music, business & geekery

I came across a post by Evan Williams posted on Medium, the new venture headed by Evan and his cohorts. I couldn’t help but be irked by a few aspects of its UI. I’ve shared my thoughts below.

When you first load a post, it’s all pretty self-explanatory. Draw your attention to the upper-right hand corner, where there’s a breadcrumb of sorts:

Cool. I can see I’m in the “Products I Wish Existed” category of Medium. Let me scroll the page so I can read the post:

Whoa, wait. WTF just happened to the breadcrumb? And what the hell is that box-spewing-fire icon? There’s no need to hide the “Products I Wish Existed” text, is there? I would understand if I were viewing in a narrow browser window and there was a possibility the breadcrumb would encroach on the main content area, but that’s not the case here. What gives? And if I hover over the box, the breadcrumb text appears again. I think they over engineered this small feature and just made it more confusing.

Also, take a look at the upper right hand corner of the first screenshot and you’ll see this:

What the hell is that? What does it mean? Can I click on it? Let me hover over it and see…nope, no tooltip or anything. Is a version number? Popularity score of some kind? I know there’s a giant “Recommend” button at the bottom, but this is so far away from that it can’t possibly be related. Or can it? Useless to me.

Now let’s look at the profile URLs. Here’s Evan’s:

https://medium.com/@ev

What’s with the @ sign in the url? Surely the following will work too, right?

https://medium.com/ev

Oh shit. That’s a 404.

So, let’s pretend I’m Evan Williams and a friend says

Hey bro, what’s the URL to your Medium profile?”

I have to tell him:

Oh, it’s just medium dot com slash at ev. Yeah, ‘at’…that same funky a-with-a-circle-around-it-symbol that’s in all email addresses.

But this isn’t email, so why the hell put an @ symbol in a URL?

The origin of the @Username thing came about in the early of days of Twitter as a means for users to have conversations with one another. But conversations on Medium don’t exist, at least not yet. And if they did, they wouldn’t require an @ symbol in the user’s profile URL.

I’m excited about the future of Medium, and I know they’re very early and have a lot of work ahead, but I’m just confused by some of these early decisions.

I teased this in a Facebook post to my friends recently (and was told that I am crazy for it), and I’ve decided to make it a reality (even with a couple additions). I’n making June health month. What does this mean?

-No alcohol or caffeine (with the exception of green tea)
-Go to the gym at least 3 days per week
-No more than 1 meal per week containing red meat (more seafood and lean meats)

I’ll let you know in a month how this goes. If you see me with a coffee or beer in my hand, politely slap it away. You’ll be doing me a favor.

I’m not usually one to set “new year resolutions”, but, as the end of a year approaches and things slow down, it’s a natural time to reflect on one’s accomplishments in the current year and set goals to achieve for the next. So here are my goals for 2012, in no particular order.

Release an iOS app
Still bouncing some ideas around, but I did receive the excellent Programming in Objective-C for Christmas, which should get me started.

Determine the fate of Canvita
 Greg and I started working on Canvita around February of this year, and we’ve been putting our nose to the grindstone ever since. I’d like us to have a good enough feel for whether or not we need to change the direction of the business (as we’ve already done), or whether or not we’re on the right track. We did just apply to TechStars as well, so that should give us some indication as well.

Get Healthy
Not that I’m particularly unhealthy, but I’ve been blessed with a metabolism the speed of light. As I progress through my 20s, I know it’s going to slow down and I need to get in better exercise and eating habits. I hope to put on 10-20lbs this year. (Yes, I hope to gain weight.)

Devote 80% of My Time to 1 Thing
Right now I have 3 things going on professionally, and it’s just not sustainable. I may not be able to dedicate 100% of my time to just 1 thing in 2012, but I hope to turn 4 into 2, and have 1 that I’m focused on the large majority of the time.

Start A Band
I’ve been a drummer for 15 years, yet, for various reasons, I haven’t been able to play seriously in about 3 years. Music was such a major part of my life for so many years, it’s obvious that something is missing. It’s more of a recreational goal, not a professional ambition, but you never know. (If we do get into TechStars, there will be serious talk about getting some instruments in the office!)

