hypebot

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?

Chinese Indie Artists Shanren Use RocketHub To Finance North American Tour

Formed in China's Yunnan province, Shanren fuses Chinese folk music from multiple ethnic groups with contemporary western forms. They toured Korea and appeared at midem in Cannes. Now they're planning a trip to the U.S. in March and they're using RocketHub to supplement their funding.

ShareSquare Offers Quick & Easy HTML5 Mobile Sites For Musicians, Bloggers

ShareSquare, once known primarily for its mobile QR Code campaigns, has expanded its services to offer an HTML5 mobile website creator. Basically ShareSquare detects content and design elements on your original site, if you have one, and "mobilizes" those elements by prepopulating related modules to create the initial version of your mobile site.  So instead of being faced with a bunch of initial choices, you begin with a site that draws together feeds and sometimes even fans from such services as Twitter, Facebook and SoundCloud.

The result is an easy way for musicians to quickly and very affordably create a mobile presence.

How To Know When Its Time To Quit Your Band [FLOW CHART]

Joining a band is easy. In a rush of musical adrenalin you say yes, drink beer, become a band of brothers and imagine the adulation of fans as you step onto stage.  Quitting a band is much harder, and this flow chart offers a road map. Follow it.  But don't worry too much about your choices. The girls will love you even if your not in the band. Right?

Karmin Goes From Covers On YouTube To Originals On Saturday Night Live

I've previously written about both Karmin and Walk Off The Earth using unique covers of popular songs to attract attention. Karmin has taken things to the next level with an appearance on Saturday Night Live featuring their original music and an album on the way.

Plus, Walk Off the Earth recieved over 50 million views for its music video cover of Gotye's "Somebody That I Used to Know."

Graphic Music Marketing: Fizzmatik's iBook, Wildlife Control's Video, Machine, dear's Vinyl

Three graphically appealing projects package music within creative presentations that have the added bonus of providing a marketing edge. Fizzmatik and Wildlife Control take DIY routes releasing albums as an animated iBook and creating interactive video respectively. Machine, dear's vinyl release of "Killing something that's already dead" is presented in a mesmerizing package that comes alive when opened.   

11 Top Ways To Create Compelling Music Video Content

This guest post is by Bob Baker and Kendra Wright of www.TheBuzzFactor.com

Every artist should be using online video as part of their promotional toolkit. That means you must set up a YouTube account (also known as a “channel”) if you haven’t done so already. And once in place, your channel must feature new videos on a regular basis.

Outsider Marketing & The Case Of Willis Earl Beal

Willis Earl Beal didn't set out to be an Internet celebrity. But he's in the process of becoming one, though the next few months label XL Recordings seem focused on making him an offline star as well. As someone who might be pigeonholed an outsider artist, I'm impressed by the insightful treatment of the music publications that are currently featuring this powerful young singer online.

CD Baby Artists Made $41.7M In 2011, Here's How [INFOGRAPHIC]

CD Baby artists released 61,339 new albums (34,379 digtal only) and were paid $41.7 million for both new and catalog titles in 2011. Much like the broader music industry,  iTune's accounted for a whopping 77.4% of all digital sales and CD sales continued to slide. INFOGRAPHIC:

PledgeMusic's Benji Rogers On Going Beyond Fan Funding To Power Album Campaigns

PledgeMusic is a unique web service for indie musicians and labels that, in my opinion, faces a bit of an identity crisis. When I recently spoke with founder Benji Rogers, he maintained that they are not a fan funding company, though most musicians perceive them as one. I am sympathetic. Yet given that fan funding is a key tool in PledgeMusic's album campaigns, the problem is not in being mislabeled; but rather that there isn't an easy label that encompasses all that they actually offer.

OneSheet Adds iTunes, Expands Management Team

OneSheet has added an iTunes sales widget to the options available to users of its musician and entertainment web site creation tool.  Founder Brenden Mulligan also announced major additions to the company's management team including veterans of Digg, Columbia Records, RootMusic, MySpace, Warner/Chappell and Groupon.

