Trendspotting and the like can be helpful in this business but we must also be prepared for those cultural curveballs that come out of nowhere.
Like the fella once said..'The best way to predict the future
is to invent it'.
Adam Ant was adamant about this in 'Goody Two Shoes'
'We don't follow fashion
That would be a joke
You know we're gonna set them, set them
So ev'ryone can take note, take note'
So it goes on. The music industry continues to find itself in a well documented pickle. Never fear. Bands, Artists, can still be a success, without big record companies, by following this simple plan.
Step 1.
Make something that touches peoples lives in some way. Make this objective you're number one priority. Remember, it don't mean a thing if it don't mean a thing. And It's not just the music. It's as much about how the rest of it resonates. Malcolm says ideally a mix of sex, subversion and style. OK Radiohead have none of those and they have done ok, but there's always an exception.
Step 2.
Find your audience. There's no shortcuts here. Organise your own gigs, club nights, events or whatever. Try and hook up with 2 or 3 other bands/artists working in broadly the same area as you. Once there are 3 bands you have a movement. Assuming each band has about 4 members and each member has 5 mates, then you should have a crowd for your gig of at least 60 people. To the outside world, and particularly the early adopters, it now looks like something is going on. If it's controversial, even better. If you are any good, it will start to snowball.
Step 3.
Remember step 1. If your product is worth it, then your fans will start to spread the word. Now is probably the time to have some music online that the fans can start to distribute for you. There's plenty of tools online for this. but don't get hung up on that. Keep focused on being amazing, and give people the opportunity to opt-in at every touch-point, so you can build your fan club.
Step 4.
Make some stuff for fans to buy. Ideally physical objects that cannot be easily replicated digitally. And make them limited editions. True fans will want to support you and will pay for stuff. Just not mp3s.
Create a movement, play for the true fans, give them stuff to buy, if you are any good the masses will soon find you.
The best answers are always preceded by intelligent, challenging questions.
Challenge yourself, challenge your brief, challenge the market, challenge conventions, challenge your client.
Understand different businesses have different strategic challenges and priorities.
We live in the real world, and this world is a combination of the analogue, digital, experiential, participatory, direct, indirect, active, passive, interruptive (!), and collaborative.
Any Tom, Dick, Harry or Social media expert can wheel out the latest 'shiny object' technology or platform, but to understand how and why people want to search, engage with brands, make decisions, transact and participate and consume means asking the right questions.
Especially of yourself and your own motivations.
(HT to Scott in our office who started this thought this morning)
'I will not be pushed, filed, stamped, indexed, briefed, debriefed or numbered.
My life is my own, I am not a number, I am a person.'
note: I see the remake of The Prisoner is scheduled for November in the US and early 2010 for the UK. Sir Ian McKellen is number 2 with James Caviezel (strange choice..?) in the McGoohan role as number 6.
Ther's a curious teaser site Seek the Six. I'm not quite sure what it's supposed to do.
In Seth's blog the other day he discussed Malcolm Gladwells challenge to the business model thinking in the new Chris Anderson book 'Free' ie In the digital marketplace, the most effective price is no price at all.
Gladwell asked 'how will this new business model support the world as we know it today?'
Seth says: 'Who cares if it does? It is. It's happening. The world will change around it, because the world has no choice. I'm sorry if that's inconvenient, but it's true.'
True.
If, like me, you spend a lot of time trying to propogate ideas that challenge the way that things have been done for a long time you invariably encounter strong resistance from those with agendas or processes that are inflexible or those for whom it suits to maintain the status quo. Thats they way of things and theres no point getting hung up about it.
Here's a thing.
Beside my desk at G-Towers has the sunny-est aspect, and is in effect a greenhouse of sorts, so is the ideal spot for the office chilli garden. There's 8 plants of different varieties.
Each plant was grown from seed.
One seed has within it the inherent potential, with the correct nuturing (light, feed, water) to turn into a plant that may produce a hundred or more chillis - each containing enough seeds to grow dozens more plants.
Once the plant flowers it's important to give it a shake in order to ensure the flowers pollonate themselves to turn into the spicy treats.
This acts as a constant reminder to me that the most important thing to do when trying to nurture the ideas we want to spread is to plant the seeds.
Then keep an eye on the ones that germinate, feed them and keep giving them a shake from time to time to make sure they grow the fruits. Once you've got a hot one then you know that contained within is the potential for further propogation that will happen all by itself...
The world will change...because the world has no choice.
A bit more on Japanese educator and philosopher Tsunesaburo Makiguchi mentioned in the previous post, and whom I’ve been reading up on lately.
Makiguchi reckoned that the ‘lifelong happiness’ of students to be the goal of education, rather than simply churning out ‘knowledgable’ citizens.
