Break out the horn section and tell the drumline “drumroll, please!” – we’re starting and I have news to share!
As the title says, I’m joining Radian6 as a Community Manager!! Much like my co-worker Teresa Basich, I’m excited to announce this news and I’m looking forward to getting started.
For those that may know me personally or professionally, you may know that 2009 was a year of change.
My professional life changed as I transitioned from a marketing role with a B2B telecommunications company to a marketing role with a B2B community platform vendor called Ripple6.
My personal life changed as I dealt with cancer in the family and moving to New York City, seemingly all at once. 2009 was the year that my little sister graduated from college, the year that two of my best friends got married, and the year that I truly realized I felt at home for the first time in my life. Thanks, New York!
The year wasn’t always easy, but it was always rewarding. I was happy to wake up and go to work with my very talented colleagues at Ripple6. I was excited to start this blog, and I was excited to meet new people and form new friendships in New York and around the US.
When the year changed from 2009 to 2010, I was celebrating the New Year near Times Square with a few hundred of my closest friends. With the sounds of “Happy New Year!” and “To new beginnings!” ringing in my ears I realized that while 2009 had been full of change, 2010 would be the year to change them all.
There’s a saying in New York City that “your first year is the toughest.” Going by that saying the next few years should be smooth sailing, as this very day is my 1-year anniversary in New York, and my first day on the job with Radian6.
To say that I’m excited to join the Radian6 team is a complete understatement. I’ve paid close attention to them for awhile now and have always thought the world of the company, the culture, and the team. I feel honored to be joining a team I so respect and admire as a Community Manager, and I’m looking forward to the steps we’ll be taking together as the year unfolds.
In my new role you’ll see me take a more active part in the Radian6 conversations happening across the web on places like Twitter and blogs. I’ll be helping the existing Community team to grow the Radian6 community as well as contributing content on topics relevant to my role and the company. The “never met a stranger” in me loves that I’ll be acting as a first point of contact, and my inner travel bug is excited about the chance to attend industry events and put handles and URLs with faces and names.
I’ve never been one to have a “dream job” in mind, simply because I know that my criteria for that job will change as my career progresses. Saying that, this role is analogous to having your first record go Platinum – you know you’ve worked hard to get here, and you can’t wait to see what comes next.
There’s been a lot of hand-wringing ever since this whole Internets thing started to pick up steam in the music industry. Namely, the recording industry has been fretting over what to do, and how to monetize this whole digital thing.
Ed note: The recording industry is a piece of the music industry – if you’re confused, go look here.
At first the Internets didn’t affect CD sales enough to actually bother anyone, so the strategy was “ignore, ignore, ignore”. The RIAA got all put bull and started bringing people to court over illegal downloading, screaming that the people who were doing the illegal downloading (or rather, sharing songs for others to illegally download) were responsible for the current state of the recording industry.
Jump forward a few years and nothing really changed. The recording industry was still for the most part refusing to provide legal options to people who wanted to download music, so the public was still downloading illegally, delivering the Internets equivalent of a middle finger to the big bad RIAA, as well as the recording industry.
Then iTunes happened. Suddenly there was a very popular was to legally download music, and people started doing so. Voila, problem not yet solved, but hey – it was a start.
The thing is, the recording industry and the RIAA were now playing two sides, so to speak. They were getting the revenues from the iTunes downloads, yet still screaming and suing. The theme as it appeared to consumers was “You’re consuming music in the way you want to, and we’re starting to allow you to do that, but we really want our old way back as we made more money, so we’re still going to whine and complain.”
Businesses have to make money, I get it. Everyone gets it.
What many companies in the recording industry fail to realize though, is that their refusal to innovate and adopt new technologies was effectively a huge middle finger in the face of the consumer. That pissed consumers off.
At the end of the day the consumer wants the music – and we don’t necessarily care about the medium it comes on. The limitation of choice is what really pisses people off, and that was a choice made by inaction within the recording industry.
Hello to a problem the recording industry helped create.
So today I ran across his gem of a quote on brand dna, and it got me thinking.
“I think records were just a little bubble through time and those who made a living from them for a while were lucky.
There is no reason why anyone should have made so much money from selling records except that everything was right for this period of time.
I always knew it would run out sooner or later. It couldn’t last, and now it’s running out. I don’t particularly care that it is and like the way things are going.
The record age was just a blip. It was a bit like if you had a source of whale blubber in the 1840s and it could be used as fuel.