There are of course the always-present goals of “be a better brother/son/uncle/etc”, which I’m working on constantly, but those are the main things on my horizon for 2012. What are yours?

My name is Justin and I have a problem. I’m terrible at making decisions. I’m occasionally able to make the snap-decision and say, “Obviously this is the best choice. Done.” But the majority of the time, I’m left weighing the pros and cons for minutes, hours, days, even weeks.

My troubles are only compounded when the dilemma is professional in nature. I was recently talking to a friend about once such dilemma and looking for sage advice on how to manage the pros/cons of it each possible outcome. Opportunities are good, but I can get overwhelmed easily.

My friend’s suggestion was quite simple: For each opportunity, write out your likes and dislikes about each, as well as your strengths and weaknesses in each.

So this weekend I sat down at my desk (turned on the new Black Keys album) and proceeded to list out my likes, dislikes, strengths and weaknesses for each opportunity.

Being a very visual person, what I discovered at the conclusion of the exercise was both stunning and obvious. I’m happy to report that my decision just got tremendously easier. A measly hour of my time has yielded great results. (Just remember, there still may be other factors not present in this exercise [other other parties involved, for example], but it’s is aimed at helping you wrap your head around those factors which you can control. After all, the things which you cannot control are not worth the effort anyway.)

Let me know if this trick works for you or if you’ve tried similar things.

Now, what to have for dinner…

There’s a lot of talk these days about people quitting their jobs to start companies. People feel like they won’t be taken seriously (by investors and colleagues) unless they quit their jobs and dedicate their lives to their startup. While the ultimate goal is to create your own company that you can work on full-time, I think that’s something that comes later in the process, not at the beginning.

Unless you’re a trust-fund kid or you work(ed) on Wall St. (I feel sorry for you and you’re probably not fit to run a startup), you probably don’t have enough money in the bank to forgo a salary for a year or two. So chances are, you shouldn’t quit your job to start a company. But that doesn’t mean you still can’t start a company.

Let me tell you a quick story. A story about 2 guys with an idea, who started a company and have grown it into a multi-million dollar business in a few years. They now live healthy lives, are considered “successful” (make lots of $$ and have nice apartments) and are able take vacations traveling the world.

This is not a story of 2 guys who quit their jobs, irresponsibly racked up tons of debt and were so pressured to succeed that they made irrational decisions and jeopardized the success of their company.

These 2 gentlemen already had jobs. One was a consultant and the other was running a team at an existing company. When they decided to start a company they didn’t say “We HAVE to quit our jobs to make this a reality!” Instead they said, “Let’s keep our jobs to finance the type of lifestyle we want, and hustle our asses off to build this other company that we’re really passionate about.” They didn’t raise funding right away (though they could have) and didn’t even take salaries for the first year (because the company wasn’t making enough money). But that didn’t matter. They hustled and hustled and were able to generate enough revenues to bring on a few employees and contractors within the first year.

You can easily replace “consultant” with “insert-your-job-title-here” to fit your situation. After asking one of them about how he was able to fit it all in, he remarked, “I just didn’t sleep.” Whether you have another job or not, building a company will require lack of sleep on a regular basis. It’s just a matter of whether or not you’d like to be paid for at least some of those waking hours.

From June ‘til mid-August, I had the extreme fortune of working at one of the music industry’s hottest startups, Topspin Media in Santa Monica. While it was obvious from the beginning that the company is filled with smart—no, brilliant—people, I couldn’t have foreseen how much I’d actually learn from those smart individuals. From day one, when Ty made me scan dozens of contracts to include in the Salesforce database, to the last weeks when I created and supervised marketing plans and campaigns for artists from Counting Crows to The Harters, I was constantly pushed to my creative limits. And, along the way, I learned a ton about the Topspin tools and general marketing tactics in the music business. I thought I’d take a moment to talk about some of the key learnings from being surrounded by the awesome Topspin family for three months.