His philosophy toward developing the value-creation potential of students can be summed up as being that each individual has the inherent ability to significantly influence the world (should they decide to) based on the notion of interdependence - between humans and the environment and also humans in their ‘social relations’.
Makiguchi said that the creation of value as the ultimate purpose of human existence, ie a happy and fulfilled life is one in which the ability to discover and create value has been fully realised.
According to traditional Western philosophy, Value is made up of three elements;
Truth, Beauty, and Good.
Makiguchi's theory of value, however challenges the notion of ‘Truth’ as a value.
For Makiguchi, truth is found in the ‘correspondence between an objective reality and the words and concepts applied by humans to that reality.’
In other words, value is ‘relational’.
To illustrate this, think about the a news report of some incident or other. The news report itself is either true or false.
But the truth or otherwise of the said report is independent from the concept of value, ie the value lies in its positive or negative impact on people's lives.
Makiguchi considers truth a matter of ‘qualitative equivalence’.
Value must then be viewed as the 'relational power of the object measured by the quantitative response of the subject'.
So value is derived from the interaction between humans and their environment. It’s relational.
So Makiguchi proposed a different three elements of value.
'Beauty' (or it’s opposite, Ugly?) relating to sensory response.
'Gain' extends and expands the total experience ('loss' is obviously the flipside).
'Good' is the ‘social’ benefit (ie in the same way that gain is to the the individual ('evil' being the b-side of that).
This philosophy of value, therefore, is an invitation to engage with and create beauty, 'gain, and good.
In this way individuals, organisations, networks or brands can create ‘potentially limitless value’.
Yeah?
Pure gold! Techdirt's Mike Masnick on Trent Reznor of Nine Inch Nails' album release and connect with fans strategy.
Why is this important?
BECAUSE IT WORKS FOR JUST ABOUT ANY BUSINESS!
Connect With Fans (CwF) + Reason To Buy (RtB) = The Business Model ($$$$)
found this via hypebot
UPDATE:
It just gets better and better.
The ex-NIN drummer is at it for his solo project. Josh Freese story via mashable.
Following that last post, in some sort of karmic alignment I stumbled across this excellent presentation - of some considerable panache - by a chap called Paul Isakson. On further digging he's got a pretty impressive blog too, which I will no doubt be dipping into for further nuggets.
I'm about to receive a copy of Joseph Jaffe's latest book Join the Conversation.
Joseph has invited 150 bloggers/podcasters to review the book as part of a 'use new marketing to prove new marketing' initiative. Full details of the initiative can be found on his excellent Jaffe Juice.
I've been regularly reading Jaffe Juice and listening to Joseph's podcast for the last couple of years and both helped significantly open my eyes to the new marketing thinking. In fact, I doubt i'd be writing this blog without some of that influence (readers voice: so now we know who to blame...)
I'm also pleased to note he appears to be using the unm2pnm logo I whizzed up.
Once I've read and reviewed the book I'm going to purchase a copy for myself then offer up the free one I got for someone else. Any one who who would like the spare copy drop your name in the comments and i'll stick them in the old tombola and draw a recipient.
Thanks to Neil Perkin from the excellent Only Dead Fish for bringing this presentation by Albion to our attention. Much chatter about new agency models in the past year or so. These guys have a pretty decent stab at articulating.
It’s now Thursday so its taken me nearly a week to get it together to report on MediaCampBucks last weekend. Around 60 bods gatherered to debate Second Life, podcasting, creative commons, the future of tv and general geekery with an educational bent.
I hosted a discussion on interactive tv advertising, au naturellement. So often viewed as the poor relation of new media, I think I helped open a few eyes - to it’s possibilities as a word-of-mouth platform, conversation and permission asset tool - judging by some of the feedback I got afterwards.
Of course it was not long before the conversation turned to the possibility of ‘TV as an open content platform’. bringing more diverse programming to your tv ,with the majority not coming from the traditional broadcasters (spelling doom cable and satellite providers and paydirt for technology and telco IPTV?).
Like BT Vision (ahem).
To be fair I’m not convinced that TV is going to be dead anytime soon. What we are seeing is an increased number of options/screens where we choose to watch TV, that’s online, timeshifted regular tv, mobile devices, Xbox etc - although anyone who’s tried to use the BBCi player or Joost etc will know that’s its far from the finished article, so there’s lots of fun ahead.
The existing Cable and satellite providers have a head start as they already provide the infrastructure to get the tv and broadband into the home. Lets forget about the Long tail for a second, at the end of the day viewers will take the road that’s easiest. TV is a mass medium, for most of us dicking about with umpteen stbs and streaming in from here and there is just too much hassle for the 2 hours of tv a day we want.
If they can figure out how to get the following to the viewers, the cable and satellite providers will be laughing:
1- the content we want, when we want it (ie on demand)
2- the ability to time shift the schedule (for all) – live events, 24hr news etc
3- the ability to Search and pull content from wherever it is?
