Episode 4 (ft. Amber Horsburgh): Why marketing music to strangers, not to existing fans, is more profitable

Water & Music

INTRO/OUTRO MUSIC:
"sleep" (instrumental) by min.a
Spotify | SoundCloud | YouTube

TRAVEL UPDATES:
I'm speaking at the European DIY Musician Conference in Valencia, Spain on April 6 and 7!
If you'll still be around, you can purchase tickets here: https://diymusiciancon.com/eu/

FEATURED GUEST:
Amber Horsburgh
Music marketing consultant; former SVP of Strategy of Downtown Records
Author of the Deep Cuts newsletter
https://us2.list-manage.com/subscribe?u=f0541c84182af8be2e2a9a627&id=6b07de7ce8

Today's episode is inspired by Amber's blog post "Playing to Strangers":
https://medium.com/@AmberHorsburgh/playing-to-strangers-8568f5e0e2fd

SHOW NOTES:

[3:44] Interview with Amber Horsburgh begins

[5:32] Byron Sharp's book How Brands Grow: What Marketers Don't Know:
https://www.amazon.com/How-Brands-Grow-What-Marketers/dp/1511383933

[10:46] Music Ally's report on the "dry streams" problem and how labels and managers navigate it:
https://musically.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/Sandbox224-62916028.pdf

[15:18] Kevin Kelly's original blog post on "1,000 True Fans":
https://kk.org/thetechnium/1000-true-fans/

[19:02] The Coachella lineup in 2012 featured many more artists from the rock and pop world—e.g. Beirut, The Black Keys, Arctic Monkeys and M83—than from hip-hop, R&B and similar genres:
https://consequenceofsound.net/2012/01/radiohead-dr-dre-the-black-keys-headline-coachella-2012/

[20:41] As one example of a study on rising concert ticket prices, the U.K.'s National Arenas Association found that the average ticket cost for a big-arena gig in the country rose from £22.58 in 1999 to £45.49 in 2016. Adjusting for inflation, that's a 27% increase over that time period:
https://www.bbc.com/news/business-42982769

[22:02] Artist manager Jake Udell's newsletter about how record labels often spend 80% to 90% of their budget on content, rather than on reach:
https://artofamanager.com/2019/02/important-marketing/

[24:26] During Spotify's Investor Day presentation in March 2018, CEO Daniel Ek shared that the streaming service receives roughly 20,000 tracks every single day:
https://investors.spotify.com/events/investor-day-march-2018/default.aspx

[29:49] According to a study by MusicWatch, 44% of Facebook users like an artist or band, while 56% of Instagram users follow, tag and/or share posts from artists
https://www.soundexchange.com/2018/08/08/musicwatch-music-social-media-perfect-harmony/

[39:12] Marshmello's groundbreaking Fortnite concert continues to be on the tips of everyone's tongues in the industry:
https://www.theverge.com/2019/2/2/18208223/fortnite-epic-games-marshmello-concert-exciting-bizarre-future-music

[40:33] Courtney Barnett and Kurt Vile's critically-acclaimed collaborative album Lotta Sea Lice was released in October 2017:
https://courtneybarnettandkurtvile.bandcamp.com/album/lotta-sea-lice

[43:32] Overrated/Underrated segment begins

[43:47] Bandsintown acquired Hypebot and Music Think Tank:
https://variety.com/2019/music/news/bandsintown-platform-acquires-hypebot-musicthinktank-1203170255/

[44:47] Throughout January and February 2019, both HuffPo and BuzzFeed laid off 7% and 15% of their workforce, respectively:
https://www.theguardian.com/media/2019/jan/26/huffpost-buzzfeed-layoffs-digital-journalism

[45:23] I recently wrote a two-part essay for my newsletter Water & Music about how artist education is the new point of competition for music companies, especially for streaming services and third-party distributors:
https://www.getrevue.co/profile/cheriehu42/issues/artist-education-is-the-new-competition-part-one-154161
https://www.getrevue.co/profile/cheriehu42/issues/artist-education-is-the-new-competition-part-two-156331

[48:37] Warner Music acquired Songkick in July 2017:
https://techcrunch.com/2017/07/14/warner-music-group-buys-concert-discovery-service-songkick/

Thank you so much for listening! :)

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