Introduction................................................ 1 Introduction................................................ Strategic Understanding............................ Understanding............................ 2 Music Industry........................................... Industry ............................ 10 Emerging Artists........................................ Artists........................................ 11 Established Artists..................................... Artists ............................. 13 Successful Digital Marketing Techniques... 18 Conclusion......................... ................................................. ........................ 20 References.................... ................................................ ............................ 22
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Marketing has always been the key way in which businesses sell their products and services to their consumers. In recent times, the digital marketing landscape has become the key way in which people notice what they are being sold. Digital marketing has become the strongest marketing technique and the cheapest. It is the most prominent in all areas of marketing. This is because technology has evolved to allow marketers to advertise online to reach their target target market. Digital marketing will continue to be the key way in which advertisers reach their consumers, with technology developing and each generation becoming more of a ‘digital generation’. The music industry uses digital marketing techniques to promote promot themselves to the public and offering different services to them. Digital marketing in the music industry is key as online sites, such as iTunes and Spotify, allow consumers to buy their music online instead of in a shop. Up and coming artists need to use use these techniques more than most other areas of the industry as they have a need to get out into the industry and they use these techniques to get people onto their sites in order to promote themselves and their music. Established artists also use these techniques t to promote themselves and their music, they use the tools, however, in different ways as they are more established and can use different techniques in different ways. This will be explored in detail further on in the report.
2 Digital Marketing’s Role Within the Marketing Mix The Marketing Industry Considering the marketing industry as a whole ‘profit margins and productivity have fallen across most types of marketing sectors, as the recession takes its toll on company accounts’ [Huber, N. 2010]. Across the whole marketing spectrum in 2010 ‘productivity fell by 1%, compared to December 2009, with gross income per head at £106,000’ [Huber, N. 2010]. Outlined in an article by [Duff, A.] ‘Companies come to marketing agencies because they want nt good, creative people and strategic planners who can advise them on which markets to target, and with what message’ [Duff, A. 2010]. Television advertisement has dropped so much in cost in recent years ‘that some agencies can work on budgets as small as £10,000’ [Marketing Minefield. 2011]. Recently even PR is ‘very cheap and effective. It’s not just about an idea but also about what journalists are going to write about’ [Duff, A. 2010]. In terms of the size of the marketing industry ‘there are an estimated imated 176,000 practitioners with marketing in their job title focusing on business to business (B2B). There is also an estimated 272,000 practitioners with marketing in their job title where B2B contributes to some of their work as well as business to consumer sumer (B2C)’ [Brookes, S & Chesher, O. 2007]. An example of a trade body which represents marketing communications agencies is the institute of practitioners in advertising (IPA). The IPA are a trade body
that represents ‘over 260 of the UK’s brightest and best agencies in membership, from a broad range of disciplines, who between them handle an estimated 85 per cent of all UK advertising spend’ [IPA. 2011]. In terms of segmentation the UK marketing communications ications sector can be segmented into over ten different categories. These include; creative, media, digital, direct marketing, search, integrated and many more. In terms of expenditure an estimated £9.8 billion was spent on B2B marketing communications during du 2005. Although this data is out of date it shows that marketing is a large profitable sector. The total UK Advertising Expenditure was £14.5bn in 2009. The annual total figure inclusive of productions costs was £15.7bn. Shown below is the total UK advertising ad expenditure in 2009 split into the different areas and there percentage share.
[Warc. 2009]
This chart above shows that as of 2009 the most expenditure from UK advertising was on press, second most on television and third most on digital marketing mar (internet). This indicates that the
traditional advertising portals of press and television are still used and that marketing agencies will continue to. As digital marketing and advertising is a continually expanding sector and according to
In terms of size, the digital marketing industry has become one of the largest 100%
80%
Web
60%
Advertising
40%
Direct Mail
20%
Mobile
0% Percentage
Moore’s Law shown in [appendix 1.6] 1.6 technology doubles every two years. This therefore indicates that in the near future, the potential digital technology available, may allow the digital industry to surpass traditional media as the leading marketing medium. Shown in the chart below is the percentage change of the total UK adspend between 1983-2011. 2011. [Warc. 2011] Through analysing this it outlines how budgets and spending in 2008 and 2009 did drop by as much as 12% in 2009. This is mainly due to the current economic econo downturn. But as the economy has been stabilising since 2010, budgets have been increasing once again by as much as 6% in 2010. Digital Marketing Moving the focus to digital marketing, it is simply defined as marketing where ‘messages are sent using a medium that depends on digital transmission’ [Bird, D. 2007] and encompasses all marketing mediums that are conducted through a digital format. This includes ncludes online marketing such as media, search and social networking; e-mail mail marketing and mobile marketing, as well as many more.