4- the ability to share and recommend?
That would do for me. Who’s going to pay? If it’s a top notch service, I will pay a subscription and advertisers will pay to get their messages into the correct living rooms based on some sort of behavioural tracking or something. And it’s all interactive.
It’s channel brands that have the most to worry about, in a time shifted, on demand environment who cares who’s bringing you ‘Everybody Loves Raymond’. Is it Paramount or Channel4? Not bothered, just get me it.
Enough about tv, and like the fella once said, I never make predictions, particularly about the future.
Highlight of the day for me, and a few others I think, was Sam Ismail’s presentation on how he and fellow adlad, Anton, took liberties with Saatchi & Saatchi with a couple audacious attention grabbing scams.
I wont go into the detail, The the stories are here and here.
Suffice to say they got themselves noticed by not being afraid to ruffle the feathers of the establishment.
Sam’s presentation was themed around job hunting for grads looking to break into advertising but ended up being about using new media as a personal branding tool. He summed up by saying the ultimate goal was; when his cv landed on the desk of the hiring person in the ad agency – they would already know who he was. Word.
I don’t think he’s going to have too many problems getting hired when the time comes.
Finally, thanks to organiser and Second Life guru, Chris Hambly for pulling the day together, and some linkage for Jason Jarrett, ‘veteran’ of podcasting and the man with the golden tonsils. I often listen to his abuddhistpodcast on my way home on the train. To be fair I have no idea what he’s on about half the time but he has a fantastic calming talking voice – It was nice to meet at last. Likewise Twitter buddy and Social media guru, Lloyd Davis.
Some new connections too, Brett Porter from the musicians collaborative thingy oomix and Melinda Seckington aka miss geeky , who is reporting on various similar days across Europe.
Another interesting guy who I never got a chance to catch up with properly was Microsoft tech blogger , Steve Lamb. Maybe he’ll see this.
Thats it, I need to get off to the creative geeks meet up tonight in Soho.
Another great article from James Cherkoff on his Modern Marketing page, musing on a wisdom of crowds theme.
When people want to know about something they go online and see what everyone else thinks. They don't rush to the corporate website to check out what gems the guys in marketing have come up with. Or to see if the new jingle is going to pique their aspirations. They jump in the bazaar. Trip Advisor. Amazon. Blogs....These days the problem isn't a lack of helpful opinion or market intelligence.
Read the comments as well as there's some great stuff in there.
I spent Monday evening having a conversation with a group of small creative business owners - from the Surrey/Hampshire area - in Guildford.
Many thanks to Kate from the Farnham Electric Business Club for asking me to fill in.
I was asked to give a short presentation and kick off a discussion and braindump to see if we could collectively come up with some ideas and tactics around the theme of 'Know your Product'.
In retrospect I think I tried to squeeze a bit too much content into the presentation as I had to whizz through to allow enough time for the dialogue piece, and despite leaving my notes in the cab I just about managed to wing it.
My presentation was loosely themed around the value of conversation and connection strategies for small businesses with low or no budget for marketing.
I started off with a sort of case study of a piece of work we did at Weapon7 for the launch of Xbox360 which went viral via the Xbox fan forums. Using a fraction of the media budget it created a disproportionate buzz compared the more expensive media and showed how getting the early adopters and influencers talking can accelerate the spread of an idea.
I introduced gapingvoid's Stormhoek blogger outreach from 2005 and neatly segued in the launch of the Blue Monster label (how cool to be featuring it on day of launch) to demonstrate the influence of social media and show the value of unlikely partnerships, and followed that up with a look at Go Home Productions - how garden shed remixer's cgc ends up on MTV and remixes for David Bowie.
The homework for the group was to connect to me, join the conversation, start experimenting with new tools/tactics outside of traditional marketing and look into the kind of innovations that can develop the talkability of their product or service.
I also promised some recommended reading to get some thinking going, I'm going to list a couple of things here for those who have done the homework and looked me up.
BOOK - Seth Godin's Purple Cow , when I first read this about 3 years ago all sorts of lightbulbs started going off in my head.
PODCAST - to get enthused about all things new media you could do worse than Six Pixels
BLOG - Any of the links on my sidebar will lead you off to many more links.
And in the spirit of link-love heres the people who left me their cards at the end.
Claire Harrison, Fine Artist
Designer, Nick Cannons
Another designer, Andrew Cross
The Boiler Room, Guildford music and arts venue.
Whats the pic all about? On my way to work I usually buy a coffee off Mr Coffee, a van parked on the courtyard ouside new Spitalfields market. Despite having Starbucks, Costa and numerous other established coffee chains around them, Mr Coffee has a long line every morning. Instead of the usual boring loyalty stamp cards you get a free pair of pants with every 20 coffee's. Or if you just ask they will give you a pair anyway.
