Sacrilicious Marketing

With music streaming business models popping up left and right, tech pundits have touted these online music models as everything from “industry saviors” to “playing field leveler for the independent artist.” Sadly, many “experts” and artists have bought into the idea that uploading their singles to various networks is going to bring them acclaim and riches. Even sadder, the companies and executives peddling these free or cheap streaming models actually believe their own bullshit. These companies, actually buy into the idea that they have viable business models that can legitimately compete with the failing record label industry in both connecting fans to music and selling/serving recorded music. But here’s the rub; the average artist would have to have their singles downloaded 849,817 times on Rhapsody, 1.5 million times on Last.fm and over 4.5 million times on Spotify to make $1,160/month AKA, minimum wage. Does anyone really think the average independent artist could really make that happen without a publicity team, label or support staff? Compare all that effort to the artists that self presses their own CD and sells it for $9.99 – this artist only has to sell 143 CDs to make that same $1160 (an $8 profit on each sale).

Resource: How much do music artists earn online

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I think the music industry owes a big hand to the Lady that brought back superstardom in 2009! Lady Gaga gave one hell of a performance with Elton John at the 2010 Grammy’s. Just a wonderful celebration of music and celebrity.

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EMI, Warner Music Group, Universal Music Group and Sony pull YouTube’s Teeth Out by Deindexing Their Video Content and Placing it on Their Own Proprietary Networks, Hulu and Vevo.

As music labels, film studios, newspapers and other traditional publishers struggle to survive in the ever changing landscape of the Internet and it’s “free content” model, 2009 ushered in the world wide war against free content. Most pundits initially looked upon Ruppert Murdoch’s “Crazy Eddie” strategy of de-indexing all News Corporation content, including both the New York Times and The New York Post as a bullying tax collector strategy of old that would not suit the new media model. But, as it turns out, it worked! That content has value. Google and Bing wanted it badly enough to pay for it. And over the past few months, as the model has shown increasing promise, most major publishing houses including those in film, television and music have taken note and found ways to work similar deals. While Sony, Universal and EMI have launched Vevo a video music network with the help of their YouTube/Google partnership, Warner Music Group joined it’s mother company, Warner Bros in the long list of music, film and television companies embarking on deals with Hulu. The end game solution for publishers is to de-index their existing video and textual content from major hubs including search engines like Google, Yahoo, Bing and YouTube, publish it exclusively on their own networks and charge the engines for access to index that content and push traffic back to their own networks. The value for the publishing houses is that now they have a central and controlled domain where they can aggregate all their copyrighted content. This means that publishers are now generating income for the indexation of content and pushing traffic in bulk back to their proprietary sites where they can sell advertising. It allows they greater control over their copyright information and, overtime, will help them to build large scale branded networks to feature their data on. Essentially, these publishers are building their own on demand TV, Radio and News networks where they not only generate revenue from advertising but also from the indexing of their content. This should be both a boon for publishers and content producers.

Resource: Hulu Tops 1 Billion Streams per Month!

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So reminds me of middle school! I was a huge fan of Tori Amos and the Little Earthquakes album! Tori Amos will perform a live concert and chat live with fans on Friday, Dec. 11 at 3 pm (EST) via my client LadyFate. Check her out. It’s Christmas Music with a Twist!

