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English · Tips

Conference Do’s & Don’ts

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Allen_20Johnston

Allen Johnston – The Music Specialist
www.asha.com

Music Conferences today have become big business for the individuals and companies that put them on.  Almost every conference created has an educational component, a seminar, panel discussion or technical workshop. Here lays the problem, why pay good money to come to a conference with positive seminars and not attend?  Every conference I have attended in the United States this year has had more night time attendees for parties and performances than daytime seminar attendees.

In Europe it is the complete opposite.  Conference attendees come for business during the day in droves.  Panels are packed and private meetings are scheduled.   Let me give you a few ideas on how to become more productive at your next conference.

Rules To Work Conferences

  1. Research Your Conference – Know who is going to be at the event you will be attending.  Read the Schedule in advance and determine who you want to meet and WHY you want to meet them.
  1. Schedule Meetings – Try and reach companies, executives, publicists and other artists prior to the event and schedule private meeting times to discuss your MUTUAL interests.  Email works when used properly for communication, so Please spell correctly.
  1. Speak Correctly – Leave the urban street based conversations at home.  This is a business and professionals will be attending and speaking on the seminars.  Lose the phrase “You know what I mean?” and the phrase “You feel me?”  Say what you mean upfront and be prepared to explain yourself.  The way you speak in the “trap” is not going to get you anywhere in the entertainment BUSINESS environment.
  1. Take a Shower – Partying the night before is NOT an excuse to have bad breath or body odor.  Make the effort to bathe BEFORE you come to the seminar.  You never know who you will be standing next to.  By the way dousing yourself in perfume or cologne is NOT bathing.
  1. Be on Time, awake, attentive and prepared – Walking into seminar fashionably late shows disrespect for the other attendees and to the seminar speakers.  It also says that maybe a professional does not want to work with you because you didn’t think enough of their time to hear them from the very beginning.
  1. Take notes – Just like you were back in school.  This is how you remember some of the information that will be disseminated.  Plus this is how you can keep names and numbers straight, while you write down any questions you may have.
  1. Have Business Cards Available – name, email, website, phone number, mailing address and a representation of what you do. (logo, business name, etc)
  1. Receive Business Cards – When you give a card, receive a card.  Take the card in both of your hands if possible; read it before you put it away.  This business card is the beginning of your entertainment industry database, treat it with esteem.
  1. Carry a Camera – Take photos of the panelists to help you remember who was who.  And take as many photos with other people as you can.  Email them back to the person and use this as a starting point for a great business relationship.
  1. Be Polite and Courteous – You want and need to advance your career, the worst thing you can do is to disrespect and upset a professional.  This means NOT telling a DJ off for not playing your music.  DJ’s TALK TO EACH OTHER and so do distributors, store buyers, publicists, record exec’s, club owners and almost everyone else that is a professional.
  1. Follow Up – email, telephone, regular mail and do ALL of these things consistently.  It is true that the squeaky wheel gets the oil.
  1. Have An Online Presentation – FaceBook is good for starters however you do need your own website that allows viewers to find out more about you and your talent.  You should also create MP3’s of your material for sending and for downloading.  If you have a visual talent, create video for web usage.

English · This & That

Call To Mobilize

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Allen_20JohnstonArticle by Allen L.  Johnston – The Music Specialist
http://www.asha.com

This year I came to a drastic realization that American Urban based artists, publishers, producers; writers, film makers, label owners, magazine owners and entertainment industry entrepreneurs are wholly under rated and under represented on the world market place. During one of my daily walks around the MIDEM convention exhibition area, I ventured in to the Electronic / Urban Village at Midem.  The name suggested that here would be a place where various types of Electronic and Urban based musical products and opportunities would be found. A place where companies from around the world could come and find music, DVD’s, film, magazines and digital deals from the best Urban and Electronic makers in the world. Feeling that the Urban marketplace should be over flowing with product by and about people of color I went looking for the best in the world

What I saw was several different spaces occupied by every nationality BUT people of color.  Blatantly missing were American Hip Hop, R&B, Southern Soul, Blues, Jazz and Gospel companies.  In fact I saw NO REPRESENTATION at all from any Black or Hispanic owned company from the United States in this area.  At least 50% of all the music I saw, and heard during MIDEM came from people of color world wide, but there was less than 5% participation from African Americans conference wide and less than 1% booth participation.  The only Hip Hop artist of any notoriety that I saw making meetings and doing deals was Chuck D, and he brought a group of business people with him as a support factor. American Hip Hop has made major influence around the world I saw Death Row Records from Germany and even though South Africa has licensed Little John’s music thru TVT there was not another Atlanta based rapper or representative at the conference.

Countries from around the world were looking for music and DVD products from American based “Urban” companies yet there were virtually none to be found. The Japanese, South Africans, French, Belgium, Swedes and every English speaking country are all looking for American Hip Hop, Jazz, Gospel, Southern Soul and Reggae, but once again there were NO representatives of any of the major artists nor any revenue generating INDEPENDENT  COMPANIES available that I saw or heard of.

This has to stop now especially while there is a window open for such great financial and cultural reward.

So I am making the first call to mobilize the American Urban based artists, publishers, producers, writers, film makers, label owners, magazine owners and entertainment industry entrepreneurs.  I have started talking with different companies and organizations to acquire a cadre of African American owned entertainment businesses that will be able to represent their products and make deals on an International basis for MIDEM 2014.

Please take a moment and look at your long range goals, if they include a digital market or an International market lets find some time to talk.  Plan your work THEN work your plan.