Zoe Keating On Subcultures, Social Media And Staying D.I.Y. [INTERVIEW]

Hypebot readers know Zoe Keating for her outspoken views on Spotify. But her 1.3 million fans on Twitter are much more interested in the avant cellist's latest creations. Before Keating left for Midem and her role as artist ambassador, we traded emails that offer a look inside her d.i.y career.

In the beginning was d.i.y. a choice, or were labels interested?

Indie Artist Outsources Music Video To Bangalore, India With Surprising Results

Guest post by Brian Thompson of Thorny Bleeder.

I was browsing the music thread on Reddit and stumbled upon Drew Smith, an independent artist from Hamilton, Ontario. What caught my eye was the following headline, which had me incredibly intrigued:

"So my brother outsourced his new music video to Bangalore, India. This is what he got back."

Was I intrigued? Big time.

Rip. Mix. Make. - Saving The Right To Remix

With the realization setting in that stopping SOPA was just the beginning rather than the end of an ongoing struggle, calls are being raised to take proactive rather than reactive responses to such legislation. Rip. Mix. Make. is a creative campaign supporting fair use of creative work in remix videos that represents one proactive approach to issues of copyright.

How The 80/20 Rule Applies To Your Social Media Strategy

The Pareto Principle, more commonly also known as the 80–20 rule, states that for many events, roughly 80% of the effects come from 20% of the causes. In business for example, 80% of a company’s profits tend to come from 20% of their customers, 80% of sales are made by 20% of the sales staff, and so on. For today’s music artist, this rule of thumb applies in a more indirect way in regards to how they should properly communicate with their audience.

Indie Band Spanish Prisoners Using Kickstarter To Buy Van For SXSW Trip [VIDEO]

A lot of elements go into a successful Kickstarter campaign. Spanish Prisoners combine a unique request, funding the purchase of a low-budget tour van, with unique offerings, songs recorded in the van along with other goodies from their upcoming trip to SXSW. Of course, the music needs to appeal to listeners and the pitch video needs to communicate effectively. You'll have to decide for yourself but I think Spanish Prisoners have put together a campaign that has a solid chance of success though they've only reached about $2000 of their $5000 goal.

The Civil Wars' Success Formula: Live Shows + Social Media + Music Placements

The Civil Wars, with Grammy nominations in Best Country Duo/Group Performance and Best Folk Album, are an indie success story built on live performance, social media and music licensing. The February debut of their first album, "Barton Hollow", gave them a #1 on Billboard's Digital Albums chart and the CD is currently #73 on Amazon's Top 100 in Music a year later. But even without the Grammy nomination, which obviously boosted album sales, The Civil Wars show you can do well by combining what are now well-established approaches to marketing and revenue generation.

Occupy Movement Inspires New Compilation Albums & Bruce Springsteen [VIDEO]

A variety of record albums related to the Occupy Movement are set for release including "Occupy This Album" from Music For Occupy with a star-studded list of participants, "Folk the Banks" from the newly formed Occupation Records in London and media claims that Bruce Springsteen's newest work is the voice of the movement though the songs were mostly written before it existed.

Zoe Keating Shares Her YouTube "Claiming" Experience

In response to yesterday's post "Warner Music Orders YouTube Takedown Of Slow Motion Crochet Video With No Music", successful d.i.y. artist Zoe Keating shared her own experiences identifying and claiming videos YouTube videos. "I can't actually claim the soundtrack of any video on my own," says Keating "It is only done by the Google bots automatically when a 3rd party uploads a video."

CASSETTE: A Documentary In Final Days Of Kickstarter Campaign

A Kickstarter campaign for a documentary about the cassette subculture received a variety of coverage in late 2011 and is now back in the news as they countdown to its last day on Saturday. A variety of blogs are spreading the word that the makers of CASSETTE: A Documentary needs your support to meet their campaign goal of $25,000. If you want to help spread the word about the cassette revival with documentary evidence or just think it sounds like a cool idea, now's your opportunity to help out.