Digital Direct 2 Fan Marketing

According to Wikipedia

Direct-to-Fan is a business model used by independent musicians, independent Music labels, music marketing professionals, promoters, and others in the music industry

The Direct-to-Fan model by-passes the major record label model that historically controlled radio, venue, and distribution channels, and lets the artist (or the team that supports that musician) create interest in their music directly with their fans, identify those fans, market directly to and develop relationships with those fans, sell directly to and monetize those relationships, and use those relationships to expand their fan base.

Musicians want to be heardThere’s always been the desire for musicians to share music online, but the delivery wasn’t very good

How did it happen?

Then there was Myspace....

ZOMG the InternetzThe development of emerging technologies enabled musicians to more easily share their music directly with their fans

Now there are lots of different tools artists are using

How Does It Work?

From bricks & mortarInitially these innovations came from ‘actual’ offline businesses operating online

They sold their services cheaper for bands who wanted to sell their music to their fans offline

To digital distribution

But then artists put their tracks up for sale online

Removing the middle man

By getting rid of the record companies distributing their tracks, bands found out they could make more money and more importantly reach a more dedicated, although smaller, audience

As a result...More bands had the ability to get their music heard

But this means more competition, so, they thought, let’s innovate – let’s talk directly to our fans

How Can We Use It?

A shift from consumer to fan

A fan is someone who is using their band or brand to define their identity, but may not actually participate or buy the product. A good example of this is someone who signs up as a fan of Greenpeace on Facebook, but doesn’t attend any rallies or leave messages on their wall

Social media on the other hand, takes on a form of customer marketing. In part this is sharing content with a brand’s customers, and on the other hand it is performing a customer service function. The problem here is that it is difficult to measure – a cool piece of content may not make someone buy your brand’s product as a result.

PR is the crudest form of influencer marketing, you find the journalist who will write about your product and influence the most people. Brands love this as it gives them, in theory, huge exposure often on a national level. It also helps that column inches can be compared against the size of adverts and you can answer: how many people may have seen that article? How many key messages were included? Did we see a spike in sales after the piece?

Let’s integrate social media and D2F!

If a brand knows that someone is a fan on Facebook , the brand knows they want to receive information

Taking it a step further

Offer them something in return for their interest in their product or service, be it content or a night out

The brand can use this to speak with the fans directly

Lets give fans an opportunity to become involved with a brand they want to actively show they are involved with, and as a result they may go and buy their first product, or strengthen their affinity with the brand

Getting fans involved

Measuring success

Event Demand

Content sharesDownloadsInteractions

A final rallying cry

D2F requires greater resource than customer or influencer marketing as it means taking time to

become a trusted and credible member of the fans community

However, it is more worthwhile as it will help to cultivate long lasting fan – brand relationships,

which will in turn, lead to more sales over a longer sustained period of time

AboutI work with the Spooks at Edelman Digital, where they let me play on Twitter and come up with cool things to do for our clients.

I consult brands to try and help them understand the digital landscape that they operate in and to identify the opportunities that social media can bring to their business in order to help them provide a service that their customers will want to interact with.

Visit my blog: geetarchurchy.wordpress.comOr tweet me: @geetarchurchyI’m also here: uk.linkedin.com/in/mattchurchill