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Amid the launch party of YouTube (Google), Sony and Universal’s 300 million dollar music video premium content site, Vevo, Eric Schmidt (CEO of Google) was overheard saying, “Vevo will “revolutionize the music industry by finally allowing it to make money online.” Now, while I have been waiting some time for a Hulu like solution to the music industry, the revenue models for the new network are flawed in that they only put money back into the pockets of major acts, leaving smaller, less established artists still in the cold. As expected of a Google/YouTube property, the revenue model for Vevo is advertising, merchandising and ticket sales. With the primary focus on rich video content from Sony and Universal, and hailed by insiders like Universal CEO Doug Morris as an “MTV on steroids, Vevo will serve content mostly from major artists and WMG has yet to add its content to the project, so it feels “light.” But I expect Warner will follow suit and we can already see Vevo is hit hard with traffic evidenced by its bugginess last night. I believe Sheryl Crow said it best, “Nothing will ‘save’ the music business, but every little thing helps. And anything that puts money in artists’ hands for the work they do is a good thing.” And that’s exactly what Vevo is, something that is helping but not the great white hope that the industry needs. Labels are still losing money while major artists’ income grows as more and more of their revenue comes from ancillary sources, labels can’t touch like merchandising and live shows. Last night served as a cool reminder that the industry is struggling but still alive and actively seeking new revenue streams while beginning to embrace the freemium content model. I wish Vevo luck!

“What we’re really doing is taking back control of everything…this is really like MTV on steroids, Universal CEO Doug Morris told CNet. We’re starting with that kind of audience. But now we’re in control of it. We don’t have to go through a middleman anymore.”

As Music Industry Struggles, Artist Income Grows

What Vevo means for the Premium Content Trend

@ Vevo Launch: Google’s Schmidt: The Music Industry Will Finally Make Money Selling Music Online

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So pleased to be able to preview Selby’s brand new music video, FAR here on Sacrilicious. Enjoy and special congrats to Bahnz and the boys on their NBC appearance, the video and the new label!

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Sacrilicious is proud to announce our new music industry God of client. Tony Michaelides is a well known former publicist to Matchbox 20, U2 and David Bowie. With more than 30 years in the industry and known throughout as “publicist to the stars” we are helping this Brit launch his book and speaking project called “Insights from the Engine Room” along with Lady Fate. Check him out.

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Here’s my review and SnazL feed for the 2009 American Music Awards.  Taylor Swift and the still dead Michael Jackson walk away with armfuls of awards while Billboard darling and super act, Lady Ga Ga gets snubbed due to new AMA rules that disqualify artists nominated the previous year from awards for the following year. However, the crowing jewel of the night was the hilarity that ensued when J. Lo fell on her ample ass mid dance routine. Good thing twinkle toes has enough cushion for the pushin’ to break her fall.

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I deal with a lot of baby bands. Every once in a while I come across one that makes me want to share. The Enemy Lovers is exactly that sort of band. Take a listen for yourself and you will be reminded of U2, Black Crows and Kings of Leon with a hint of Dave Mathews. The lyrics are moving and deep and driven from the rich history of two brothers, Tim and Steven Scroggs. Sons of a southern preacher, each bring a depth of soul and musical talent to the band that you generally hear from more seasoned artists. Musically impressive in that Radiohead kind of way but catchy enough to want to hum along to. I love the first song, Coming Down – it has a cow bell. Come on, you can never have enough cow bell!

I’ve been lucky enough to work with Tim and Steven on their Internet presence. Recently, I’ve been helping them develop a stronger, more feature rich and usable website and social media presence. What struck me most about this band is how committed to their success they are and how involved they wanted to be in the process. Tim was a huge asset, helping to guide and contribute to the look and feel of the site. I love that they were concerned about the usability and authenticity of their online brand. That level of brand awareness Tim brought to the table was something I rarely see in artists. Being able to work directly with an artists to carve out an online brand that suits their band and presence was an amazing experience and I am eternally grateful to the Scroggs to giving me this opportunity to help more fans connect with them and their music.

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SnazL is getting a lot of industry attention lately. Just check out their write up on Huffington Post! Yesterday I had the opportunity to chat with Mike Fabio of Warner Music Group and Candid Katie of CandidKatie.com about the music industry and it’s future in the age of piracy on SnazL for a New York Entrepreneur Week Un-panel. With over 6,000 people at the live event and over 1900 on our online SnazL page, it was amazing to see the traction the discussion received! Check out the SnazL chat accompanying the videos for a birds eye view of this hot button topic and what industry insiders are saying. Thank you to Ameeda of SnazL for organizing the event and Mike and Katie for their wonderful insights and participation.

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