Before gas came along, if you traded in whale blubber, you were the richest man on Earth.
Then gas came along and you’d be stuck with your whale blubber. Sorry mate – history’s moving along.
Recorded music equals whale blubber. Eventually, something else will replace it.”
The quote started me thinking about everything I wrote above. How if the THING you trade or sell suddenly is made obsolete, you need to figure out a new thing, a new product, or in this case, a new transportation method (from CDs to fiber optic cables).
Do yourself a favor and go read the entire article. It will take you a few minutes, but the letter is wonderfully written and really shows the evolution and struggle of many to monetize this whole Internets thing, while still delivering what fans want.
I’ve included a few excerpts below (emphasis mine), but really, you should go and read the entire article.
Believe us, we want you to pass our videos around more than you do, but, crazy as it may seem, it’s now far harder for bands to make videos accessible online than it was four years ago
The label fronts the money for us to make recordings – for this album they paid for us to spend a few months with one of the world’s best producers in a converted barn in Amish country wringing our souls and playing tympani and twiddling knobs – and they put up most of the cash that it takes to distribute and promote our albums, including the costs of pressing CDs, advertising, and making videos. We make our videos ourselves, and we keep them dirt cheap, but still, it all adds up, and it adds up to a great deal more than we have in our bank account, which is why we have a record label in the first place.
Let’s take a wider view for a second. What we’re really talking about here is the shift in the way we think about music. We’re stuck between two worlds: the world of ten years ago, where music was privately owned in discreet little chunks (CDs), and a new one that seems to be emerging, where music is universally publicly accessible. The thing is, only one of these worlds has a (somewhat) stable system in place for funding music and all of its associated nuts-and-bolts logistics, and, even if it were possible, none of us would willingly return to that world. Aside from the smug assholes who ran labels, who’d want a system where a handful of corporate overlords shove crap down our throats? All the same, if music is going to be more than a hobby, someone, literally, has to pay the piper. So we’ve got this ridiculous situation where the machinery of the old system is frantically trying to contort and reshape and rewire itself to run without actually selling music. It’s like a car trying to figure out how to run without gas, or a fish trying to learn to breath air.
So, for now, here’s the bottom line: EMI won’t let us let you embed our YouTube videos. It’s a decision that bums us out. We’ve argued with them a lot about it, but we also understand why they’re doing it. They’re aware that their rules make it harder for people to watch and share our videos, but, while our duty is to our music and our fans, theirs is to their shareholders, and they believe they’re doing the right thing.
Let me say it again – go read the entire article.
OK Go (or Gizmodo, I’m not sure which) then included the Vimeo video you can see below, and me being a blogger of course put it on this very blog (I dig the song and love the video, so go forth and view).
What’s the conclusion? Well, I’d say right now we’re all in agreement on something at least. There’s far less money to be made from selling CD’s then there was 10 years ago, or even 5 years ago. This Internets thing has thrown a major wrench in the recording industry operations, and labels are suffering.
Is there a solution? That remains to be seen. Companies like Topspin, TuneCore, Involver, Kickstarter, ArtistData and others are coming out and helping artists (and labels!) better manage things in this whole Internet-driven economy, but these companies are still few and far between in the grand scheme of things. It’s progress, but is it the solution? I don’t think it is, at least not yet.
I’d love to hear your thoughts on things. Do you still buy CD’s? Do you download music from legal online sources? What trends do you see (for better or worse) in the recording industry??
experiences from listening to a great piece of music, listening to dubplates, listening for the meaning behind the music – the list goes on.
From the marketing side, I hear about listening to the marketplace, listening to your consumers, or listening for your brand across the web.
Listening is great, and it’s absolutely necessary. The challenge though, is to separate listening from merely hearing.
Listening is hearing with purpose.
In the examples above, “hearing” can be substituted for every instance of “listening”. The challenge, is to not get stuck in that comfort zone of “yeah, I’m listening”.
The trick is, to never be able to say “Yeah, I hear you” as a throwaway.
Do you?
Are you listening to that dubplate, or merely hearing what you think should be there?
Are you listening to the new album at that listening party, or just waiting for the tracks to finish so you can weigh in with your support and comments?
Are you really listening to what the marketplace is saying, or are you sorting out the comments by “stuff we want to hear” and “stuff we know comes through, but we’ll qualify as unimportant and ignore”?
When you hear a piece of music, are you listening to it, or letting it pass you by?
Listening is a great skill, and a skill that takes a lot of work and patience. Just like learning to pay an instrument, listening takes practice. Listening is not passive.
