SONG CONTEST BLOG

Pandora, the revolutionary streaming music and tastemaker service, and one of the most disruptive promotional platforms for musicians of every style and caliber, has imposed new rules for submission of music to its playlist database by artists and labels.  In the past, Pandora accepted music in almost any form at no cost.  Now, artists and labels must have a CD of their music, a unique UPC code for that CD (for vendors to keep track of inventory), and it must be available for purchase on Amazon, rules that most artists and labels already comply with.  However, some indies are not yet on Amazon.  In order to meet Pandora’s new criteria, artists and labels will need to obtain a unique UPC code for the physical album they wish promote prior to joining the Amazon Advantage Program at a cost of $29.95/yr, per Pandora’s recommendation, to make it available for sale.  These new measures will standardize the album artwork spec Pandora displays on its playlists, pulling all the images directly from Amazon, and linking every playable track to the Amazon store.  Amazon takes a 55% commission from sales from which it pays Pandora a share for referrals.  Considering that the Net proceeds of six or seven CDs annually will cover the cost of the Amazon Advantage Program plus the fee for the UPC code, I reckon that any artist worth hearing will be only too happy to oblige.

If you don’t already have a UPC code, you can get one here or through any number of musician resources such as CD Baby, Discmakers, and Nimbit.  Check out Pandora’s submission FAQ and Amazon Advantage Program for application details.

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Animoto, the ultra slideshow-to-music creation service and one of my favourite properties for music marketing, announced last Thursday that the company has raised a second round of funding from Madrona Venture Group to the tune of $4.4 million.  Animito boasts 750,000 registered users, 10% of which are premium, as well as a Facebook application installed by 2 million users and iPhone application with a modest 300,000.

Duncan Freeman of Indie Music Tech uncovered an interesting startup over the weekend.  Smirp, in spite of its long-winded and confusing ‘how it works’ page, is a remarkably simple and practical service, allowing artists and music promoters to sell their MP3s at a customer-determined price point directly via email.  The set-up is brilliant: use your existing Google, Yahoo or other OpenID username and password to log in instantly, link your account to your Amazon account, upload your content to your Smirp ‘name-your-own-price’ page (example), and promote this page by embedding Smirp buttons on your website or social network profiles.  Your customers will click, enter their email, name their own price (or select the minimum price you establish) and receive a link to download your MP3s via email with a 12 hour lifetime [for security reasons].  At face value, it’s similar to Twitpay, the Twitter-dedicated payment solution.

Smirp’s two-tier pricing is more than fair: $6/month for unlimited use or Free in exchange for 20% of your proceeds.  On concept, inspired by Radiohead’s In Rainbows campaign, and ease-of-use alone, this is one of the hottest digital music distribution solutions I have come across.  Perhaps an alliance with CreateSpace, Amazon’s flexible print-per-order CD distribution service will position Smirp alongside the current indie titans, namely ReverbNation, CD Baby and TuneCore?

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By distributing your music through Amazon’s CreateSpace, you can sell both your digital downloads and CDs on Amazon without ever having to finance and ship-in your physical stock.  Simply upload your digital assets (i.e mp3s, album artwork, discface graphics) and CreateSpace will set you up with a store, make your mp3s available for download, and print CD’s and ship them to your customers on demand.  Although Amazon’s commission for this service is high, duplicating CDs per pre-paid order may save you a tidy sum in the long run.

TuneCore recently partnered with CreateSpace which adds a much needed physical dimension to its one-stop, fixed-price digital distribution service.  CD Baby already offers physical and digital distribution and, since its acquisition by Discmakers, can fulfill the printing process too.  How will ReverbNation respond?

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Music discovery and playlist service, Grooveshark, was selected as one of ten winners in CNET’s 2009 Webware 100 in the “Audio & Music” category, sharing the spotlight with the formidable usual suspects including iTunes, AmazonMP3, and Pandora.  This is indeed a privilege for the Floridian upstart which triumphed over CD Baby, iLike, Sellaband, Jango, and other well publicized and funded music dotcoms.  Nearly 630,000 votes were cast this year.

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Skittles have the right idea.  When engaging their customers online, rather than developing an all-encompassing website, they simply grouped together their community assets (i.e. YouTube, Facebook, Twitter etc.) into a single navigation menu and window interface.  For instance, on Skittles.com, if you click on ‘Pics’, you go directly to Flickr.  This approach inspired UnHub to create  a service that will help you build your online presence by grouping your various network pages into a single URL.  Simple, clean and brilliant.  I created an example for We Are Listening.

After winning The Singer/Songwriter Awards in the last quarter of 2008, Jesse Terry opted to work with We Are Listening’s accredited music supervisor and founder of Tinderbox Music, Jon Delange, as his prize package. With only ten copies of Jesse’s latest release, “The Runner”, Jon secured no less than nine network-sized television placement licenses on Jesse’s behalf, including MTV (Road Rules, The Real World, Road Rules Challenge, The Hills, The City, Human Giant, My Super Sweet Sixteen, Teen Cribs, Parental Control); E Network (Keeping Up With the Kardashians); and Oxygen Network (Bad Girls Club). The relative ease in which Jon placed “The Runner” is a reflection of Jesse’s adaptive songwriting style and compatibility with today’s leading pop-culture entertainment.

“Just got news that nine TV shows (including The Hills and The City) are interested in using music from my record. I am holding the licenses in my hand!! This is all possible because of We Are Listening and your investment in my career. I’m so grateful. I feel like things are really starting to line-up…” — Jesse

More Success Stories by We Are Listening.