Arguably one of the finest exponents of the art of mash-up/bootleg/bastard pop - Go Home Productions - has released a 20 track retrospective 'cd' compiliation this week. "This Was Pop (2002-2007)" A 5 year bootleg retrospective.
GHP has delivered some of the most celebrated examples of the mash-up genre over the last few years including the Madonna/SexPistols fusion 'Ray of Gob' and 'Rapture Riders', the Blondie/Doors hybrid.
The mash-up phenomenon exploded around 2001/2 as bedroom mixers, enabled by the democratisation of music production allowed by software such as Acid, Ableton and later garageband fused acapella tracks with the instrumental tracks of other records to create new 'remixes’. 'Stroke of Genius' was probably the biggest of the time and that spawned an MTV slot with the video mash-ups to compliment the tracks and Mash-up club nights like ‘Bastard’.
GHP’s retrospective is a pretty decent introduction if anyone’s missed out.
GHP is also a pretty interesting case study in a couple of the basic ideas of the new marketing.
I'm thinking about, the power of free, permission and the product is the marketing.
By giving away the tracks for free via his website and mash-up community blogs like GYBO and Boomselection (early example of the long tail of distribution..?) GHP has build a fanbase and mailing list, with permission to contact the list when there’s new tracks uploaded.
With this comes reputation and with that comes dj bookings, ‘legit’ remix work etc.
From fiddling in the shed to official remixes for Bob Dylan and David Bowie is quite a ride.
Of course, it helps that his work is shit-hot. As an art form that is by nature ‘user-generated’ there are thousands of wannabe mash-up artists making pretty average at best, shoddy at worst mixes, but GHP’s ‘Purple Cow’ is the vast musical knowledge from years of fandom which allows him to introduce the little extra elements into his tracks that the less detail focussed would miss. In ‘Rock in Black’ - the Queen and AC-DC blend – the little addition of Freddie’s ‘..get on your bikes and ride’ line is that knowing final piece of polishing that gives it the extra 5% .
Anyway, the tracks are here.
What makes a great blog post? the answer is..many things. Up there with the best reasons to post is pure partisan passion and opinion. Chuck in a bit of controversy and make sure you're gonna rile somebody somewhere and your just about there. James Cherkoff sticks it to the dinosaurs of the ad business in fine style over here.
"The tectonic plates that the marketing industry sits upon have shifted. What adfolk don't get is however great their ideas - no one cares anymore"
This gets the NGOTB chocolate watch for inspirational rant of the week.
Keep at it mate.
We now know about Punk Marketing. I’ve also come across Punk Planning and Rock’n’Roll Advertising. But where does the new media marketing and social media explosion sit in the world of pop cultural analogies?
Its ACID HOUSE MEDIA.
Like its distant cousins mentioned above ACID HOUSE MEDIA is a grass roots movement built from the ground up by passionate enthusiasts, bored with the conventional establishment thinking, and determined to build their own scene relevant to their values.
Podcamps are like the illegal raves, popping up in any urban space that can accommodate them. New friends are made in seconds as strangers bond over the sounds of techno bleeps. While the warehouse party generation kept themselves up all night with Ecstacy the drug of choice for the new media generation is another kind of E.
Connectivit-E. (behave yourself! – Ed)
Like the payphones in M25 service stations back in the day, Twitter spreads the word among the new media ravers about the latest techno tools to keep the party going.
For the hardcore the party continues all day and night in Second Life where people who have never met can rub sweaty semi naked bodies against each other.
Podcasts pump out the message day and night from the tower blocks and council estates.'Big shout out to the new media posse in the area. Keep it locked!'
Meanwhile, as in the first wave of Acid House, everyone is a DJ. Ripping and remixing content then sharing their ‘mixtapes’ via Youtube and Flickr then spreading the word via the superclubs like Facebook, which have sprung up as the underground starts its inevitable journey into the mainstream.
Where does it go from here? Every integrated agency is ramping up digital as the new media marketing rave bubble grows. Every big brand marketing director is asking questions about how they can leverage this cultural explosion.
Like Acid House it will not be long before the whole culture is absorbed by the mainstream. Maybe it already has? Maybe we will see the endless fragmentation of sub-genres? Balearic Digital Marketing, Drum’n’Bass Advertising, Handbag PR.
Maybe we won’t care though, because we will already be onto the next thing.
In the meantime – Get on one.
just read that Mattel's Barbie Girls an immersive brand virtual world, has signed up three million members in the first 2 months, and they’re getting around 50,000 new sign ups a day.
anyone else still doubting the transformation of the web from a 2d browser experience to a 3d immersive one? the only question now is how long?...