Social Media
marketing mediums. Shown in [appendix 1.5] is the percentage use of the main marketing channels by UK marketers in 2010. Illustrated below is this data within a bar chart. This includes the 6 most commonly used marketing mediums within the UK and the percentage that they are used: Out of these 6 areass only direct mail and advertising don’t solely exist within a digital format. These results therefore emphasise the sheer size of the digital marketing industry. Further emphasis of the size and growth of the digital industry is evident in a report generated rated by [Abrams, K. 2010] who outlines how ‘UK advertising spending suffered a double-digit double drop in 2009, according to several sources. But the Internet defied this downward trend. UK advertisers spent £3.54 billion online in 2009 - 5.7% more than in 2008’. 2008 Breaking down this £3.54 billion into the different parts of online marketing ‘search accounted for 60.7% of Internet ad spending in 2009, display claimed 20% and classified ads 19%, while less than 1% was spent on e-mail mail sent to purchased lists’ [Abrams, K. 2010]. Shown in [appendix 1.7]] is a table outlining this online advertising spending in 2009, forecasted spending for subsequent years and the percentage change each year.
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This data is based on the assumption of economic recovery in 2010 and 2011 and the Olympic Games in 2012 bringing higher rises in digital ad spending. Shown in this table, the forecasted percentage change is greatest in 2012 with an 8.8% increase, second to 2010 with a 7% increase in online ad spending. The total forecasted increase in online ad spending between 2009 and 2014 is £1.3 billion, equalling a percentage increase of 36.72%. In terms of Europe, ‘Western Europe accounts for 27.7% of global online ad spending in 2010’ [Abrams, K. 2010]. In France, Germany, Italy and Spain Sp ‘total advertising spending fell sharply in 2008 and 2009 during the recession. Spain and Italy were hit hardest, and they remain less advanced online markets. Yet internet spending grew in all these countries,
testimony to digital’s importance for advertisers’ ertisers’ [Abrams, K. 2010]. Paid search proved to be the ‘largest category of online ad spending in 2009’ and ‘will continue to dominate digital marketing budgets in France, Germany and Spain, according to most research firms’ [Abrams, K. 2010]. In terms of the value of the digital marketing industry; online and digital marketing mediums are generally replacing traditional marketing formats. This is supported in [appendix 1.8] which is a budget allocation of 265 business to business marketers in business of all sizes. Shown below are two bar charts showing these companies increase and decrease in budget allocation. Decrease in Budget Allocation
Increase in Budget Allocation 70% 60% 50% 40% 30% 20% 10% 0% Digital Traditional
Off-siteSocial OffMedia SearchEngine Optimisation On--siteSocial Media E-mail mail (acquisition) E-mail mail (retention) PaidSearch (PPC) Mobile Marketing
Off-siteSocial Media SearchEngine Optimisation On-siteSocial Media E-mail(acquisition)
60% 50% 40% 30% 20% 10%
E-mail(retention)
0% Digital Traditional
PaidSearch(PPC)
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Analysing these two charts it is evident that digital marketing formats are showing a higher increase in budget allocation and traditional forms of marketing are showing howing a much greater decrease in budget allocation. In the current economic climate the strongest growing and cheapest area to market within is that of digital; which over the past few years has evolved into one of the most prominent and profitable forms of marketing. This is supported by [Huber, N. 2010] who outlines how ‘Digital marketing continues its strong growth (11.7%)’ and current sales trends dictate that marketing agencies and there budgets will continue to shift towards online, with more customers ers going online early in the buying cycle. Referring to the buying cycle [Appendix 1.6] it ‘has four phases: awareness, research, comparison and purchase’ [Ramos, A & Cota, S. 2009] (shown in appendix 1.9 as: awareness, interest, evaluation and commitment). commit Therefore consumers first become aware of a product or service through marketing or referral which then dictates a need or desire. This then leads to research and comparison omparison of the item in question in terms of price, quality, etc. The result of this is research and comparison can then lead to a purchase. Consumers are mainly using digital to buy products, research and compare price. But, with this shift in marketing to a digital format, consumers are being made aware of products and services digitally as well. As a result of this shift towards online [Chamberlin, B] outlines how ‘marketing leaders must move marketing mix budgets to mirror where the customers and prospects are - online. Online channels can reach a very targeted audience, are lower wer cost, and are becoming more
measurable. As a result we should expect the continued decline in the use of traditional media. This cannibalization of traditional media will bring about new marketing channels, professions, and processes as well as a decline decli in overall advertising budgets. Traditional agencies and publishers must transform their businesses to include digital marketing capabilities’ [Chamberlin, B. 2010]. This is supported by [Chaffey, D] who describes how ‘prospects and customers increasingly ly use multiple channels when selecting products and services switching between digital media and traditional media’ [Chaffey, D. 2010].
