunity to raise the value of music then, he says, “Context will be king.”

Nostradamus of the music industry?

So there you have it. The Nostradamus of the music industry? You be the judge, but there is no denying that Terry McBride is at the forefront of reinventing the antiquated music business model… and it looks like we’re in for a wild ride.

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