It’s About The Music, Stupid

We can talk until we’re blue in the face about how artists should be using facebook, myspace, last.fm, immem or what-have-you to connect with fans (which is all true), but if the music sucks, none of that is going to matter. I won’t mention the artists we weren’t crazy about (and therefore had dismal sales), but we can look at Fanfarlo, who is on the opposite end of that spectrum (and whom I also blogged about previously). They came up with the great idea of selling their latest full-length LP for $1 for 1 month. They sold well over 10,000 copies by the end of the campaign and generated tons of buzz on twitter and music blogs for their stunt. But what do you think was the common thread running throughout all the buzz, aside from the face that it was 14 tracks for $1? The music was good! Simon’s voice is an instant classic and the instrumentation and arrangements are nothing short of solid. If the music sucked, a few hundred people would drop the $1, tell their friends how much they hated the album and nobody else would bother. It’s easy to generate buzz around a good story and great music, but it’s impossible to generate buzz around crappy music and a bad (or nonexistent) story. Which leads me to my next point…

Story is Key

I feel like I shouldn’t have to mention this, but way too many bands don’t realize the importance of a good story in selling music. They’re not going to be able to just put up an album (even if it’s great) for $8-10 and expect it to sell. Fanfarlo’s story was that they just want people to hear their music so they’re selling it for $1 for 1 month. The Harters want you to join their “family” to get access to some free goodies (it’s a country music thing). Big Kenny is a hippie and wants to do good deeds to improve mankind. (His upcoming release is going to be awesome, by the way!) No matter how good the music is, there has to be a compelling story to set your music apart. Whether it be a great deal, a sense of community, the concept of using music to impact people’s lives or even just an endorsement from a friend of the band, fans need a compelling reason to drop their hard earned dough on your new album. Amanda Palmer has shown us the power of community and designing “stunts” to generate buzz around concerts or lazy Friday nights on twitter; and she knows how to turn those stunts and stories into dollars.

The Power of Marketing Lies in Analytics

I’m not exactly a seasoned marketer, so excuse me if this seems obvious. I realize that metrics and analytics in the marketing setting have been around for quite a while, even on the internet, but we now have the ability to track clicks and views easier than ever. First of all, your website must have Google analytics these days, and you should also use their Google Analytics URL Builder when including URL’s in emails or Topspin widgets. These simple additions will unlock an entirely new world of analytics and data tracking you probably never knew existed. (For free!) You can even track the value of your average visitor based on how much business has been transacted on your website. I believe that Topspin’s analytics tools will get even better in the coming years and will be a crucial differential advantage in their favor. And once a real developer community is built around their platform via API’s, the true strength of their platform will really shine.

These may seem like three simple concepts, but implementation is key. Don’t let anyone tell you how you should be using twitter, facebook, myspace or anything else. There are numerous ways all of those networks can be used. Use them as tools in your arsenal to connect with your fans, tell your story, and if the music is good, success will be yours.

On a personal note, I must thank the great folks at Topspin for providing me with such great experience this summer. The internship far exceeded any prior expectations I had.

As a musician, it’s not enough to have facebook, myspace, iLike, YouTube and last.fm accounts and profiles. To really engage your fans, and the public, it’s essential to have a twitter account and a blog. twitter is great for short form content, sending quick shoutouts to your fans, posting twitpics from the stage and the like. Adding a blog into the mix will allow you to post more long form content with more detail. And since it’s a blog, don’t limit it to a diary or journal of events. “Personal branding” is a bit of a buzz word these days (thank you, Gary Vaynerchuk), but it really holds true for independent musicians. Your fans (and the general public) are visiting your blog to not only learn more about your music, but also to learn more about who you are. Leverage this opportunity and invite everyone in to learn more about you by blogging about current events, your childhood and your opinions on other topics. You’ll bring non-fans into the mix, and they might even check out your music while reading your thoughts on the RIAA.

