Subscribe to this... my personal case study

Well, I know I have been a bad bad boy.  My blogging as of late has been a bit lack luster and non-existant.  If you are still reading.  Thank You. I have been in the process of working on my taxes over the past week or so and I had a bit o an epiphany.  You see, when you are relegated to staying in the States while all of the talking heads of the music industry are in Cannes at Midem, you will find yourself enjoying the time you have by filling it up with things like tallying your own personal music tab from the past year for the purposes of writing some of it off (I am in the MUSIC business after all).

Point being... the buzz this year is all about Subscriptions.  Subscriptions are going to save the music industry.  Well- we knew this-  that is why we created the Naxos Music Library years ago.  Subscriptions are a very important part of our business model.  It is good to hear all of this new buzz-  But with the likes of Bob Lefsetz, Donald Passman, and other touting how this really could be the paradigm shift gives it a whole new value in my mind.  The fact that you cant have a talk about digital music without Spotify coming up tells me that this is a move that is coming sooner than later.

Back to my taxes.  I noticed a really interesting fact as I added up my tally from Amazon, , iTunes,  eMusic, Classics Online, etc.  The really interesting thing is I REALLY did spend more money on subscriptions this year than I did on a la carte purchases.  This is a bit freaky to me as I spend a good deal of dough on music.  But it is true.  eMusic got the lion's share of my money.  This could be attributed to a number of things.  1st of all, I use eMusic as a discovery tool and as a catalog builder.  I would never set out to buy Starship's Greatest Hits, Gogol Bordello, or Boston, but eMusic facilitated this for me.  These are what I consider great catalog fillers.  I may not want to put them in queue on my iPod touch, but some time I may wish to hear them again and therefore I bought them...  Move over to my iTunes and Amazon purchase patterns.  The vast majority of music purchased through these outlets last year were singles.  Radio hits.  One Hit Wonders... whathaveyou.  Call it what you want.. the crazy thing is I spent less on these than I did at eMusic.  This tells me that I am either a) wasting too much money on eMusic.. of b) I would rather keep my monthly tab knowing that I can exhaust it on any mundane old albums my heart desires than go looking for those albums to pay for them in real time.  I wonder if the rest of the music buying public would agree with this...?

I dont know if this proves any of the great music business thinkers' concepts as this still neglects the difference between my eMusic subscription and a Spotify subscription.  But it does make one thing evident.  I WILL spend more money on music by the Album than I will by the single and eMusic's model of giving me an allowance each month will continue to feed my album fetish.  This is mostly a behavioral thing I suspect- but I still find it incredibly interesting.

Ok- thats all for now- I will try to be a better blogger in 2010.. Thanks

Oh.. and Happy 2010.. here's a video to celebrate.

Music City Interactive (http://www/musiccityinteractive.com)

I want to tell you about Music City Interactive.  MCI is a site that was dreamed up over some great greek food with my friend Tony Groticelli.  Tony and I were commenting on the fact that there were multiple factions of tech-minded folks in Nashville.. but they were quite scattered.  I mean... we have Barcamp , Podcamp, Geek Breakfast, Digital Nashville, and probably a dozen other gather places for like-minded geeks but there was not one place you could go to find information on all of these... let alone learn about other interesting happenings around music city. We decided that we would try to do something about it.  We would establish a blog aggregator.  A "Mashable" for Nashville's music and technology set.  Hence the brand spanking new blog: Music City Interactive.  This is very young and at this point.. we are still REALLY working out the kinks, but the idea is- we will have multiple bloggers who write on various issues surrounding technology and music contribute via their RSS feeds.  Here in one place- you will be able to find and learn about (hopefully) every facet of the music, social media, technology and where they all intersect.

CHECK IT OUT! More on this later.

Flash Sales sites make holiday shopping a breeze... perhaps the music industry could learn a thing or two..

I love flash sales!  I love everything about them.  They are discounted, quick, dirty, and in limited quantities.  They are urgency and discount bundled into one fantastic package that I as a consumer cannot resist.  Obviously, they have been around for a while now.  Amazon.com has often push urgency marketing on their customer base and many other sites have attempted to emulate this tactic with varied levels of success.  However it seems that just lately, companies are starting to figure out the value in this type of marketing and sales.  Now more than ever... sites like Woot, Rue La La, Gilt, Haute Look, and others are popping up for everything from consumer goods, to clothing, wine, t-shirts, etc.  And they are smart about their marketing... these sites are "invitation only" (click above for "invitations")... they build scarcity around the deal.  Scarcity is power!  If it is an expiring deal, or a limited number of deals... it is much more attractive isnt it?  Combine this with top-notch social media networking and you have a powder keg of cash drawing, deal making, fantastic-ness (yes I just invented this word). So... when is music gonna wise up and get on the bandwagon?

Great question.

Bob Lefsetz figures that it will begin with concert ticket sales...  How cool would that be?  Well- we already have scarcity (there are only a number of seats you know..)... so add to that an expiring deal and you may just have something great!

I would like to see it in recorded music as well.  Obviously, there are great daily deals to be found in e-commerce with Amazon and iTunes leading the pack but these dont really count in my book.  The sites listed far above are deal of the day sites.  Sites people who love technology, fashion, t-shirts, etc. go to on a daily basis and accept "spam" from because they ASKED FOR IT in order to get a great deal...  Why haven't we embraced this yet as a Music industry?  It wouldn't be too hard...  In my book you have general music lovers and genre specific lovers... take the top 10 genres and hook up a deal from each every two days or so... JACKPOT!  I think this will be a great way forward should anyone have the chutzpah to pull it off (I am available to consult- since it was MY IDEA).

I think the industry could do well to take some notes from these other folks.  This may not be the idea to right the ship, but it does help bail some of the water.  Til that happens... much of my holiday shopping will be relegated to name brand handbags and sunglases rather than that great Pink Floyd box set I had my eye on...