YouTube Playbook Gets a Music Facelift

If you’re a savvy YouTuber, you may already know about YouTube’s Playbook. Of course, if you’re a savvy YouTuber you already know everything in it. For a while, I’ve grumbled that it could use some reapplication to multiple types of creators. After all, not everyone is making cool episodic series or pioneering animation on YouTube. Therefore I’m sure the new Playbook Guides are all due to my influence!

They’re not yet converted to a user-friendly website, but you can download them as PDFs. Probably of immediate interest to most of The Orchard family is the music guide. While it’s not as heavy on strategy as the main Playbook, it does go in-depth on numerous successful tactics for promoting music on YouTube. I highly recommend it. Pay particular attention to the section on increasing watch time starting on page 27. It’s relevant to my last post on increasing engagement and helpful in mentally getting you over the hump of focusing on view counts.

Of course a big part of The Orchard family includes action sports. YouTube has a sports guide just for you. In particular, I recommend the section on programming starting on page 20. This is an area upon which I believe many of our sports clients could improve and the guide is fairly concise in this regard.

There are three other guides, one for educators, one for media companies, and one for nonprofits. I also recommend reading these. At first glance you may think they’re irrelevant, but you never know where a tactic used in one area could have applications in another.

You Asked, We Answered: Sales Strategy and Tips

One of the questions we get a lot in our midsts is how to improve your sales. Whether you’re just starting up or have a rich and exciting catalogue, there are always things you can do to get that extra something something.

On that note, we got Brandon Becker, one of our expert Retail Marketing Managers, to tackle the answer to our latest “You Asked, We Answered” below:

My sales have decreased recently and I need your help to raise them. Can you give me some advice for the strategy of my sales?

Sales numbers are quite liquid when it comes to music, meaning these numbers fluctuate regularly based on a variety of variables. It can be frustrating to see sales on your catalogue drop after the holiday spike, the economy takes a downturn, during a lull in your release schedule, or simply when marketing drivers are not present.

I’ve provided a short list of things that can help raise awareness of your catalogue in order to stimulate sales growth.

1. Price your catalogue strategically to increase visibility through promotions. This can be achieved by small discounts of 20-30%, where with the right promotion, your incremental revenue will show growth.
2. Create fun, timely and unique playlists for streaming and mobile partners.
3. Cut ringtones for all key tracks in your catalogue.
4. Drive traffic to buy links from all available social networks (artist, friends of artist, label, etc.). Check out GeoRiot for an easy way to centralize and monitor the clicks on these links.
5. Create ads that point to a retailer — and communicate ad spends to your Orchard Client Manager so they can share with the appropriate rep at that retail account.
6. Point all promotional assets to one retail account in order to show your focus with that retailer and garner support through their store and/or social media outlets. Make sure to discuss these options with your Orchard Client Manager for proper posting techniques.
7. Create a landing page for pre-orders and purchase options on artist and label websites.
8. Participate in catalogue-themed promotions on all retail accounts.
9. Discount an artist’s catalogue releases (and drive traffic to them) before and around a new release from said artist.
10. Use the suite of marketing and business tools provided in The Orchard Marketplace to create a Press Kit, connect to SoundCloud, build a D2C store, and more.

Freeloader Friday: Young Galaxy, The Appleseed Cast, Ra Ra Riot, Mark Mulcahy, AM & Shawn Lee, Lonestar, Veronica Falls and He’s My Brother She’s My Sister

Welcome back to Friday, folks! And what a week it has been. Our hearts go out to everyone in Boston, and may the second bomber be apprehended soon so Bostonians can go back to being awesome, as they’ve proven to be yet again in the face of these horrible events, and safe.

So, for all those on lockdown in Boston and all those around the world who want to be connected through music, I hereby present you with your Freeloader Friday.

To start off, we’ve got two incredible Pitchfork Advance features for Young Galaxy and The Appleseed Cast. Then, Ra Ra Riot, who just announced new tour dates alongside The Shins and The Postal Service, give us a new single via The New York Times Magazine, and Mark Mulcahy comes back to the scene after eight years on hiatus with “She Makes The World Turn Backwards.” To close out the music streams section, AM & Shawn Lee give us a remix of their first single “Two Times.”

On the music video front, we’ve got three amazing premieres from Lonestar, who just announced the release of their album Life As We Know It, Veronica Falls, and He’s My Brother She’s My Sister. If you want more visuals than what’s listed below, you can also check out Black Star Riders rocking our stairwell with “Bound For Glory.” 