Key components of Online Marketing Online marketing is used by businesses for ‘getting closer to consumers and understanding standing them better, adding value to products, widening distribution channels and boosting sales through running e-marketing marketing campaigns using digital media channels’ [Chaffey, D. 2008]. The main online marketing channels used by the music industry to promote promo established artists and new artists are outlined below:
• • • •
Social Media Marketing E-mail mail Marketing Lead Generation SEO/PPC/SEM
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Social Media Marketing Shown within [appendix 1.1] are industry statistics of the social media industry and what social media marketing is. In terms of marketing within social media it is conducted through mediums such as interactive (banner) advertisements, interactive games, videos, ideos, and even live streaming sessions. Interactive (banner) advertisements are simply advertisements placed on website pages that are used to refer the users of a website to the websites of the company who paid for the advertisement. These links can either eith be external to the social network or external. It is becoming common place for organizations to link these advertisements through to a specific campaign micro-site, micro rather then link it through to their actual site. As a result these micro-sites sites normally include content which is of specific value to the marketing campaign. Interactive games on the other hand, work on the same principle of banner advertisements. But, as well as this within the game itself brands can market themselves by offering products for or the games character. For example brands such as Addidas can offer trainers which make the games characters run faster or have a bonus. Videos can be used to promote bands or artists, films, television programs and many more products. Further more these videos can also act as interactive advertisements to a company’s website. Finally the idea of live streaming was first produced by Katy Perry on the social media site Facebook. This live streaming was ground breaking because as well as offering an interview intervie about the artists up and coming plans, it
offered ‘fans the chance to interact live and direct with Perry’ [Martinez, A . 2011]. A case example of social media marketing is that of the Channel 4’s efforts to raise awareness of dangerous street weapons among mong a young audience. Conducted in 2009, the television broadcaster targeted this hard to reach demographic through the social networking site Bebo. Channel 4 created three fictional profiles in which each had been affected by street crime in different ways. ys. All were linked back to a central page in which comments and issues were shared through chat rooms and forums. As a result of this campaign the issue received ‘over 90,000 views on the Bebo hub, in excess of 1,500 comments and pictures left in the dedicated cated chat rooms and 2,500 active friends registered to join in the debate’ [Profero. 2009]. This case study identifies the power of social media marketing to infiltrate a hard to reach market through integrated social media.
E-mail Marketing Described within [appendix 1.2] are industry statistics of the e-mail e marketing industry and what it is. In terms of how ee mail marketing is conducted, it is done through the sending of e-mails e with marketing that encourage customer loyalty and new and repeated business. busi The types of marketing used to utilise this are offers, rewards and promotions. Further more; e-mail mail marketing can include interactive advertisements to other company’s websites as well as the company’s own. Key areas to consider
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when creating e-mail marketing are its deliverability, renderability, email response decay, communications preferences and that its resource intensive. Deliverability is simply getting the e-mails mails delivered through ISP’s firewalls and webmail systems, which can class some e-mails ails as spam or junk. Renderability is how easily the e-mail e marketing can be viewed within different e-mail mail systems such as yahoo mail and windows hotmail. Some of these systems can block images or view text in a larger size then originally intended. E-mail E response decay on the other hand is the time in which consumers stay engaged with an e-mail mail marketing campaign. Finally communications preferences are how consumers like to receive offers; content and how frequent they like to receive e-mail marketing. A case example of e-mail mail marketing is that of the chain Pizza Place in America. The full case study is shown in [appendix 2.5]. Pizza Place realised through analysis of its online and offline capabilities that the company made on average an extra 50 cent online than from a phone order. Therefore Pizza Place decided to create an e-mail mail survey of what pizza consumers wanted in their newly revised menu, and what customer’s favourite local pizza place was. As a result of this email program, whilst it was as being conducted 'online orders jumped by a whopping 47%, to 4000 orders per week’ [Baggot, Baggot, C & Sales, A. 2007]. This case study therefore reflects how effective e-mail mail marketing can be even if the marketing’s original purpose was a survey of opinion.
