Last week we touched on the subject of switching perspective from short term music sales to long term fans.

This week, I want to set the ball rolling for a series of posts that will drive at the heart of that idea: Manning your virtual merch table.

Music Merch Table — Image Credit: Nick Sherman

I Have a Virtual Merch Table?!

Yes, yes you do!

And, as with the real thing at a live show, how you approach it makes a big difference as to how you’re perceived by everyone, from new listeners to ardent fans.

Broadly speaking, the ideas that we’ll look at in the upcoming series are applicable across the range of creative arts and will serve anyone seeking to build relationships with those showing an interest in your work. Again, the focus will be on those relationships lasting for years (ideally the duration of your career) rather than just the brief amount of time it takes to make a sale.

“Manning Your Virtual Merch Table” will focus on musicians, though, for clarity (not to mention the ease of extended metaphor). It covers 3 core elements that are crucial to developing a growing base of life long fans:

The spectrum of people you’re catering to, including key differences in how they’ll react to your approach,
How variety of price and product are crucial to attracting the attention of those you connect with,
How (and who) you choose to promote not only what’s on your merch table but also your future with a potential fan.

The Beat Start Here…

Let’s begin by making sure that you get the inside track on this important series…

Enter your e-mail address below to receive an in-depth monthly newsletter that will dissect each element and give you specific action checklists to work on.

(Note that some of this content won’t be available in the blog posts… consider it my special thank you for the privilege of entering you inner e-mail sanctum!)

If you prefer to stick to the articles here on the blog, I’d love to have your input as to the major challenges you face building a fan base as a musician. This is your chance to shape the discussion for the series, as I’ll tweak the content to answer specific questions or concerns.

So please, ask away! What one thing most baffles you about how to market your music to new listeners or seasoned fans?

I’m excited to get this series underway and add some structured learning that you can build upon with every read. Watch for the start next Monday and thank you, as ever, for spending time on the site. I greatly appreciate your time and input.

Concepts, Marketing

Think Lifelong To Kick Start Your Career In Music

January 24, 2013 Steve 2 Comments

I’d always been a fan of Frank Turner, but it was a series of social media-centric events in 2009 that turned me into a fan for life.

The English singer-songwriter (“skinny, half-arsed English country singer”, by his own admission) tweeted some enigmatic request for Brooklyn-area followers to get in touch with him, as plans were afoot. Naturally I complied, feeling the urge to hear a familiar song sung in a familiar accent, after several months away from the Motherland.

It turned out to be a show on a date that I would be out of town, yet the simple one-on-one connection with a musician whom I admired drew me into Frank’s blog and Twitter feed still further. This, in turn, resulted in another e-mail exchange on his way back through the tri-state area, through which I learned of a secret show in a tiny Hoboken pub (think pool table in the middle of the “dance floor”) and was able to attend an intimate gig that lingers long in my memory.

Through just a few personal touches, Frank had gained a life long fan.

A Lifetime Customer.

The Value of a Lifetime Customer

Lifetime Customer Value (LCV) is a somewhat inelegant marketing measurement that is, nonetheless, a huge boon to any artist serious about pursuing a long lasting career in music. If you’re in it for the long haul, you’re going to need a dedicated core of fans in it with you, no?

LCV is calculated based on the average spend over a set period of time, multiplied by the expected duration of the relationship. We can work in factors such as losing fans and the cost of keeping them around, but for simplicity the main areas to focus on here are these:

What your average fan spends in a year, and
How long you expect a given project to last.

The concepts are more important than the actual measurement, for the moment, as they get you thinking about where you make money on your music (and, more importantly, how you may be able to increase that average spend).

You also gain perspective on the differing contributions that your various musical projects are making to your income…

Which of your projects have potential to expand into crucial income streams?

Which are more ‘for fun’ and should be prioritized accordingly, at least in terms of marketing time?

Understanding where your effort and time is best spent, along with seeing what the spend will be in return, allows you to contrast the value of a simple album sale or song download with the broader context of a fan that knows you, loves your music, and wants to support you for the long haul.

Turning Listeners Into Lifelong Fans

As there is more and more competition for listener attention, so the distinction between a listener and a fan becomes increasingly important for you and your career in music.

You may begin to attract substantially more listens, be they monetized spins on Spotify or indicative ‘views’ on YouTube, but without converting a good proportion of these folks to fans, then lifelong fans, making a living from your music will be all the more difficult.

I have a full series of articles planned for February and March that will dissect every inch of moving your listeners along this spectrum, from passive listener to passionate fan for life.

The truth is that it’s a slow burn for 99.9% of musicians.

Very few of you will soar from a tightly knit group of fans to superstar status on the basis of one amusing YouTube video or turning your cat into the next big internet meme (this is a valid strategy, should you wish to explore it… but, please remember, that a cat is for life, not just viral marketing). Relationship building, boosted by new media connections, and incremental nudges are at the core of what I believe is the key to succeeding as an independent in the music industry, now that the old models are falling away.

