6 Ways to Fix Online Music Radio

Kurt Hanson, publisher of the Radio and Internet Newsletter, wrote a great piece that was published in the Los Angeles Times last week. It was about webcasting and six ways the music industry can solve this whole online royalty rate hike mess that threatens to go into effect July 15.
Here are my favorite parts of the article:

Rethink your approach to peer-to-peer file sharing: Record labels in the 1930s tried to prevent radio stations from playing their LPs because they thought it would hurt sales -- after all, why would someone buy the disc if the radio was playing it for free?

As it turned out, airplay actually helped sales! The Bing Crosby records that got airplay sold a lot more copies than those that didn't. The same may be true of P2P. Remember, the music industry's best year ever coincided with P2P's strongest year ever (i.e., the year Napster was at its peak). People sampled vast quantities of music via P2P and they bought the stuff they liked on CD. It's counterintuitive but it might be true.

Quit being a jerk to your customers: Every month, the record industry causes an untold amount of pain for thousands of consumers by suing them for exposing song files via P2P services. You're causing tears, heartbreak and stress; you're taking away vacation savings and college funds. And you do it in such a way -- a slow steady stream of lawsuits every month -- that you derive virtually no worthwhile public relations value from it. You guys simply severely damage thousands of people's lives every month because you can.

Embrace your friends: Virtually all Internet radio properties today were launched by music fans -- people who love their genre (or genres) of music and want to see the musicians and labels involved succeed. They've designed Internet radio products that are, in fact, getting people excited about music again.

Regarding this whole royalty imbroglio, to quote Jack Bauer, "You're making the wrong play." Instead of asking for a royalty rate so high that it would bankrupt webcasters and shut them down, as you did in your successful case to the Copyright Royalty Board, you'd be better off offering webcasters a livable royalty rate and a plan to work together to sell more product to consumers. If you guys do, you'll be surprised how effective working together can be!

Hooray to Kurt Hanson!

-Bob

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Check out the revised and updated edition of Guerrilla Music Marketing Handbook, with four new chapters on Internet music promotion. Get more details here.

Internet Radio Day of Silence

In case you aren't already aware, today is a "Day of Silence" for many Internet music radio stations. The voluntary muting is to protest a recent decision by the Copyright Royalty Board to substantially raise the royalty rates paid by online music broadcasters, effective July 15.
Here's an article from Slashdot.org that explains more:

Thousands of U.S. webcasters plan to turn off the music and go silent this Tuesday, June 26th, to draw attention to an impending royalty rate increase that, if implemented, would lead to the virtual shutdown of this country's Internet radio industry. In March, the Copyright Royalty Board announced that it would raise royalties for Internet broadcasters, moving them from a per-song rate to a per-listener rate. The increase would be made retroactive to the beginning of 2006 and would double over the next five years. Internet radio sites would be charged per performance of a song. A "performance" is defined as the streaming of one song to one listener; thus a station that has an average audience of 500 listeners racks up 500 "performances" for each song it plays.

SaveNetRadio.org is a coalition of artists, labels, listeners, and webcasters determined to persuade Congress to lower the rates before the July 15 enactment date. Visit the site to learn more about this important issue and to find out how you can help. Also, check out the many news stories being published on the subject.

This is a complicated issue, one I'm still trying to wrap my head around and comprehend. What isn't clear to me yet is how this would effect online broadcasters that play indie artists who give permission to play their songs without royalty compensation (via the Podsafe Music Network, for instance).

I'll do a little more digging. If you know something about this aspect, please leave a comment.

-Bob

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Wanna create a music buzz online? Check out my special report 50 Ways to Promote and Sell Your Music on the Internet.

The Hottest Music Trend Right Now

I get asked this question a lot: "What style of music is selling really well now?" or "What genre is creating the biggest buzz?"

And every time I hope and pray the person is asking for the right reason. If an artist wants to know what's hot because they're curious and want to be more aware of the overall musical landscape, fine. That's great.

But more often than not, they ask because they're looking for a quick fix way to tap into a genre that's currently popular. BIG MISTAKE!

Here's the deal: The music you create and promote should be a natural extention of who you are. If you're at the point where you're ready to record new music or put together a live act, you should already have a handle on what makes you tick musically. That's the genre you need to stick with.

Consider the incredible online buzz created by Paul Potts, who recently won Britain's Got Talent, the U.K. version of American Idol. He sings opera. That's right, opera! Watch this video of his audition, and then you tell me he should have asked what genre was most popular or more likely to "sell" on this show.


Nearly 1,700,000 people have watched this one video clip of him. Hundreds of thousands more have watched his other clips, including his winning performance in the finals.

He didn't create this buzz because opera is hot and he's riding a trend. People are drawn to him because of his passion and talent. And because of his appealing story: an average Joe, who's awkward and lacks confidence, wows a nation with the power of his voice.

So, go ahead and look at the pop charts to stay informed. But when it comes to performing your own music, listen to your heart and stick with your core musical strengths.

-Bob

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Check out the revised and updated edition of Guerrilla Music Marketing Handbook, with four new chapters on Internet music promotion. Get more details here.