7 Lead Generation Described within [appendix 1.3] is what lead generation is and industry statistics of the lead generation industry. Referring to this appendix and considering the neglect of sales leads within the industry, businesses need to employ a variety varie of techniques and teamwork to avoid this pitfall. These techniques include; cold calling, direct marketing/direct mail, ee mail publications, interactive advertising to a landing page, white papers and special reports. The main concept of cold calling is to generate a relationship with a prospective client and then once that relationship is established sell the product in question. Cold calling defined is simply ‘initiating any type of contact that scares you or makes you feel uncomfortable in order to sellll yourself, your service, or your product’ [Hocutt, J. 2007]. Direct marketing/direct mail on the other hand involves marketing ‘directly’ to the consumer offline, as well as online. In a nut shell it is marketing that asks for consumer action. E-mail mail marketing mar in itself fits under this category of marketing as it directly targets the consumer. Offline tactics include promotional or informative direct mail that leads to either a monetary or data informative (collection) response. This collected data could be complied in a database and used for list broking. Online methods include e-mail mail marketing techniques promoting or informing the consumer; as well as landing pages directed from direct mail or e-mail e marketing. E-mail mail publications are a form of e-mail marketing rketing and could include the
creation of a newsletter e-mailed mailed to current and prospective clients to generate leads. Finally white papers and special reports can be compiled about certain industry topics, general topics of relevance to a company’s operating operati profile, or ‘how to’ guides. They can be both online (through PDF document downloads) or offline (through direct mail and or subscriptions) which can generate traffic and leads to a company website call centre or contact point. Considering these techniques, teamwork between sales and marketing within organisations is imperative to the success of lead generation in the field. A case example of a successful lead generation program as a result of teamwork is that of a ‘large utility company working with major energy users’ [Carroll, B. 2006]. This case study is shown within [appendix 2.14]. This company had just acquired another company and were attempting to merge the different companies sectors. The company decided to integrate the sales and marketing sectors. However, this proved to be unsuccessful and yielded poor lead generation results. To solve this pitfall, the company eventually conducted ‘an all-day day universal lead definition workshop with divisional managers and front-line salespeople alespeople for purposes of creating a universal lead definition’ [Carroll, B. 2006]. The result of this common definition was ‘effective teamwork, more cross-selling, selling, opportunities between different groups, and greater return on marketing investment’ [Carroll, oll, B. 2006]. Further more ‘the sales team has become more
productive, sales cycles are noticeably shortened, and new insights into customer’s needs are gained daily’ [Carroll, B. 2006].
SEO/PPC/SEM Described within [appendix 1.4] is what SEO/SEM is and industry ndustry statistics of the SEO/SEM industry. The techniques that could be used within SEO are proper META tag formatting and inclusion, proper use of ALT tags, search engine registration and submission, search engine services, privacy policies, about and feedback edback pages to improve search engine visibility and copyright pages. Considering this, to get the most out of search optimisation websites have to be ‘designed correctly, choose the right key words that are going to bring the most hits, use the right titlee tags, ensure appropriate contact writing, properly formatted META tags and choose the right search engine to submit the website to’ [Brown, B. 2007]. Exploring deeper into the techniques used, META tags are simply keywords associated to a website, designed ed to promote the websites within search engines, inform search engines about the websites contents type or broadcast the geographical location of the website. Title bars are simply the title of the website or page within the website. Correctly formatting this area aids towards search engine optimisation and higher rankings. Finally ALT tags (attributes) are designed to be an alternative for an image or video if its primary method of viewing cannot be
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rendered within the web browser. Further more within a graphical raphical browser (deigned for visually impaired individuals) the ALT tag replaces the primary method of viewing as default. SEM on the other hand, encompasses paypay per-click click and contextual advertising as well as SEO within its framework. Pay-perPay click ck is the same concept of optimising a website to be placed higher up search engine rankings. However, this is paid for rather then earned and operates through openly auctioning keywords. The higher price a website owner is willing to pay for keywords dictates ates how high up search rankings paid results the website is. These paid results are called sponsored links in Google’s case or sponsored results in Yahoo’s case. An example of Google’s sponsored links is shown in [appendix 2.16]. Therefore, website owners offering higher bids are normally placed higher up search engine results when that keyword is searched. Contextual advertising is advertising placed within websites where the websites content and keywords are relevant to the advert. This advert can redirect ct users to similar websites and destinations which have the same topic area, category, or relevance. The bonus for operating contextual advertising is the website hosting the advert receives payment every time a prospective client clicks through the advert. t. The disadvantages however are that these adverts lead clients away from the original website thus potentially losing a sale. This pitfall is not present within search engines as there main purpose is to guide clients away to other sites. In Goggles case
9 contextual advertising exists as sponsored links. A case example of search engine marketing is that of a real estate developer. The full case study is shown within [appendix 2.17]. Through success ‘the company struggled to manage the growing number of keywords ywords within an individual, fixed monthly budget for each apartment community’ [Rapp, S. 2010] within its website. To combat this problem the company ‘reorganised all keywords into smaller campaigns organised by geography and customer stage of the buying cycle [Appendix 1.9] [Rapp, S. 2010]. The results were fantastic as within the ‘first 16 months of the enhanced campaign, the company more than doubled its number of online leads per month and reduced its CPA by more than 200 percent’ [Rapp, S. 2010].
