Apple Will Help You Create & Sell Multimedia Music Projects For The iPad
Guest post by Bob Baker of TheBuzzFactor.
Apple caused a stir some weeks ago when it launched iBooks Author, a new free app that indie authors and book publishers can use to create multimedia ebooks for the iPad. Another great thing about this development is that Apple is giving content creators a way to take the titles they produce with the new app and sell them (or give them away) in the iBooks Store.
What does this have to do with you and your music?
You may not be an "author" per se, but another way you can think about this free iBooks Author app is as a multimedia design and publishing platform. It allows anyone to combine text, images, video and even interactive touchscreen content into a single file that can be enjoyed by anyone who has an iPad. (About 60 million iPads have been sold so far.)
Wouldn't this be a great way to create an extra product line for your music fans? Instead of producing an expensive DVD boxed set package for your super fans, why not create something cool with similar features that requires only a modest sweat equity investment?
Visit the iBooks Author page on Apple's site or watch this video for an overview of the app's capabilities.
(Note: The free iBooks Author app works only with the new Lion operating system.)
What could you create with this app? Maybe something fun to go with your latest album? Include lyrics, exclusive video interviews, behind-the-scenes photos, a diary of the "making of" the recording, and more.
Consider all the app has to offer and start thinking about how you might use it to reach new fans — either as a for-sale title in the iBooks Store or as a giveaway to your fans who have iPads.
What do you think? Is this a silly idea? Or a potentially powerful tool if used creatively? I welcome your comments!
Bob Baker is the author of “Guerrilla Music Marketing Online,” Berkleemusic’s “Music Marketing 101” course, and many other books and promotion resources for DIY artists, managers and music biz pros. You’ll find Bob’s free ezine, blog, podcast, video clips, and articles at www.TheBuzzFactor.com and www.MusicPromotionBlog.com.
I will be doing this. Amazing.
I released an entire album with multimedia content on the iBook Store , using iBooks Author.
See the article on hypebot : https://www.hypebot.com/hypebot/2012/02/graphic-music-marketing-fizzmatiks-ibook-machine-dears-vinyl-wildlife-controls-video.html
Taking advantage of any new available outlets and trends that allow an artist to deliver content for free or in exchange for income to their target audience is not a bad idea.
However, with all these new choices popping up, it is in my opinion getting a little bit out of hand.
Some may remember the days when a consumer only had to choose between buying a cassette or a vinyl record. (besides choosing which store to buy it from).
The artist or label only created one type of music product to be distributed to one type of outlet. A record store.
Today there are hundreds of different ways to distribute or sell media besides the hard copy CD, DVD, and USB Key which are all so 36 seconds ago.
Smart internet marketing / Entrepreneurial type of artists have been creating eBooks and other types of Instant downloadable or streaming content for a while now in order to reach Smartphones, Ipads, Tablets, Kindles, etc…, and for each device their are thousands of services that one can sign up to in order to make it all happen.
Notice I said smart and entrepreneurial, as for the rest of the 95% of artists online who believe that spamming forums and sending my email addresses unsolicited links and attachments to click on, is a way to promote themselves and gain credibility.
I doubt that any of them will jump on the iBooks Author app anytime soon.
Arnold Stolting.
Stolting Media Group
That’s Really cool and creative, I think if used right it could help a few artists out but I doubt it well do much though.