The Top 4 Music Sellers

Want to know where the most music is being sold? According to a survey of 40,000 people by NPD Group, here are the top four music retailers in the United States today:

1) Wal-Mart (15.8% of total U.S. music sales)
2) Best Buy (13.8%)
3) iTunes (9.8%)
4) Amazon.com (6.7%)

Note that these figures include both online and brick and mortar store sales, and both CD and download sales.

Despite their steady decline in recent years, physical CD sales still dominate with 86 percent of all music sales.

The biggest surprise with this survey is that iTunes moved up for the first time to surpass Amazon in music sales.

-Bob

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Wanna create a music buzz online? Check out my special report 50 Ways to Promote and Sell Your Music on the Internet.

Bob on NPR's 'Morning Edition' today

Hey, I wanted to share some good news. I was featured in a short radio piece today on Morning Edition, which is broadcast to more than 12 million people on 600 NPR stations across the U.S. and beyond.


You can listen to the three and a half minute segment here:
www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=11250011

It was about the recent FCC payola ruling (which I wrote about last week) and, more specifically, Clear Channel's new attempt to give more exposure to local and independent musicians. But the agreement they ask artists to make is raising a lot of questions.

Reporter Neda Ulaby used quotes from three people in this great piece, so she could only use sound bites from each of the interviews. While I take a "pro exposure" stance, don't think for a moment that I devalue the worth of an indie artist's music.

I don't think musicians should always give up everything or "play for free" just for the "exposure." You should read and be concerned about the legal agreements you enter into. But don't let these concerns scare you and keep you from taking advantage of true exposure opportunities.

I've found that a lot of independent musicians are overly paranoid about people -- and corporations -- stealing their stuff. But in reality, their biggest problem isn't copyright infringement. It's obscurity.

If Clear Channel (or any commercial radio station) is willing to give you airplay in an attempt to improve its image as a do-gooder, I think you should strongly consider it. As I mention in the NPR piece, the worse case scenario isn't really all that bad, in my opinion.

-Bob


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Hilary Clinton & Celine Dion on Viral Marketing

Want a great lesson on how to use the Internet to create a buzz? Keep an eye on the U.S. presidential campaign over the next 18 months. During the 2004 campaign we discovered the power of bloggers. This time around it seems video content will be king.
In an effort to show her softer side, Hilary Clinton ran a lighthearted contest to pick a new campaign song. Check out this video from a couple of weeks ago (which has been viewed nearly 300,000 times).

Also take a look at the announcement video on Sen. Clinton's site, which spoofs The Sopranos finale and makes nice use of former pres Bill and Soprano Johnny Sack.

All of this lead to a big climax: the announcement of the winning song ... which turned out to be an upbeat anthem by, of all people, Canadian songstress Celine Dion.

Here's what was right with this song contest idea:

Hilary did indeed loosen up. In these clips she shows that she has a sense of humor and the ability to not take everything so seriously (something her campaign people have been desperately trying to convey).

Kudos to her for including some of the video submission clunkers and particularly the negative comments people made about the song contest -- important aspects of open and transparent, community-driven communication. Most politicians (and corporations) try too hard to control their intended message and suppress critical comments -- much to their chagrin.

The Sopranos spoof was clever, and the use of Bill, Chelsea and Johnny Sack added some smiles.

Now for the bad: Crowning Celine Dion, the queen of female power ballad sap, as the winner was a mismatch. When I think of web-savvy, forward-thinking voters ready for a change in the White House ... Celine doesn't immediately spring to mind.

Viral buzz is all about connecting with a group of people with a similar worldview. Trying to overlap Hilary-supporting Democrats with Sopranos devotees and Celine Dion fans was a stretch by anyone's imagination.

Another important aspect of today's viral buzz creation is community involvement. While I believe Hilary did welcome new song suggestions, the voting was mainly to choose an existing popular song. Had she opened it up to songwriters and solicited a brand-new campaign song, that would have added a lot more "community involvement."

So, when concocting your own online video buzz theme, make sure your concept ties in directly to your identity AND the audience you're wanting to reach.

-Bob

Join the YouTube revolution. Read How to Use Video to Promote Your Music Online. Learn how to create, promote and profit from your own low-cost music videos.

How to Make Money With Your Music

One of the biggest indie music career obstacles I hear about is a lack of cash flow. Well, in my latest podcast you'll get some frank and perhaps surprising advice on the subject from Derek Sivers of CD Baby and Jeremy Morrison of the indie label Cooking Vinyl.
This episode features a short audio excerpt from a panel I participated in at the East Coast Music Awards called "DIY for Profit." It was a good one.

Note: You can download the MP3 audio of the entire panel (a full hour and 12 minutes long) as a free bonus when you purchase the new edition of the Guerrilla Music Marketing Handbook.

Please go check out this and other episodes of my Artist Empowerment Radio podcast now.

-Bob

In How to Make a Living as a Full-Time Indie Musician, I interview indie music success story John Taglieri on what it takes to support yourself and live the independent music dream.