We Have Moved!

COPYCATS Media now has a new blog. Check it out here!

Weird Ways to Distribute Music: Do They Work?

I came across an interesting article over at wired.com about new ways that artists are marketing and selling their music. Check out the article here.

–

According to the article, teenagers are less frequently downloading music and more frequently using online radio sites like Pandora. To combat this trend, artists are trying to find more creative ways to market and sell their music. Some of these are a bit absurd, and range from offering a free music download when you purchase a can of soup, to selling music in older formats (8-Track anyone?). Some artists are even offering t-shirts that include a download of their album. The question is “Is any of this effective?”.

It’s anyones guess which, if any, of these things will catch on. However, I’m willing to bet that at least a few of them will NOT catch on. Especially the ones that use older media formats…

While selling music on a cassette tape would certainly make you different, I don’t think it would necessarily increase sales. I doubt that the current generation of iPod users would trade their iPod that carries multiple thousands of songs, for a walkman just to listen to one cassette. In fact, check out another article on that subject here. The same is true of artists who are offering their music on the new ancient 8-track.

Some of these methods, on the other hand, have great potential.

Some artists are offering iPhone apps that allow users to not only listen to their music, but remix it as well. In my opinion, something like this could really take off. It can be downloaded instantly, used wherever you are, and is compatible with an iPod. I can fully imagine many teens using something like this, where I cannot with something like an 8-track version of an album.

Make sure to check out the article here.

–

Michael Tuschman

COPYCATS Media Marketing Intern

Happy 4th of July from COPYCATS Media

We’ll be closed tomorrow, July 3rd, for the holiday weekend, but we’ll be back at it on Monday morning.

If you are forgoing the lake cabin getaway and staying in the Minneapolis/St. Paul area for the weekend, here’s a sampling of good concerts around town:

Dillinger Four is playing at the Triple Rock Social Club on Saturday night.

Legends of Rock and Roll Tribute Show at the 501 Club on Friday. Local bands play tribute sets to the Ramones, Nirvana, and Rush.  Now that’s a great mix of music!

Lookbook and Ghost In The Water at the 331 Club. As always, the 501′s sister club never charges a cover.

Elvis Costello playing at the Taste of Minnesota festival on the 4th of July at Harriet Island in St. Paul.  The festival runs throughout the entire weekend and features other national and local bands such as Staind, Throw The Fight, The 757′s, Judas Priest, Jason Shannon, and others.

The Roots are playing tonight at the First Avenue Mainroom.

Head to the MN Zoo Amphitheater for Soul Asylum tonight and Toots & The Maytals on Friday night.

Haley Bonar is playing at the Walker Art Center’s Free First Saturday concert in the Sculpture Garden.

If that isn’t enough music for one weekend, there’s still a couple more shows on Sunday: Charlie Parr is playing the Turf Club and No Doubt is at the Xcel Energy Center.

That’s what caught my attention for the weekend.  Anything else going on worth checking out?  Let us know.

And now, I’ll leave you with this patriotic tribute by the Muppets.  Have a great weekend!

Duplicated CDRs On-Demand: Are They Worth It?

There was an interesting little article over at Billboard today the problems of on-demand CD manufacturing.  On-demand CD manufacturing is the process of duplicating, printing, and packaging a individual CDs as they are ordered.  The article mentions that customers do not like the lower quality print and packaging that come with these duplicated CDRs.  But there are ways that you could improve the product quality with this distribution method.  Below is a real-life example:

At COPYCATS Media, we had a client who was in the business of recording live concerts and selling freshly recorded, mastered, and printed CDs within an hour or two after the show.  They had some big name clients and were hired to record a summer tour for the Black Crowes.  So how did we provide CDs, print, and packaging for a customer who needed a 2-hour turnaround time?

We printed up blank CDRs and empty packaging for each show.  The client that recorded the shows would have a big truck with all their equipment outside the concert venue.  Once the show was finished, they’d start mastering the recorded concert inside the truck.  When the mastering was finished, they would start burning copies using the printed CDRs we made for them in advance.  Then they’d take the duplicated copy of the CD and package it in the pre-printed digipaks we provided for each show.  This was how they got their products to the fans almost immediately after the performance.  They would then duplicate and package the rest of the CDRs and sell them through their online store.