Starting next Monday, we’ll be looking in more depth at the concepts that relate to building a long term fan base and calculating LCV to understand your income from music. To avoid missing this journey, sign up for the e-mail updates over there in the top right hand corner.

I’m excited to start a discussion around these ideas and eager to hear what you want to read about in more depth. So come on, overload me with posts to write by telling me what you need here in the comments!

Life is too short to just sing the one song,
So we’ll burn like a beacon, and then we’ll be gone.
~Frank Turner – ‘Poetry of the Deed’

Miscellaneous

A Muse Month? Setting Your Creative Course

January 22, 2013 Steve 2 Comments

Compass art Belfast Titanic Museum — Image Credit: Ross

The artist’s balance between creating business and the business of creating is a difficult one.

Of course, my obsession is with the former. Providing creators with a tool kit to pursue your own marketing (and more) has been – and will continue to be – the driving force behind this site.

Once in a while, however, I benefit from turning the tables and exploring the artist’s perspective on the creative process itself…

The Business of Creating

Stan Stewart has afforded this site many sharp artistic insights with his commentary contributions, both here and across his myriad social networks. If you’re looking for an inspirational reboot, or just a better understanding of your own creative process, Stan wrote an outstanding five piece series around the turn of the year that you need to see.

You can take these posts on individual value or, better still, as a complete series of activities and guiding questions to better understand your artistic drive. Part two is particularly useful for reflection on what fires your creative neurons, Part five explains the value of improv and connects to a wealth of further reading resources, if you find that a productive outlet to pursue.

These are the five articles to work through:

Part 1: Set Creative Course

Part 2: Inspire Yourself

Part 3: Following & Leading

Part 4: Do What Works For You

Part 5: When In Doubt – Or Certainty – Improvise

I’d love to know what these pieces do for your own creativity, as I begin to work through them for mine, but if you’re pushed for time then please use it to leave Stan a comment. You’ll find much deeper answers from him than I on this subject anyway and you’ll get a great discussion!

Best of the Blog, Marketing, Web Presence Development

The Visual Artist: How Musicians Can Use Pinterest to Find New Fans

January 15, 2013 Steve 6 Comments

I know, I know, another bloody social network to add to add to the pile. Add some pinning to your tweeting, ‘booking, and blogging schedule and pretty soon you’ll be able to give up this music lark entirely, right?

Well just for you poor, beleaguered souls, I’m going to start this one off by listing some of the reasons you might not want to be on Pinterest:

If your fans are mostly male. Estimates run that over 3/4 of Pinterest users are women, backed up by the firm stat that 97% of the Pinterest Facebook fan page likes are female (AppData 2012). Although this has probably evened up somewhat as the site has grown, it’s fair to say that a metal band with a predominantly male audience can spend their time more productively elsewhere.

If you have no artist hub site. You’ll need a place to connect the visual angle you present on Pinterest to the music that we’re hoping to nurture new eyes and ears towards. If you don’t have a site that you control to achieve that, then we have bigger fish to fry. Ask me why.

If you’re already neglecting your existing social platforms. Don’t invest time you don’t have. Spend that reviewing what sites you have, which you need to trim away, and commit to developing the one or two you keep. Come back here in six months if you get that together (or immediately, if Facebook eats Pinterest).

If your music has little in the way of visual imagery. This one is fairly weak, as every subject can be spun into a visual in some way, but some may be less intriguing than others. The basis of the rising image-based social platforms is communicating something via a striking visual, so if you have no inspiration to that end then feel free to excuse yourself.

If you hate puns. Seriously, pinsanity can set in pretty quickly and you probably get that enough from your tweeps already.

Still here?

Great! Then let me explain why Pinterest is going to be worth your time.

How Musicians Can Use Pinterest to Attract New Fans

We’ll assume that you’re already signed up and have the standard boards – ‘Places & Spaces’, ‘Books Worth Reading’ and the like – ready to go. At this point, two questions unfold in front of you: What do I pin and where do I pin it?

Being just over a year into its rapid ascent, both the joy and the trial of pinning is that there are no well paved roads to success. Experimentation is to be encouraged, but do follow the shining social netiquette that you would on other sites… share the work of others, don’t spam (or sell to the point of it), and give back more than you take out.

That said, here are some ideas to get your boards hanging alluringly in the sights of fellow Pinheads (errr….):

Associate your songs with appropriate imagery. This may be an iconic location, landmark, work of art, piece of literature, or anything you can find that both fits the theme of the song and is also a striking visual. Connect image and audio on a single page of your site, explain briefly your inspiration, then pin the image to an appropriately titled board (‘Artistic Inspiration’ or ‘Sparks for Songs’ spring to mind).

Explain your own influences. Create boards that pull together your favorite writers, painters, philosophers, and anything or anyone else that has Keep in mind that the better known they are, the more searched and therefore visible they will be on Pinterest. Nonetheless, you should keep this authentic and an honest expression of who you are as an artist and the inspirations that brought you here.

Add your lyrics to existing works of art. Pin your favorite pieces of art (from your favorite site or by searching within Pinterest and using the ‘Repin’ option), adding suitable lyrics or poetically-inclined thought that you yourself have written.

