Music Business/Law Tip - "Video As Promo"

It used to be MTV was the only outlet for a video, and if an artist was not signed to a major label forget about it. When MTV became less of an outlet for music, the importance of videos faded away for awhile. Not anymore. These days the Internet is the medium for music videos, and legions of music fans surfing the Net determine if a video becomes popular: YouTube, not MTV, is the new platform/marketing tool to break an artist – signed or unsigned. A video that becomes popular on YouTube often persuades radio to add/play a song, which in turn spurs sales of albums and singles. Moreover, several indie artists have been signed to record deals on the strength of a low-budget video the artist shot themselves and uploaded to YouTube. A few examples of recent artists that used YouTube to get mass media to pay attention are Macklemore & Ryan Lewis with “Thrift Shop” and Robin Thicke with “Blurred Lines”. However, the key is to make a great, compelling video, so it has a chance to set itself apart from all of the bad amateur footage that is out there and go viral. Ben McLane Esq Benmclane.com

Music Business/Law Tips - "Social Media Success Indicators"

For an artist to really know if his/her social media activies (i.e., YouTube, Facebook, Twitter) are generating any kind of success, there has to be some active engagement from the public. The 3 main factors to look for to see if the marketing plan is working and fans are properly responding are: (1) buying product (i.e, downloads or merchandise), (2) repeat purchases, and (3) recommendation of the artist/product to the fan's friends. The key is to sell product or what is the point?; and; in order to sell things, the artist has to first build an audience to sell to via both online - and offline (i.e., performing) - activities. Ben McLane Esq benmclane.com