Image by Brian Solis
I get sent a lot of press releases. I have a really good filtering system for them too. I glance at them, see if there’s anything I need to know anything about, and then I bin them. But although I must be one of the hardest (or at least one of the most pointless) people to send stuff too, every now and then something cuts through.
So… what follows is not a sponsored post. This is essentially a clever piece of public relations from someone who clearly knows what they are doing, and I am walking into the trap of simply republishing press releases with both eyes open.
I’m going to let you read this one and see if you can figure out what attracted me to it – and what has led me to reprint it, verbatim, onto New Music Strategies. Answers at the end.
Kia ora Andrew :)Greetings from your home land. My name is Che and I manage one of New Zealand’s most talented rappers David Dallas (from Frontline).
I have to say thanks first of all for your 20 things ebook, I’ve taken a few pointers from it and it’s been particularly helpful in constructing Dave’s website www.daviddallas.co.nz in between working and studying. We’re releasing the new David Dallas album in New Zealand and Australia in mid 2008 and the reason why I’m contacting you is because I thought I’d tell you about a creative and cost-effective way that we’ve created some buzz for this album that you may find interesting.
We recorded a 12 track mixtape that we released for free online via a series of podcasts, beginning in late January we released one track every second day until the mixtape concluded on Monday.
Being that our fans were not familiar with podcasting we had to educate them a little about the benefits and I produced a help page on Dave’s website to explain podcasting and encourage fans to subscribe, it paid off because the podcast became a featured music podcast on iTunes NZ and reached as high as #3 on the top 100 music podcasts just behind Radiohead and Ministry of Sound.
It’s also generated chatter amongst a few of NZ and Australia’s hip hop blogs and websites and a few general music blogs and websites. Also a few industry heads have contacted me and asked me how to create a podcast because they want to use one to promote their music or record label.
The purpose of the mixtape was to reintroduce Dave as a solo artist and clear up any confusion about his recent stage name change (he used to go by the stage name of Con Psy), this was done through Dave’s raps and the use of audio tags throughout the mixtape.
The mixtape had a 90′s New York rap theme to it and featured Dave rapping over his favourite 90′s New York rap beats, the final track however was a full-length song taken from his forthcoming album to give fans a taste of what to expect. The final track is not a single but what we’re referring to as our “leaked” track, one that we’ve encouraged fans to share amongst their friends that will attract new fans and hopefully generate traffic to Dave’s website, which is one of our most important marketing tools.
We’ve made it clear to Dave’s fans that the podcast will continue after the mixtape and we will podcast exclusive content on a regular basis such as interviews and exclusive songs etc. to maintain interest in “David Dallas”.
Most of our traffic is currently within New Zealand which is a very small market as you know, but we’re hoping to drum up some international interest through blogs and the like because of the novel way that we are marketing David Dallas through podcast and simply because the music is good :)
Here’s a couple of links about the mixtape and exclusive song:
The Artist Formerly Known As
Get Out Of The Way – ExclusiveI hope you find this interesting :)
Can you spot what Che did right? Here’s the list:
1) It appealed to me personally
I’m a New Zealander and I like to see New Zealanders doing well – particularly in the music arena. I’m interested in this kind of music. I actually know Con Psy as a rapper, so this is something I find relevant and interesting to me because I have context.
2) It was aware of what I do
He mentioned the e-book, and that it was interesting and helpful. Whether that’s true or not, those are the two things I’m trying to be.
3) It pushed the right buttons
Che talks about the fact that it’s hard to educate people into using podcasts and RSS feeds, which is not only true, it’s something that’s important to me. Likewise with the whole ‘in between working and studying’ underdog thing.
4) He gave me a reason to read it
This is not just ‘new album coming out’ – this is ‘new album coming out – and the reason that I’m telling you that is this‘.
5) He gave me a reason to share it
This is useful information for my readers, I think. It’s a clever way of using the available technology to get this music into the hands of people who might not otherwise have found it – and to promote it more strongly. It’s a helpful strategy to share, and that’s what I’m trying to do here.
This is good stuff, and you should not only steal Che’s ideas about promotion – you should pay attention to his wisdom about getting the information out there, in those five key points.
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[...] out Che getting some props over on New Music Strategies. For those that dont know Che is my manager and is the man responsible for the podcast/this [...]
[...] and led to Dallas getting a US record deal with Duckdown Records. Andrew Dubber wrote about their approach here. It’s taken Dallas and his team four years, but he got there. NYC, baby! Home of [...]
12 Comments
Did you feel it was too long?