Blog with visuals in mind. Begin to integrate images into the heart of some of your blog posts, in a similar way to the first tip here, but include the work of others and anything visually alluring that catches your eye. Take this one out to the real world, snapping anything that stirs words or music in your soul… this could be a board in and of itself!

Repin others, often. Take time to follow people with similar artistic vision/tastes and take time to browse your stream for pins that catch your eye. Repin them and add your own (brief) comment as to the inspiration for doing so.

Collaborate with visual artists. This may take more effort, but if you have artist friends, look for opportunities to connect your sounds with their visuals. This could be anything from a blog post (see above) about the connection, to a full blown collaborative project like a video or audio-visual mini-site.

Create a variety of boards representing your artistic tastes. Users can ‘Follow All’ but will be more likely to follow only specific boards, so as to fit to their interests and keep their pin stream free from clutter. Increase your chances of connecting by offering of wide range of interest touch points.

Don’t forget the admin basics. Ensure you complete your bio and location, include links back to your website, and consistently use key words or phrases that represent your music and creative tastes for other users to easily find.

These are just some starting points for your exploration. Try out variations on the above to see what your followers show most interest in. Keep what works, discard what doesn’t.

Take aways:
Keep strong visuals at the heart of everything you do on Pinterest, from board creation to individual pins.
Remember that Pinterest is a strong driver of traffic to source sites, so incorporate your images into your own hub, associated with your music wherever possible.
Vary what you pin and think up relevant categories to slot them into, so that you build up some attractive, inspiring collections for people to stumble upon.

How does this all sound… artistically invigorating or another colossal social time suck?

If you think this is of value to you, connect with me on Pinterest and I’ll be happy to discuss approaches with you.

Marketing, Opinion

The Fine Line Between Listeners Spamming Or Spinning Your Music

January 7, 2013 Steve Leave a comment

I had another piece of writing in mind for this evening, until I made the pleasurable mistake of opening up the latest Lefsetz Letter before writing. Rather than staying my course, I thought I’d change tack, fulfill one of my three words for 2013, and ‘react’.

You might not like what Bob Lefsetz has to say, but you’ll defend to the death his right to say it when the passion bleeds through in his every missive. To wit…

SPAM: No one is going to listen to your music because you sent them an e-mail, tweet or Facebook link. Hope this effort makes you feel good, because it’s worthless.

Spinning Music vs. Spamming Music

Not all spam is created equal.

In fact, any honest marketer – not an oxymoron, for any smart arses reading – knows the pain of seeing just one ‘Marked as spam’ check in in their campaign report numbers. A painstakingly developed opt-in e-mail list, combined with a true desire to update people on something in which they’ve previously shown an interest, is still one of the most important tools in your music marketing kit, no matter what sweeping statements you read to the contrary.

Beyond that, there are certainly many ways of communicating on Facebook and Twitter that will grate on many people’s last nerve. But to extend that to all tweets and Facebook links being spam is to point to Mitt Romney and call him Mr President… not of this reality.

A personally crafted message to a listener espousing tastes similar to your style of music is far more a caring act than a callous one. Describing your lovingly crafted, finely honed new track to your Facebook community and asking them to share, if it moves them to do so, is opening a doorway and gently ushering new listeners into your home, not jamming a foot in the door of their home and feverishly waving a set of headphones about their face.

The spectrum runs from unwelcome to warmly welcomed, infuriating to ingratiating. People know spam, meaning they also know what it isn’t and will not summarily dismiss everything unexpected as such. That is, apart from those frustrating few in the aforementioned marketing reports… is it so hard to use the ‘unsubscribe’ option, really?

I digress.

Know Your Audience Know You

The key here is familiarity. Your prospective listener needs to know you, or at least understand that you are attempting to personally know them, in order to elevate your approach from spam to a spin of your song.

How do you achieve this?

Only practice opt-in e-mail marketing, preferably segmented for relevance to specific sets of your audience.

Set up listening stations to spot fans of similar styles, explore their web presence to see what they’re listening to or subjects that they’re interested in, then recommend the most suitable song you have for them with a brief explanation.

Become a part of online communities that fit with your music and subject matter,

Write your own self-hosted content, attracting readers and comments to your website where you can build a closer relationship with them.

Or one hundred other steps that involve a personal connection and an open the door for willing new listeners to check out your music. Recent examples for me include Twitter conversations with Brooklyn’s Sojourn Society and Nashville’s Red Measure, both unsolicited but neither of which felt like an intrusion, due to the nature of the approach.

Honest. Personal. Spam factor zero.

Spamalot?

My feeling is that the original point is more nuanced than the spam conclusion asserts, but it raises the valid question that all artists should ask ahead of that next e-mail update or Twitter DM: Are you spamming or connecting?

How can you change the way you approach potential fans this year to make the desire to listen to your music more of a personal thank you than an obligation?

Above The Static |

Monthly Archives: January 2013

Manning Your Virtual Merch Table