The idea is to use your blog as a marketing tool. Not just for your single, EP or album, but for your (ahem) personal brand. As a musician, let’s face it: you are a brand. Not in a Jonas-Brothers-manufactured-pop-star kind of way, but if that’s your name on the CD (or on your D2F website <wink>), then that’s what your fans are buying. So use your blog as a tool to market yourself not only to your existing fans, but to new ones as well. Write about things that appeal to anybody, with your own twist, of course. Realize that it’s a two way street now, and encourage fans to leave comments. Build a community around yourself by engaging your fans and writing about valuable topics. Below I’ve listed some ideas and examples of this concept. Please feel free to add your own in the comments.

1. Current Events - Moby on the RIAA

With the recent guilty verdict in the RIAA vs. Jammie Thomas case and penalty of $2,000,000, everyone and their brother in the music biz had an opinion. Even Moby. He realized that this topic requires more than just a tweet; 140 characters are just not enough to formulate and support an argument on this topic. It doesn’t have to be a 5,000 word essay either. (Moby’s blog post was just 151 words.) But he took the time to write a short, concise blog post on the topic, and he received quite a few replies as well.

Be aware of current events inside and outside the music industry and write about them. Don’t wait to write about them in your next song. Use your blog to start a discussion and welcome your fan’s comments.

2. Touring - David Byrne’s In-Depth Journal Entry

Ahh, the classic journal style blog post. These can work, but just use them sparingly. Most fans have read enough about where their favorite artists happen to be and how much they hate the bus, etc. But if you can add pictures and a certain flair (such as the one only David Byrne can), fans will be more interested in what your experiences are like. Give your fans something more than just a rundown of the events. Adding high quality pictures and some videos will help keep them engaged and they’ll feel like they’re really getting a behind-the-scenes look.

3. Photo and Video Blog - Kanye West’s Blog

There are lots of creative types on the web with Tumblr or Wordpress photoblogs, but some of the most creative people I’ve met have been musicians! How cool would it be if a musician scoured the web for cool photos and videos? Well, Kanye West has done just that. Short on opinion and commentary, but heavy on the imagery. You really get a feel for Kanye’s style and what he digs. I encourage you to do the same, if it’s your thing. If you have an interest in design, fashion, art or any other creative outlet besides music, scour the web for them and post links on your blog. It will show that you’re more well-rounded and, again, will help keep your audience engaged and feel more of  connection to you.

4. Day to Day Schedule - Tom Howie’s Schedule

This may sound a bit mundane, but how many other musicians do you know blogging about their schedules? Posting your typical day-to-day schedule for other musicians to read will help establish you as benchmark for what other musicians should be doing day-to-day.

5. Endorse Other Bands - John Mayer on Passion Pit

I’ve already talked about how important endorsements can be for upcoming acts. But don’t wait to be called upon to endorse a fellow musician or band. I’m sure you’re constantly listening to new music; it’s how musicians typically operate. If you see a promising upcoming act, post a link, embed an MP3, just somehow mention why you like them and how you found them. They’ll appreciate the exposure and it’ll establish yourself as a tastemaker for your community.

In summary, the idea is to write about things that will appeal to the general public, as well as your fans. Blogging is a wonderful marketing tool, and if done right, your readers (fans) won’t even know they’re being “marketed” to. As Derek Sivers recently said, “‘Marketing’ is another way of saying ‘being considerate’. It’s all in how you talk with people.” So talk with your fans, not at them. They’ll appreciate you even more for it.

While the ideas in this blog post are all mine, the impetus came from a great friend, Christopher Carlson. I was brainstorming ideas to blog about, and he suggested this one. Thanks for the suggestion, Chris. It’s a great topic I hope we all can discuss more.

Give your music away for free.

This is a notion that has been tossed around in the music industry (among others) for quite some time now, and I had an interesting conversation last night with someone from “a major creative arts agency” about this very notion. (“There’s William Morris and there’s us,” he said.) Anyhow, he was quite adamant that music, in no way, shape or form, is free. Somebody has to pay for it, he contended. And while I can’t say that he’s wrong in his contention, I can’t exactly say that he’s right either. Giving your music away for free is not right for every artist, and certainly is not sustainable, but it’s a novel idea for gaining new fans and/or as one component in your product mix.