To close out, we have a few music specials and special events you might want to know about: Todd Rundgren, the incredible songwriter/producer/recording artist/conceptualist/interactive artist who just released his new album State earlier this month, is hosting a live Google Hangout this Sunday at 5pm EDT / 2pm PDT / 10pm UK. You can send in your questions and join the Hangout using this link, and get yourself excited by watching these epic vids from back in the day. Other specials you might want to check out are Rachel Zeffira on NPR Music, performing “Front Door” and “Silver City Days,” and PAWS singing the hell out of “Jellyfish” and “Sore Tummy” on The Newtown Sessions in Brooklyn.

Have a safe weekend, everyone!

Young Galaxy: Full album stream via Pitchfork Advance
Ultramarine out April 16 on Paper Bag Records

The Appleseed Cast: Full album stream via Pitchfork Advance
Illumination Ritual out April 23 on Graveface Records

Ra Ra Riot: “All I Fear” via The New York Times Magazine
Beta Love out now on Barsuk Records 

Mark Mulcahy: “She Makes The World Turn Backwards” via Rolling Stone
Dear Mark J. Mulcahy, I Love You out June 18 on Fire Records 

AM & Shawn Lee: “Two Times (Colorama Remix)” via Under The Radar
La Musique Numerique out May 7 on Park The Van 

Lonestar: “Maybe Someday” music video premiere via CMT
Life As We Know It out June 4 on 4 Star Records 

Veronica Falls: “Waiting for Something to Happen” music video premiere via Pitchfork
Waiting For Something To Happen out now on Slumberland

He’s My Brother, She’s My Sister: “The Same Old Ground” music video premiere via VEVO
Nobody Dances in this Town out now on Park The Van

Help Support The World Savvy Gala with The Orchard

On Thursday, April 25, from 6:30 to 10:00PM at Harvard Club of NYC, The Orchard will partner once again with World Savvy to celebrate the organization’s 11th anniversary at the New York City World Savvy Gala.

The evening will consist of delicious cuisine from all around the world, a beer and wine bar, live entertainment, interactive media stations created by World Savvy students, as well as exclusive live and silent auction items. Some of the top-tier live auction items include a day at Gardiner’s Bay, “A Capitol Weekend” in the nation’s capitol, a weeklong trip to Supetar, Croatia, and much more.

World Savvy is an organization that promotes systematic change in education for students in grades K-12. They hope to provide opportunities for these students that will give them the knowledge, skills, attitude and behavior to become the future leaders and decision makers within each of their local and global communities.

For more information and to find out how to purchase tickets for the New York City World Savvy Gala, please visit this event page. All of us at The Orchard hope to see you at this wonderful event for a great cause.

To conclude, here’s a throwback to 2010, when we helped put together the first ever World Savvy student album:

Get Traction on YouTube: Think “Episodes”

The concept of episodes has been generally associated with traditional cable television only. However, as the line between TV and internet continues to blur, more viewers are looking to internet streaming for their daily fix. It’s clearly apparent that video streaming services like YouTube, Hulu, and Netflix are all vying to compete directly with cable television giants. But what does that mean for musicians and labels? Time to adapt.

For musicians, YouTube has historically been viewed as a vault to hold music in a video format. A catalogue of MTV-style music videos is uploaded, maybe a live performance or two, and those videos sit until the next album or tour. That’s great if you’re able to bombard your fans with email updates each time you sporadically upload a video. But that’s not nice. It’s also not beneficial to your brand or your YouTube presence. Think pull, not push.

Instead of hoping viewers come back to your channel after a long break between albums and video uploads, make sure you give them something they can expect regularly. Enter “episodes.” If you can commit to a regular schedule with a new video update each week or so, your chances of engaging an audience are instantly improved. As YouTube predicted, its viewers are watching on a more regular, predictable basis (much like TV). This is a huge opportunity for musicians and labels to connect on a level that was much less available until now.

So how do you get started? Often, the toughest part for music companies and bands is coming up with content that is consistent. This is the time to get creative. Your episodes don’t have to be long. They don’t even have to be the best quality. The most important thing is consistency and creativity. Give your viewers something they can’t get from buying your album or going to a show. This can be as simple as an intimate performance of songs in a setting they’re not used to (Tiny Desk, La Blogotheque). If you’ve exhausted all of your material, a simple video blog or interview will suffice. Plus, these allow your viewers to get to know you on a more personal level. Some channels even go as far as writing and producing completely original web series.

The fact that YouTube and its counterparts are competing with TV isn’t necessarily news. The point is that users will have to adapt to take full advantage of the opportunities that this shift could bring. This is a bit more difficult for musicians and labels to grasp, but if you can pull it off, the potential is huge. Get started by checking out the YouTube Creator Playbook.