Artist Essentials

ARTIST ESSENTIALS
a digital marketing guide from Million
& The Artist Network

1.  The official website
2.  Official shop
3.  Fan Forum / Community
4.  Facebook
5.  YouTube
6.  Twitter
7.  Soundcloud
8.  Mailchimp
9.  IFTTT.com
10. Tickets

MillionMedia.com A digital marketing guide from Million! theartistnetwork.ws!

Artist Essentials

This presentation is based upon a
lecture I give to music students entitled
‘Artist Essentials”. In it I give my 10
essential tools & services for a musician
to focus on. Further information at:

www.millionmedia.com
&
www.theartistnetwork.ws


The official website remains the most essential
digital marketing tool for a musician
Musicians should think of their official Example: Coldplay have nurtured their
online community with a constant flow of
website as the hub at the centre of a wheel.
news and exclusives surrounding their
The spokes represent the social network and new albums. Mumford & Sons use their
website to focus attention on the band
community, such as Facebook, Twitter,
member’s interests in photography,
YouTube, Flickr, Instagram etc. These sites cooking and books. Arcade Fire use their
website to push fans towards new
should regularly link back to the official site releases, social media, filmed projects
and encourage fans to visit often to buy and their online store.
products and sign up for the mailing list.


The official artist store, connected to the artist
site, is vital for developing direct to fan sales
When an artist links to iTunes or Amazon for a Example: TopSpin is a leading
ecommerce service for musicians. They
sale it’s really a lost opportunity, not only to
offer detailed case studies of artists who
sell direct and enjoy higher profit margins sell direct to fans and build valuable data
but more crucially, to acquire fan data. This about their fan-base. Artists include Paul
is typically in the form of an email address McCartney, Arcade Fire and Beastie
Boys. By selling direct these artists
which can be used to build a valuable gradually accumulate a large database of
relationship with the audience. fan information and contact details.


Grow a community around your artist site - not
leave it to Facebook or MySpace
It’s easy to fall in to the trap of thinking your Example: Lady Gaga created a fan zone
called ‘Little Monsters’, which was built
efforts to build a community of fans can be
exclusively to manage and develop her
done on Facebook or Myspace. However, fan community.
this limits your ability to build meaningful
relationships with your audience and also
puts the control of your community in the
hands of third party organisation.


Facebook’s 1 billion people network is an ideal
way to reach millions of potential fans
Facebook’s immense reach in to every Example: Labrinth uses his Facebook to
constantly post updates. However, he
corner of the globe provides a super
also uses the Tabs to provide interactive
opportunity to connect with millions of fans. competitions, access to merchandise,
Use your Facebook profile to update your tour info and pre-order information.
audience about new music and video,
using embedded Soundcloud and YouTube
widgets. Use the tabs to provide more
information and keep posting content fans
will want to share.


YouTube is a vital music channel for both
discovering, sharing and playlisting
YouTube is one of the most important digital Example: Alex Day holds the UK record
for the highest chart position by an
marketing tools available to musicians. Fans
unsigned artist. He has based his career
use YouTube to discover and share music around regular updates on his YouTube
using embeddable widgets. Musicians can channel. Psy, an artist from South Korea,
use it to post promotional videos, footage enjoyed a huge global hit with Gangnam
Style based significantly on the
from the studio, live performances and popularity of its YouTube video.
spoken messages to the camera.


Soundcloud - the ‘YouTube’ of audio - is used
by fanatics to discover new music
Soundcloud provides a wide range of Example: Diplo posts his new remixes on
Soundcloud alongside tracks & mixes by
versatile tools to record and distribute music.
friends and artists on his label. Disquiet,
Fans can hear music, leave comments, an avant-garde artist from San Francisco,
share tracks via widgets and create playlists. posts his audio projects and claims,
For a low fee artists can add extra features ‘Soundcloud groups are the record labels
of right now’.
including the extremely useful ability to see
which blogs have posted the music.


Twitter can be used as an instant
communication tool to both fans and the media
Twitter posts are immediate, direct and Example: Amanda Palmer is a regular
Tweeter who made over $11,000 in 12
global. Your followers will see what you have
hours by selling Tee Shirts direct to her
written seconds after you posted it. Your fans fanbase.
want to know what you, and no-body else
but you, has to say. Which means
empowerment is at your fingertips. Now, the
news is all under your control.


Email continues to be a cost effective way to
directly contact your most valuable fans
Email direct to fans remains a critical digital Example: Mailchimp is a leading provider
of email software and offer the first 500
marketing tool for musicians. The fans who
subscribers for free. This is a great way
sign up to receive your marketing messages for musicians to start their mailing lists.
are likely to be your most ardent, and Topspin claim over 40% of sales come
perhaps critical, fans. When they sign-up direct from offers on a mailing list sent
from artist to fans.
they expect to receive news & offers from
you, so ensure you provide them with both
on a regular basis.


IFTTT (If This Then That) is a great time saving
tool to update multiple websites
IFTTT.com is a great site for updating multiple Example: You can set up IFTTT to post an
update to Twitter and Facebook everytime
sites. It works on the basis of ‘If this, then
you update your blog. Updating multiple
that’, e.g. If Wordpress has a new post, then sites is often time consuming and difficult
update Facebook with the headline. You for artists (or their assistants) to manage.
can set up a lot of trigger events which save
you valuable time updating all your profiles.


Develop a way to sell tickets direct, either
through your official store or third party site
Performing live is a vital part of being a
musician. Selling tickets direct can make you
a slightly higher profit margin. However, it’s
the email and data captured that is most Example: Mumford & Sons phenomenal
success was built, in part, on the decision
valuable to you over the long term. Selling
early in their career to sell tickets direct
tickets direct enables you to capture the using Music Glue. This enabled them to
details of your most valuable fans and build build a database of fans, which they
a direct relationship with them. could use to sell music and more tickets
and so on….


Credentials:
•  Invited to present concepts of ‘Digital Marketing’
at MIDEM 7 years running
•  Lectures on ‘The Music Industry’ at The Institute,
Europe’s finest school of modern music.
•  Presented Digital Marketing at conferences
around the world
•  Was voted by The Observer as one of the 500
people who will change the future of the UK
•  Chair of music charity, Community Music, one of
the UK’s longest established music training
courses

About the author
Neil Cartwright is a veteran of Digital
Marketing, having built his first website in Million Media Website
1995. He joined Sony Music as their first www.millionmedia.com
dedicated digital marketing manager in
1997 and pioneered in areas such as social Artist Academy
media, online PR, digital distribution & Direct www.theartistnetwork.ws
to Fan sales. He now runs his own agency,
Million, and artist academy.


Artist Essentials

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