10 The music industry sells recordings, compositions, merchandise, etc, of music artists. There are many people present in the music industry; some may say that it is one of the most competitive markets in the world. In order to be the best in their field, each department in the music industry needs to keep up with technology, in order to keep people wanting to buy their music and giving them a way in which they know to do it. The music industry is replacing their old ways, with new, up to date ways of reaching ching out to their consumers. Technology has lately developed so that the internet is the most popular place to buy and sell products of the music industry. In order to make sure they sell the music and the artist to the pubic, digital marketing techniques need to be used so that they can sell as much as they possibly can. Established artists and emerging artists both use techniques, however, in different ways. They do this as they have different needs and budgets. There are many techniques which cater for each part of the music industry.
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Emerging artists are possibly the most in need for digital marketing. Digital marketing is used for gathering new, potential fans to their website so they can spread the word about what they are about and their music. As there are so many different ways to get people peo to their site, each artist needs to pick their techniques so it can work the best it can for them. The artist’s website is the biggest seller when it comes to getting them noticed online. It is the way fans get to see what they are about and listen list to their music. A good website keeps people coming back to the site and makes people want to talk about it. A website that is user friendly, accessible and has good aesthetics. The site ‘personality’ and the views of the artist can be shown well through the use of a good webpage. The up keep of the website also needs to be recent as this shows that the artist cares about their fans and communicating to them. A website is also one of the key ways in which an artist can market themselves. One of the most common tools for digital marketing up and coming artists use is social networking. These sites, such as Facebook and MySpace, are the best way to tell fans what they are currently up to and what is happening with their music. Some bands use MySpace as their th actual website, this is because the site
offers artists the opportunity to put so much information onto the site as well as music and merchandise. Social networking sites can also be used to link with other, more established bands, for example, posting a ‘tweet’ on network Twitter on a bands page so the up and coming artist can put themselves out there more. Social networking sites allow artists to communicate directly with their fans and their fans to communicate with them. As there are many more people signing up to sites like these, social networking, it could be argued, is one of the best new tools for bands to use for digital marketing. E-mail mail marketing is also a big way an artist can market themselves towards their fans. By having e-mail mail communication people can have a newsletter, or information piece where they tell their fans what they have been up to and what is new. By using this, an artist can guide people towards their site, showcasing their music and gallery. E-mail E marketing is also a way to communicate towards other people who haven’t visited their site yet. They can do this by buying e-mail mail addresses from other sites, these artists then become the ‘third party’ people at the bottom of a form. This allows them to showcase themselves th to even more people and get themselves noticed.
12 As some digital marketing tools cost money, up and coming artists may not be able to afford the same tools as other sections of the music industry. Tools such as adwords, search engine optimisation on and pay per click all cost money, and is usually more than an up and coming artist can afford. This puts new artists at a disadvantage because they cannot gain the same publicity as other artists. On the other hand, there are some techniques which can be used by new artists which do not cost money, however; they are not a guaranteed way to gain marketing and new fans. Posting links onto forums, answering questions and comments on websites and leaving a signature link, and submitting links are all ways to get noticed for free online. These links act as a portal to the artists webpage and these can be very useful when they are trying to get noticed in the public eye. A signature image or link is also like a logo for a company, when people see it they will think of that band. This is very good marketing as if a person thinks of the artist they are likely to talk about the artist to other people, getting other people to notice the artists as well. As online techniques are not always noticed, it could be a good idea for artists to do some offline traffic building as well. Up and coming bands can also use their merchandise at gigs they perform at to gain more fans to their site. Leaflets, tt shirts, key rings can all have the website printed onto them so people le can find out more about the artist on the site. This tool
is a great way to get fans to be directed to the site as they are more then likely to have seen the band perform and, as a result, the attendees can use the site to get their friends looking king into the band. Using flyers, stickers and other marketing and distributing them around local areas when the artist is performing, performing is also a good way to get noticed. This may make people want to see what the artist is about and, by putting the website on the marketing,, people are more likely li to go to the site so they know what they might be listening to. An artist needs to incorporate all or most of these techniques in order to get noticed and to gain more interest into themselves and their music. They are used to brand themselves and can ca show themselves in the way they want to be shown.