For you musicians wondering how to listen as marketers, here are a few ideas to get you started:
Subscribe to blogs of bands/artists similar to you via Google Reader
Set up Google Alerts for your name and the name of your band
Set up Google Alerts for acts similar to you
Search on Twitter (search.twitter.com) for your name, as well as the names of your songs or albums
Subscribe to the RSS feed of that Twitter search, and pull it into Google Reader
Search for your name, the names of acts similar to you, or other terms on socialmention.com
Subscribe to that RSS feed and pull it into Google Reader
What you end up with is a Google Reader (or any RSS reader of your choice) full of information about what’s being said. That’s step 1.
The value comes from going back through that information and absorbing it. Read the blog posts. Comment if appropriate. Go see who’s talking about you on Twitter, reply or send them a Direct Message (DM) if it makes sense.
Look for feedback, look for trends, look for opportunities to connect.
Turn the data that gets fed to you into information by listening.
I’ve been a fan of Alicia Keys since “Songs in A Minor” was released in 2001, and have continued to follow her career as my life, and the world, has evolved.
9 years later a hit new song with Jay-Z playing on radio stations and iPod’s everywhere, I’m now even more in love with her music.
Personal tastes aside, I have a lot of respect for the marketing going on around Alicia Key’s new album – “The Element of Freedom”.
She first debuted the album on Facebook, that’s right – Facebook. To my knowledge – she’s the first major artist to do so (smart move!).
To do so, her marketing team got a company called Involver on board, which I admit is new to me (hey Involver, if you’re listening I’d love to pick your brain for a future post!).
In addition to the Facebook album debut, Alicia and her team have also put together a “I think it’s going to be slightly insane in a great way” event happening tonight at the legendary Apollo Theatre. Actually, it’s happening now, and I’m there, and you can watch here. Full review coming tomorrow, of course!
Back on track…
That’s right – the entire concert is being livestreamed (thanks Billboard!), and straight from their article on the event, here are some juicy details:
The chart-topping singer/songwriter’s new album, “The Element of Freedom,” peaked at No. 2 on the Billboard 200 in December, but Keys has enjoyed a pair of long-running No. 1’s on the singles charts. Her New York centric duet with Jay-Z, “Empire State of Mind,” — which the duo performed to much acclaim at Yankee Stadium during the World Series in October — rode the top of the Hot 100 for five weeks in November and December. Meanwhile over on the Latin Pop Songs chart, Alejandro Sanz’s track featuring Keys, “Looking For Paradise,” has been No. 1 for the last nine consecutive weeks.
If you’re more of the “I like to watch the interviews” type, I included Billboard’s interview below. It’s a good watch!
I’m looking forward to seeing more major labels jump on the “let’s innovate!” train. If you’ve seen any examples then by all means, please share them in the comments!
That’s right, someone (Jason Keath, to be exact) has invited me to participate in a panel on Social Media in the Music Industry as part of the Social Fresh Nashville conference.
I’m really excited to be participating, and even more excited to see what my fellow panelists have to say about their perspectives of how social media has impacted the music industry.
Justin McIntosh, Manager of Web Services and Marketing at Big Machine Records
In advance of flying to Nashville for the conference, I’ve been connecting with people on the Social Fresh Community and reviewing some of my favorite blogs and videos.
In case you’re curious, I’m a particular fan of (in no particular order):
Hypebot – Ridiculously quality articles about anything and everything related to music. Sometimes it’s practical, sometimes it’s more theoretical. All of it is good.
Bass Music – I like my beats extra crispy, and this blog has a great selection of new tracks and music on a regular (more than daily) basis.
The Future Buzz – I’m a recent fan of Adam Singer and keep wondering why I didn’t find out about him earlier. He’s a smart cookie and his blog shows that.
Bit Rebels – I like these guys for all the nerdy techy stuff they write about, and the fact that their blog is a great source of music-related information makes it even better.
Artists House Music – These guys help teach me about the pure music business side of things, which I find refreshing since I (by situation) tend to be more tech-oriented.
Buzzsonic – A great resource for music trend roundups, tech information and other such quality articles.
I’d love to hear what you want us to answer during the panel. Leave your questions in the comments, or join the Social Fresh Community and leave them for us directly there.
@db I know I'm bias, but #CLT is still my favorite airpot. Bojangles + rocking chairs + bean bags = airport WIN (cc: @jakrose @93octane) in reply to db4 mins ago