Once you’ve obtained those fans by giving away your music for free, how do you add value on top of that free music so they want to pay? If the music itself has essentially been driven down to “free”, what will they pay for? Easy—people will pay for anything that adds value to their life or to their experiences. (I’m being quite general here.) You’ll want to add something to their experience that will cause them to want to not only pay you, but buy directly from you, rather than from iTunes, Amazon or, even worse, Bittorrent. There are some very interesting ways that this can be accomplished and listed below are what I believe to be the 5 best ways to add value, along with some examples.

1. Physical Offerings

This is pretty much a given, but the best way to add value to a digital (read: free) offering to to include a pristine-quality vinyl, a sweet poster or some other physical good associated with your act. (Bottle openers, tote bags, backpacks, etc.) This makes the fan more willing to spend money because they’re getting more than just digital files pumped to their harddrive. They’re getting a physical item, that you’ve taken the time to consider including in the package, which is well worth their money.

2. Bonus Content

When you tell fans than you’re including some “bonus tracks” or a “bonus DVD” with their purchase, this creates a feeling of getting a great deal. “So not only am I getting the album, but I’m getting 4 B-sides too!? What a great way to spend $5!” So that might be exactly what your fans are thinking, but bonus content is a great way to add value to your items. It’s also a great way to repurpose previously released material. Fanfarlo had already released their album when they decided to re-release it for $1. How would they keep those previous customers, whom paid more than $1 for the album, happy? Simple—they included 4 bonus tracks. These bonus tracks were new to not only new customers, but to existing ones as well.

3. Exclusive Content

Often times, D2F content is exclusive content. Many of the packages that are offered from an artist’s website are not available elsewhere, and they’re usually available from the artist before anywhere else. Make sure  you communicate this to your fans and they’ll feel like they’re not only getting a deal, but that they’re getting it before anyone else.

4. A Connection

A connection between artist and fan can often be more valuable than any physical offering. Frequent videos, tweets and emails are great starts to accomplishing this. But don’t stop there—send some “@ replies” to your twitter followers, encourage your email subscribers to email you back (and then reply to their replies) or give some viewers shoutouts in your videos. Make it a two-way street and you’ll really seem on top of your game and your fans will appreciate you even more.

5. Get Endorsed/Recommended

As I mentioned in my previous post, our success with Fanfarlo was due in large part to an endorsement from Iceland rockers Sigur Ros. Now, how did this add value? It actually added value to both parties. Fans of Sigur Ros might not only enjoy Fanfarlo, but they might even appreciate Sigur Ros for giving them the recommendation. They appreciate Sigur Ros for acting as a sort of filter for their fan’s taste. This recommendation will not only establish a relationship with the new band, but it will further the relationship with the existing band. These fans will find value in the new band because they’ll respect the fact that, since the endorser acted as a sort of filter, they didn’t have to search very hard to find this new band and it was suggested to them by a reputable source.

To sum it up, it’s very possible these days to add value to your digital (free) offerings and offer your fans something worthwhile to pay for, be it physical offerings or just that oh-so-valuable connection. You want to keep as many fans as possible in your own ecosystem and not sacrifice them to iTunes or Amazon. When you’ve established that connection with them, they’ll be fans for life, which is hard to put a price tag on.

What are some other ways artists can add value to their product offerings? Please leave your thoughts in the comments!

Please note: I’m currently interning at Topspin Media in Santa Monica, which is working with the band mentioned in this post. No confidential information will be divulged and the opinions expressed on this or any other post on this blog are mine and not necessarily those of Topspin. Please don’t ask for specific numbers.

Inspired by Mike Masnick’s recent NARM talk, I thought I’d provide yet another example of a band that has used the direct-to-fan (D2F) channel to connect with their fans (CwF), give them a reason to buy (RtB) and have not only made money, but earned thousands of fans in a matter of days.