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Established artists have the benefit of already having a fan base and public awareness through their successful music and exposure through media channel’s such as TV, newspapers and radio. However, to further increase popularity and their fan base they can expose themselves through digital media. By utilising social networks and creating a website, artists have a direct communication link between themselves and fans. This also enables them to t market themselves, show their fans their brand image and sell merchandise, gig tickets and any other products they make have created.
According to http://twitaholic.com/ Lady Gaga is the most followed person on Twitter ter with 8,858,769 followers. Whilst on Facebook she has 30,498,758 people who like her page.
Admittedly, this is the high end of popularity within social media but even if the fan base online isn’t as high as Lady Gaga’s, artists have to offer their fans something in return. They do this by showing exclusives of new videos and songs, announcing new tour dates and very importantly, offering fans the option to sign up to the website to be able to view exclusive content. By incorporating a sign up feature on their website, it allows their fans data to be captured and therefore allowing them to be specifically targeted for special campaigns and promotions. This would be done through Opt-in e-mails. mails. Once the sign up has occured, certain pieces of personal data can be collected and from that the artist can determine what they can offer to that specific fan. By making it more personal, the fans are more likely to be loyal to them.
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When looking at artist’s personal websites one of the main focus is whether the fans are likely to keep their attention so the whole website can be looked at. Gaga’s website keeps colours to a minimal. With a black background and white writing the fan’s vision is relaxed which allows focus on detail. As shown above, to back up the point made, with the colours used fans can focus on details given, which for Lady Gaga’s website is useful because it contains lots of writing and the website has many different sections to it. Another example of an artist’s website use is Katy Perry. Totally different to Lady Gaga’s website, Katy Perry uses more colour to make key parts of her website stand out. This makes the audience focus more to find what they are looking for. But, this may be the image that Katy Perry wants to show how her fans.
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Primary Face to Face Interview: Mute Records This interview involved Tom Brooker, who works within synchronization at Mute Records. Mute Records was founded in 1978 and is owned by Daniel Miller. The company has worked with experimental music such as Erasure and Fad Gadget. They currently work with bands such as Goldfrapp and Liars. Mute are established within the UK, America and some of Europe and have their UK Headquarters in Hammersmith in Soho. The interview quotes are drawn from analysis of an audio recording of the interview itself. The strengths and weaknesses of face to face interviews are shown within [appendix 3.0]. Questions asked: 1. What techniques does your record company employ to bring traffic traf to its website? 2. What are the most profitable techniques used? 3. What techniques does your company use to promote new talent? 4. What are the techniques used to enhance established artists? 5. How important is social media to your companies operating profile? 6. How much is SEO/SEM used when promoting company projects? 7. Does your company pay for search engine marketing (paid placement) and which (established or new)
artists’ websites receive funds for paid placement? 8. Does your company use pay-perpay click advertising, cost-per-click cost and contextual advertising? 9. Areas of Lead Generation that your company uses and what partners does the company operate with? 10. What future techniques are likely to be implemented by your company and the industry?
What techniques does your record company employ to bring traffic to its website? Social Media SEO/SEM E-mail Marketing Lead Generation What are the most profitable techniques used? ‘E-mail mail marketing is the most effective tool; we use the company database to reach prospective tive and current fans and clients’. ‘It is utilized within newsletters outlining company developments and industry evolution’. ‘It yields high profit margins due to the fact that producing the e-mail mail marketing and newsletters costs next to nothing and the reach of the marketing in itself is so vast’ (dependent on database size and extent of list broking). ‘It also allows the company to redirect our fan base to potentially profitable income streams such as
merchandise websites, ticketing companies’, company partners and retailers.’