 

English · Tips

Music Industry Changes

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Allen_20JohnstonArticle by Allen Johnston

Today’s music business is heading rapidly toward entertainment industry structural changes, the laws and regulations we use for our everyday business are morphing into a totally new set.  Greater interest in direct digital licensing among publishers, efforts to establish Pan-European licensing and the creation of a global repertoire database are reshaping the landscape being navigated by Writers, Publishers and  Performing Rights Organizations (ASCAP, BMI, SESAC, etc…) worldwide

Outlets, businesses, independent labels and some major labels are not renewing their digital agreements with the performing Rights Organizations (ASCAP, BMI, SESAC, etc…)  A number of large digital music users, including Clear Channel, Entercom and Sirius XM, have negotiated direct licenses with various music labels in an effort to lower the rates that these services pay for music royalties. Future changes in the entertainment industry will include PRO (Performing Rights Organizations) having smaller revenue bases and possibly charging higher percentage rates or even dedicated service charges.

For in-store business music services (also called background music services, or business establishment services), one of the largest companies negotiated a direct deal with one of the largest music publishers – and the negotiated prices eventually were found by rate courts to be the best evidence of the market price, which were used to set the price that ALL players in the market pay to ASCAP and BMI.

We once thought that Regardless of what happens in the digital market, PROs will always have general performance licensing to fall back on because monitoring song plays at bars, clubs and stores requires boots on the ground to track.  Technology is changing that concept by monitoring on line streaming events, “live” and recorded shows and the design of tracking software for cloud storage of music & video files.

New online services now enable the music industry to do business (as never before) by providing the searching, previewing,  license pricing, contracts, invoices and download access needed to foster efficient, professional relationships between the music creators and the industry people needing to license their tracks for an unlimited variety of commercial media projects.

The new music industry has been ushered in with a swift change of leadership and direction.  Many foolish people still hold on to ancient concepts and believe that the Black radio & record community will revive itself.  This is NOT going to happen, for everything must change.  My generation made the music industry an industry of “smoke & mirrors” where companies and individuals were paying thousands of dollars just to tell a LIE about their music.  The reasoning was that a major label would pick them up, pay them and make them a star.  Technology, even though still used to perpetuate LIES, has made several common place entertainment entities completely worthless.

RETAIL PROMOTION – Hiring people that would make sure that your song got Sound Scan reports every week and assist you in “hyping” the charts.  No longer is it necessary for there are no independent records on the charts to be hyped.

RETAIL TRACKING – Seems like there is no one who really cares about where your record is physically or digitally located and what it is doing on a weekly basis.  So there’s no one left who calls retail on a regular rotation.

RADIO PROMOTION – The KING of hype games is still being played but on a much larger, more expensive level.  Today you can pay a promoter $25,000 to $65,000 just to get spins at night, during mix shows and on weekends.  This can get you into the Billboard charts, however you haven’t sold any music and you still have to spend money to have your artist work promotional dates.   For $80,000 – $250,000 you can have your music placed on air (depending on the stations format), BDS (Broadcast Data Service) reported and eventually Billboard charted.  However since NONE of this promotion is truthful you still have to find another way to sell physical and digital product to the masses.

RADIO TRACKING – This was a given job for hundreds of label secretaries and interns, now there are no lists of songs for the station to give out, no one within the station who even makes a decision on music or relationships between the caller and the station.  Independently owned music is not even being played on terrestrial radio under any format except non-commercial.

VIDEO PROMOTION – Who tracks your video plays, has the relationship with the major video television companies or even owns a list of the available television programs to send your video to?  Of course there is You Tube and multiple online outlets, but who knows that your video is on You Tube?

RECORD POOLS – When DJ’s were playing records, then you needed someone who knew the most popular club DJ’s and could get your music to them PLUS get feedback on your tune.  The advent of MP3 technology coupled with the shady, money hungry actions of Record Pool Directors has made this type of company totally unreliable and unnecessary.   The reasoning behind even having a Record Pool was to give unbiased feedback directly from the “end user” (audience), today your feedback is coming from Facebook, Twitter, Reverb Nation, You Tube, etc..

INDEPENDENT RETAIL STORES – Sure there are still a few stores left in certain neighborhoods around the United States, the biggest transformation is that they are selling music as a sideline.  Their front line business is clothing, drug paraphernalia, household accessories or hair care products.  An extremely few specialty stores are making Sound Scan reports, but most of those can be bought and have no honest relevancy.

BILLBOARD – The Billboard charts were once used as a list for the record retailer to purchase from.  Customers would come in, look over the list, normally posted on a wall or bin, and make their purchases. As a record label you had to chart your record to justify sales, improve airplay and get wholesalers to pay you what they already owed you.  It truly was the bible of the music industry.  No longer is it necessary to “climb” the charts to become a musical success.  The “bible of the industry” has become the “comic book” of the major labels.

INDEPENDENT DISTRIBUTORS – These are the wholesalers that operate as middlemen between the label and the retailer.  Because the chain system (Best But, Target, K-Mart, etc…) now controls the majority of sales of recorded music, these distributors have a much tighter and smaller inventory and some malicious games for the label.  As a label you must pay for distributors’ promotion, marketing, place and positioning within stores, special programs and if your product sits on the wholesalers’ floor more than 30 days you pay for storage.

ONESTOP – a smaller wholesaler that has almost disappeared from the industry landscape, while most were specialty record orientated there inventory was never large. The majority went out of business based on outstanding debts coupled with mobile music trading, purchasing, streaming and video.

I am truly glad for the change that has over taken the music industry.  Today you can own your music completely and sell directly to the consumer without any middlemen.  By the way, for all you old timers that wishes for the good old lying, hyping and buying reports days to come back.  Keep dreaming.