The only downside to this method is the packaging did not contain the tracklisting because most touring artists don’t play the exact same setlist at every show.  However, we did print seperate packaging for each date, so they would have a different color scheme along with the date, city, and venue printed on it.

In order to make this on-demand CD selling model work, this is what these companies would have to do to improve their product.  But this would negate the reason retailers are interested in on-demand CDs in the first place (larger selection, less shelf space).  The next best option is getting better printing technology to produce single high-quality prints at a reasonable price.  This solution is also a dead-end, as a single high quality print might cost more than the CD, and reasonably priced print is going to be of lower quality.

Here’s an idea that might work for both brick-and-mortar retailers and online retailers: mail a commercial quality printed CD whenever a customer purchases a digital download of an album.  If they purchase the downloads at a store kiosk, they can just dock their MP3 player or USB flash drive to the system and get their music on-demand.  Then they can have the option to enter their address and have a physical copy of the CD mailed to them.  The same would work if you buy from an online retailer like Amazon.  You download the tracks on your home computer and receive the CD a few days later in the mail.  Again, this satisfies the need for on-demand music as well as having a physical copy complete with the packaging and artwork.  They would still need to store these CDs in a warehouse somewhere, but it will save valueable space inside stores.

Just my two cents.  Has anybody ever purchased an on-demand CD from a kiosk? What did you think of the quality?

Get Duplicated CDs If You Want To Be On Pandora

Hypebot is pushing a headline that reads “Pandora Forces $29.95 Payments From Indie Bands.”  The title is somewhat misleading because the $29.95 does not go to Pandora; it goes to Amazon.com.  Pandora now requires submitting artists to have a CD available for purchase on Amazon.  Amazon charges the annual fee to make your titles available for distribution.

From the Pandora FAQ page, here is what they require from you:

* a CD of your music
* a unique UPC code for that CD
* your CD to be available through Amazon (must be a physical CD, not just MP3s for download)
* the legal rights to your music
* MP3 files for two of the songs from your CD
* a free Pandora account, based on a valid email address, which can be associated with your music

While some artists are focusing on the digital realm for music distribution, this is an example of why you shouldn’t abandon physical formats just yet.  The CD still has plenty of life left to it.  If you only sell digital downloads, then you’ll miss out on lots of opportunities to sell your music.  The same goes if you haven’t gotten on board with selling MP3′s yet and are only selling CDs.  It’s best to have a mixed media distribution strategy.

If you get your CD duplication services provided by COPYCATS Media, you’ll be all set to submit your album to Amazon and Pandora.  We provide a free bar code with our projects along with all the packaging and print.

Before iPods, There Was The Walkman

There was a great article over at BBC News written by a teenager who trades in his iPod for a classic Sony Walkman for a week.  It may not seem like that big of a deal to a person like myself who’s in his mid-twenties, because I used to tote one of these around when I was a kid.  It’s funny listening to him marvel at the device, but being that he is a teenager and born after 1990, he’s probably never actually seen or used on before.

It’s a good article to read not just because of the nostalgia, but also because he points out a couple advantages of the Walkman.  It’s funny that Apple has yet to add such simple features to the iPod.  I’m not going to switch back to using a Walkman just for multiple headphone jacks or a built-in AM/FM radio, but it sure would be nice to have it in an iPod.

Cycle Keeps On Spinning: So Long, Trocaderos

Trocadero’s in the Warehouse District of Minneapolis has shut it doors and put up a “For Sale” sign.  Our own Zac Boyd was disappointed at the sudden closing and feels this may be a reflection of the Twin Cities music scene itself.  You can read his blog here for some more in-depth thoughts.

It was about a month ago that we were celebrating the arrival of a brand new music venue in Downtown Minneapolis.  But with every new beginning, there comes another beginning’s end (or however that line from Semisonic’s “Closing Time” goes).  Gained the 501 Club, but lost the Trocadero’s a few weeks later.  As long as there are good bands out there and fans who want to listen to them, we’ll continue to have good music venues in the Twin Cities.  Clubs will come and go, but the music will always be here.