What techniques does your company use to promote new talent? ‘Social media marketing is imperative in gaining database streams in order to market and develop artists inside the music industry, allowing the maximum potential artist fan base to be secured’. Further more ‘e-mail mail marketing is a key tool in instigating the augmentation of fans in similar genre sections, providing a pre mobilized audience to be subjected to a new talent that hat may appeal to their taste.’ What are the techniques iques used to enhance established artists? ‘Our company expenditure is more likely to be focused on established artists as they provide a sense of security to the company’s recoupment. When trying to enhance established artists, they are more likely to feature ture on social networking home sites and be contained within interactive advertisements, in order to further er enhance their market reach.’ How important is social media to your companies operating profile? ‘Social media marketing is massively used within mute, for building sites for people on Facebook, MySpace and twitter to keep up interaction between fans and artists. It provides relevant information on upcoming shows, merchandise, contests, album and single le releases; enabling the
company to utilize potential income streams through these social networking hubs.’ Further more these social networking sites ‘provide a level of intimacy between fans and artists, removing any sense of pressure from over bearing companies’ s’ to purchase their products.’ How much is SEO/SEM used when promoting company projects? ‘SEO/SEM is used to bring in the maximum amount of traffic to the artist websites without being directed to user generated content and competitors. We also use us SEM to build up the company database so future projects can be marketed more effectively and targeted towards the right fan base.’ This technique is also ‘used to get ahead of rival competition, as higher search engine rankings reflect higher profit margins.’ Does your company pay for search engine marketing (paid placement) and which (established or new) artists’ websites receive funds for paid placement? ‘Generally the company can optimize its search engine result without having to pay for keyword placement ment within popular search engines. But it is not unusual for a small percentage of artists to be provided budget allocation for this use. More established artists are likely to receive a proportion of this budget allocation alongside specifically chosen new n breakthrough artists, which the company feels are likely to achieve success through this appropriated ropriated marketing technique.’
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Does your company use pay--per-click advertising, cost-per-click click and contextual advertising? ‘Pay-per-click/cost-per-click click isn’t generally utilized within the company’s advertising conventions. However contextual advertising is a highly influential technique in promoting and establishing artists. It is very common to find reciprocal links between similar artists, partnering companies, es, social networking sites and interactive content sites’ (such as we are hunted and hype machine). Areas of Lead Generation that your company uses and what partners does the company operate with? ‘Lead generation is utilized through reciprocal links from m company partners. These partners place interactive advertisements embedded within their WebPages; on the basis that both partners place advertisements reflecting reflectin each others website content.’ What future techniques are likely to be implemented by your company mpany and the industry? ‘New industry streaming software such as Spotify or web browser based sites such as YouTube utilizes a pay-per--play service, which generates an income for the company every time a user plays the companies music. In terms of future techniques there has been talk of broadband providers offering unlimited downloads of music through a central network at a subscription fee. These providers would then pay the music
industry in the same way as streaming services.’ Interview Analysis Analyzing this first person interview it is i evident that the online marketing techniques that Mute Records use are social media SEO/SEM, e-mail e Marketing and lead generation. Considering the most profitable techniques for Mute it is that of social media marketing and e-mail e marketing. These areas are universally recognized within the industry as a whole as the most profitable and successful areas of online to market within. Further more, when marketing for new and established artists the company’s preference of marketing is that of social media. Thee main reasons are its consumer reach, cost effectiveness and popularity. In terms of SEO/SEM it’s used by Mute to build the company database to target market more effectively, generate the most site traffic possible and stay ahead of the competition. In terms erms of paid placement and pay-per--click Mute Records typically don’t need to pay for placement in search engine rankings. This is typical within the industry as a whole as competition for artists websites only exists with fan based websites. However, contextual extual advertisements and lead generation is very commonly used within artist websites and record companies marketing campaigns. It is conducted through reciprocal links between similar artists, partnering companies, social networking sites and interactive content sites.