Fanfarlo is a band from London that a decent following in Europe and the UK. They’ve toured Europe a few times, and even made it to the US and made a bit of buzz at SXSW this year. They really wanted to expand their fan base in the US, so they looked to Topspin for some guidance. I won’t be too much of a Topspin shill, but I will provide some anecdotes that I learned while working on their latest campaign.

marketing basics are still relevant in the D2F channel

First let me break down the 4 P’s of marketing (remember those?) and how they related to Fanfarlo’s latest D2F campaign:

Product: Their latest LP, “Reservoir”, which had been released previously and bought by a few hundred people. They didn’t was to piss off their previous paying customers by offering the same album for only $1, so they included 4 bonus tracks to give their previous customers something to come back for, and everyone was happy.

Price: $1. That’s right. 15 tracks (11 album tracks + 4 bonus tracks) for just one stinking dollar. But wait…

Place: Only on Fanfarlo.com. This allows them to control the messaging and method by which people purchase the album. It’s a seamless and controlled experience, which is one great aspect of the Topspin platform. (Hint hint.)

Promotion: Remember that $1 price point? Well it’s only $1 until July 4th. This creates a feeling of immediacy. If you don’t get it now for $1, you might miss out. We also made it easy for fans to share the deal with their friends on twitter and facebook, which can work extraordinarily well because friends serve as great filters and recommendation engines. Another key aspect of this campaign’s promotion was an email sent out by Iceland rockers Sigur Ros. They encouraged their fans to check out the Fanfarlo deal, which did lead to a significant sales bump.

what can i take away from this as a musician?

The first thing you must remember is the product must be good. None of this would’ve been possible if the music sucked. Also, remember to give your music away, in some way/shape/form, for FREE. As you’ll see on Fanfarlo’s website, there is a streaming player there for you to stream all of the tracks, in their entirety, for free. (And in decent quality I might add.) A $1 price point is hard to beat, but may not work for every act. The objective here is just to raise awareness and build up some fans. The great thing about Fanfarlo is that they knew they had to be in it for the long haul. They knew that building rabid fan base is of utmost importance right now. Those fans will then be willing to purchase any offers or packages in the future. It’s critical for new bands to remember this: focus on fans now, and the money will come later. Don’t expect to record a 10-12 track LP, sell it for 10 bucks and get rich in a few months. If nobody knows you, who’s going to spend $10 on your album? NOBODY.

What was also crucial to the success of this campaign was the Sigur Ros endorsement. All unknown bands should try their hardest to get some sort of endorsement from a band that is more popular than them. Remember, this is a business, and “who you know” can often play a key role in the success of any business. You don’t necessarily have to shoot for the starts and go for a Sigur Ros type endorsement, but you have to be talking to and networking with other, more popular bands. Send them your record and see if they can say something nice about you to their fans.

CwF + RtB = $$$

This is Mike Masnick’s golden equation. Connect with Fans + (give them a) Reason to Buy, and you’ll make $$$. Let’s break this down.

So how did Fanfarlo connect with their fans? The promo on their website was written by them, in a very casual manner. You can tell it’s not marketing speak and it’s direct from the band. Fans fell a real connection with this type of language and are more apt, in my opinion, to buy the album. It was also a controlled experience all on the Fanfarlo website, so the messaging was controlled and the fans were always connected to the band. When you sell via iTunes or Amazon, that connection is lost and is very difficult to get back.

What’s the reason to buy? It’s only $1 until July 4th. After that, this deal will be gone. As they say on their website, after July 4th, you can buy the CD, vinyl and a “beautiful new special edition at normal prices.” Basically, if you don’t act now, you might miss out on this crazy $1 deal. And if you like it, maybe after July 4th you’ll buy the CD, vinyl, or even the special edition package.

To sum it up, Fanfarlo is yet another example of an unknown band that harnessed the power of the direct-to-fan channel and have been very successful with their latest campaign. They’ve got thousands of fans in the U.S., where they had effectively zero fans only a few weeks ago. Services like Topspin, Bandcamp, nimbit and others enable any band to experience the same success. The future certainly looks bright for independent musicians.