Yep. I saw it was something I wanted to read and chucked it into my ‘read it later’ pile. Sometimes things disappear in there, but this had enough going for it on other fronts.
the boys are on the right track!
http://pmoneymusic.blogspot.com/2008/02/dj-mouli-new-music-strategies.html
Cheers Dubber, thanks for sharing :)
Re: Justin, I was weary of writing a long email, I’m a DJ too and am often on the receiving end of poorly written and/or targetted press releases, so I tried to keep it as brief as possible without neglecting any important information. I suppose personal relevance, as Dubber pointed out, is of key importance here because it increases a persons motivation to process a message (can you tell I’m studying marketing?).
Going back to the podcast, I emailed Dubber about it in the hopes that he would find it to be interesting and share it on here, which I’ve achieved :). We chose to release Dave’s “leaked” single this way because we wanted to make an event out it and create anticipation for it – we didn’t want this single to be one of those blink-and-you-miss-it type of releases. The 12 track mixtape podcast was handy in that it gave us 12 opportunities to advertise the upcoming free single. I’m keen to share the knowledge so hit me up if you have any questions, suggestions or experiences with podcasting you’d like to share…
Yeah sometimes it works. Sometimes. I feel like I’m just getting a feel only now for how much Seth expects us to bleed.
So I’d do the math.
Wasn’t that the point of that hub bub over the tipping point critique? Forget about influencing the influencers?
Good MC though.
You lost me at “New Zealand’s most talented rappers”…
Surely if it’s that targetted we’re talking about a letter, not a press release..? There’s no way anyone’s gonna pursue that level of research and customization for each of 100 local radio stations, for instance!
xx
@ Joe Parker -
Maybe that’s the point, though. Maybe if someone went to that much effort to learn about everyone they sent a press release to it would be more like beginning/developing an ongoing relationship instead of a one-off disposable piece of junk mail to process.
yes – but there’s a question of scale; not even the majors have that many man hours to throw at a campaign (not that they need to, grr) whereas for indies it’s literally impossible to spend, say, two hours on each mailshot
there will be some djs or outlets to do respect and admire enough (or know through word-of-mouth) to devote more time to – but they’re a minority
Kia ora fellas,
Props, this is good stuff aye. It automatically gets me thinking a few months back to Atmospheres latest release: ‘When life gives you lemons, you paint that shit gold’
Those guys at Rhymesayers really went the extra mile when promoting that album. For more than a month leading up to the release, they had weekly videos on Youtube, hosted by Ant and Slug (the guys that are Atmosphere). Anyone could email them with any questions and they would then proceed to answer the questions in a personal manner on-screen. Slug professed that he checked each and every email himself.
A few months previous to this, Atmosphere had released an online-only, free, full length album: ‘Strictly Leakage’: http://www.rhymesayers.com/atmosphere/ <– cop it.
Now the thing with these guys, is that they dont need to create a fanbase anywhere.. they basically own a pretty niche part of hiphop. The double edged sword of their niche though, is that their market loves to download albums. Putting across a personable approach to marketing, so that they appeared more as your friends than favourite artists.. it was basically a conversation, with their fans. i mean hell, i went out and bought the album :) dont wana rip off ya boy eh.
these guys really put the time in to interact with their fans (aka revenue) and it probably has paid off — where can i find international (or otherwise) record sales figures? hah it would be nice to back this ish up — It’s the way things are going though aye, and its good to see us kiwis arent being left behind in this respect.
Its probably our only hope of being really successful overseas where hip-hop is concerned (and im talking about people that make actual dope music, not Savage et al) You know, making the music you want to, and getting it to where you need it to be.
Social media is where its at, and we need to dominate it deep. Its cheap as the proverbial chips, it doesnt take too much nouse to implement, and its just so damn relevant to the listeners.
Thanks again guys.
Peace
Leary
@ Joe Parker
Joe, I think something you may have overlooked with this ‘personalisation’ concept is that people are far more likely to spread the message into their own social networks if they believe in you and they feel they are helping you as an artist out. By building that ‘human’ feeling to your PR, you are essentially building a relationship with your fan, and they are then far more likely to reward you (maybe unknowingly) by passing on your message. You are empowering them with the information because they are now part of your team. Not another number. You say that “the people you would want to devote more time to are a minority” (not exact quote) I think you are not picking up on the fact that a lot of ‘minority’ groups can add up to one extrememly large group. Communites talk. Some people are in more than one… Things spread.
This thread is case and point. Andrew was impressed by what he read.. used it as an example on his website (which has over 3000 people getting the RSS feed – congrats on that Andrew) and now we are all talking about it. Not only are we talking about it, but I am about to start checking out David Dallas’s website. The ripple effect can be huge. Just think of the hits now after Andrew posted this on his page.
Hope that makes sense bro.
Really enjoying this discussion.
Peace
D