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Both emerging and established artists use digital marketing techniques to promote themselves and their music. Some techniques are successful for both of the types of artists, such as social networking. There are many ways in which digital marketing techniques can an be successful, however, if not done correctly, techniques may not have the desired effect on what they are trying to promote. It is evident that social networking sites are one of the most effective ways in which an artist can promote themselves. Music Week (2011) describe the use of social networking as ‘Analysis Analysis of fans’ social interaction with a product or band is vital in building a picture of how much value marketers can attach to their fans – and then how that relationship can be nurtured’. Social networking allows artists to communicate with their fans and show what they are working on. Greg Rollett, a music marketer who has worked with different bands, trying to change the way music marketing is delivered. He states (2011) that the main way to get ge loved by fans is to ‘take advantage of social networking sites, start a website and blog, sign up to email marketing, and make the artist a brand and promote and use the brand at all times’. This is especially useful for emerging artists as established artists a already are a sort of brand and up and coming artists need to evolve into a brand. By doing the ideas Greg Rollett has, artists can have a successful social networking
experience with their fans. A sign up feature within the site allows the artist to keep in touch with their fans. This is the feature in a site where the consumers leave their details, allowing them to be kept on a database, to e-mail, e text, etc, updates on the artist they have chosen. A sign up feature is a good feature for fo both emerging and established artists as it is a way to see who is coming onto their site, allowing them to get to know a bit more about the sort of people that are going onto the site and use this information to attract new fans who may be interested in their music. For emerging artists, this would allow them to see what sorts of people are attracted to visiting their site and therefore can target similar people in the future. Established artists have proved this technique to work and this allows up and coming artists to follow them when setting up a website. New Media Age (2011) states that: ‘The The emergence of a relatively stable supply of music-related related online platforms, including ad-funded funded streaming services such as Last.fm, Spotify and We7, video sites like Muzu and sometime social music giant MySpace.’
19 This was from an article about making money in the music industry. This means that these are some of the best ways to get the public listening to music, as well as making revenue at the samee time. For emerging artists, it would be harder to get music onto sites like Spotify and Last.fm as these are well established sites, however, they do have some music from emerging artists, which means that there is a way to get music onto these platforms.. MySpace was mentioned again, this has grown and developed as it has faced competition from other social media sites, such as Facebook. Therefore MySpace has re-developed developed itself to become a more musically aimed media platform. Sites like this are free and allow artists to showcase themselves fully without any restrictions.
20 As stated at the beginning of the report marketing has always been the key way in which businesses sell their products and services to their consumers. In this case, the focus is on the digital form of marketing. As technology has changed, so has the way artist have to sell themselves and create an income. CD sales are dropping and online sales of music are increasing which means artists have to establish h themselves online to continue a stream of income. This is done by creating a website where fans can not only purchase music but also merchandise and gig tickets. It also allows artists to show of their personality and their brand through the design of their eir website. This gives fans a more visual perception of their favourite artists. Also, with the use of the internet, it allows artists to keep in contact and gain their fans attention. As discussed, blogs allow artists to give potential ‘behind the scenes’’ gossip to let fans feel more involved with the artists. Also, opt-in opt email can allow a closer relationship between artist and fans by personalising the e-mail. mail. Established artists do have the benefit of already having a large fan base, which can be easily ly transferable to their website, so long as the right techniques are used to sustain the fan base. With UpUp coming artists there is more of a challenge but if the right techniques are used which suit the artist the most, development of an online fan base can an be created successfully. Previously, social media sites such as MySpace and Facebook where seen as places for the public to
communicate to each other and expand their social network. But as times have progressed there has been an option for people ople to advertise themselves on there, especially artists. They create a page on the sites and can display information about the band, fans can may comments to the artists, music can be streamed and pictures and videos can be seen as well. Essentially it iss a smaller version of their own website, but within the limits of the social networking sites. MySpace has developed the furthest in terms of showing off new and established artist. With the increasing interest in artists displaying their brand online MySpace MyS have decided that they will transfer their site for just the promotion of artists. This way they can develop their site based on the promotion of artists, offering them benefits of using MySpace rather than Facebook, such as the personalisation of their pages. One thing that poses as an issue for both up-coming coming artists and established artists is the use of Search Engine Optimization (SEO). Some artists cannot afford to invest in rating high within the search engines. Many people don’t go beyond the first page of the search engine results and from this the artists may not get the audience they seek, therefore making it a poor investment in trying to optimize their rating within the search engines. Also, if the artists have a name that already rates high within the search engine it will be a challenge to rate close or even higher to
them, which again, would prove to be a poor choice of technique to gain a fan base online. Essentially, up-coming coming artists can learn from the established artists and use the relevant digital gital marketing techniques to generate a fan base online. This way mistakes are less likely to occur. But, what needs to be remembered is that the artist must independently develop their brand image without relying too much mu on copying established artists. Concluding from the results of the primary face to face interview, it supports the methods and techniques of how emerging and established artists market themselves within the music industry. Therefore drawing from the analysis of this t primary research it provides a strong backbone for this report to stand on.
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