The Orchard Loves to Market… Part Three

By now, you’ve experienced Part One and Part Two of our Marketing love affair. This week, we bring you the final installment with Hook, Line & Sync’ers, a map of our Film, TV, Advertising and Gaming partners.

We’ve partnered with the cream of the crop in all different industries and genres to get our clients’ music heard, and our Concentrated Music team is always hard at work securing more partnerships, like our latest one with Kina Grannis and Disney. Check out some of our past and current partners below:

Thanks to Airene Resurreccion for the graphic! 

15 Events We Would Never Have Anticipated in 1997

When Richard Gottehrer and Scott Cohen first founded The Orchard back in 1997, they did it because they could see the potential of digital way before its prime — before iTunes, YouTube and Facebook had even launched.

In 15 years, the industry has certainly come a long way, and while we pride ourselves in continually staying on top of the fold and up-to-date on the most recent and budding trends, we thought it’d be fun to go back and see some of the things we didn’t see coming — back in 1997.

1. Independent music taking up a collective share of 25.2% of the market in 2011 (and 32.6% in publishing)!
2. Millions of songs at your fingertips wherever you are through paid (and free/freemium) streaming services
3. Over 1 billion people around the world talking to each other through social media, proving that word of mouth is more powerful than ever
4. Instant social sharing, where when you listen to music (or read an article, or attend a concert…), your friends can see what you are listening to and when through Facebook’s Open Graph
5. Public Performance and Broadcasting revenue (also known as Master Rights and Neighboring Rights) getting its biggest boost when revenue from Physical started to decline, thus helping labels continue to survive during harder times in the industry
6. Sync licensing no longer being considered selling out to big brands, but becoming a popular way to increase exposure (check out some of our placements here!)
7. Netflix successfully converting their massive DVD-by-mail subscriber base into an internet streaming user base
8. YouTube successfully converting wide-spread copyright infringement into one of the largest commercial revenue streams for rights owners
9. Apple products opening their previously-closed retail environment to include competing streaming services like Hulu, Netflix and Spotify
10. The ability to communicate with multiple people around the world through a live video/audio stream 
11. Seeing most music sales occurring through companies whose primary business is not music, such as Apple, Target, WalMart, Amazon, etc.
12. The return of vinyl‘s popularity
13. Today’s pop stars being picked by the audience (American Idol, X-Factor, etc.)
14. That The Rolling Stones would STILL be touring and Keith Richards would be a New York Times best-selling author
15. That a tech king like Steve Jobs could so greatly impact the music industry

Looking back at this list gets us pretty excited at how much the industry has evolved, and that we work in a field that is so versatile and innovative. So bring it on! We’re ready to roll for another 15 years!

Viva Volkswagen (and The Black Angels)

Volkswagen Italia just can’t get enough of The Black Angels, but can you really blame them? The band’s 2010 single “Telephone” is being featured, yet again, in a commercial for the Volkswagen Polo. The ad began to air in March of 2011, and Volkswagen Italia has recently decided to extend their use of the song. The band has tour dates scheduled now through November in Canada, the US, and Australia. Check out the Volkswagen Polo ad below!

Post by: Hannah Brooks

Ever Wonder What Sync Licensing Was Like In Morocco?

My name is Laila Lebbar and I have been interning in the Sync and Creative departments at The Orchard for the past 4 months. Throughout my internship  I was able to discover some of the great work done by The Orchard team for brands like Target, Heineken, Honda, and more.

Coming from Morocco, I am always impressed by the quality of music in American advertisements. While most people hate interruptions while they are watching their favorite TV show or movie, I enjoy every second of the music when it’s beautifully placed. Sync in Morocco is still in its infancy compared to the United States. The cost to sync American music to an advertisement is very high compared to the general standard of living in Morroco. With the exception of a few cases, I have always thought that Moroccan advertisements do not have the greatest music.

Even though I have been away from Morroco for over eight months, I have kept an eye on what is going on in the Moroccan music industry. I came across this video by students of at Al Akhawayn University in Ifrane. The video was submitted as part of an advertising contest organized by the School of Business. Personally, I love the music that the students chose and I think it fits well with the picture. I am thrilled that sync is finally getting attention and interest of Moroccan youth and I am optimistic for the future of the industry in this regard.

Project by Sakina Rhattas, Lamiae Skalli, Yacine Kaouti

The Orchard Sync Team Becomes Concentrated Music

Today is a big one for The Orchard and more specifically, The Orchard’s Sync team. SXSW is obviously an exciting event on its own. It’s the main stage for bands and new technologies to introduce themselves to the industry at large, offering new sounds and solutions, paving a path to the future and inspiring execs and fans alike. And let’s be honest… it’s an awesome party and a wonderful platform to discover the importance of tacos as part of your balanced breakfast.

Well, The Orchard has never been a stranger to any of these aspects, but today is like the debutante ball for The Orchard’s Sync team. Today The Orchard Sync team becomes Concentrated Music as we launch www.concentratedmusic.com, a new platform for industry tastemakers to manage their projects and access The Orchard’s worldwide catalogue of licenseable music. It’s the same quality music and service that supervisors and licensing professionals have come to expect from The Orchard’s Sync team but now with a new look, a new name and improved access to our suite of services.

Our supervisors can still request music from us as they always have, but now they can securely review their custom selected tracks, audition them to video, and also explore the catalogue on their own to discover and tag new music for current and future projects. With a custom login, our network of tastemakers will also have access to our newsletters, special pre-releases, live event invitations and of course, tons of great music to stream and download. They can request high quality audio files and instrumentals, securely upload video to help audition music and organize ongoing projects and exercise complete creative control over how they use The Orchard’s music.

Our labels can join in on celebrating this occasion as well. They will have greater access to the Concentrated Music team, a direct look at the music searches that we are able to share and the ability to submit suggestions, upload new music, instrumentals and lyrics. They’ll also have the ability to help us tag their music with new moods and keywords to help supervisors more accurately and efficiently discover their music.

Of course, no party would be complete without some loot-bags, so in addition to giving out some Concentrated Music bottle openers (a SXSW must have) to the fortunate attendees at the event, we’re also offering the opportunity to win new hardware and software from the amazing folks at Propellerhead. Sign up for a Concentrated Music account for a chance to win 1 of 2 copies of the new Reason 6.0 or the new Balance interface, complete with Reason Elements.

Today The Orchard’s Sync team becomes Concentrated Music and we couldn’t be more excited to celebrate with all of you, offering our partners a new and improved way to discover the amazing music distributed by The Orchard. Don’t hesitate to reach out to us directly at concentratedmusic@theorchard.com for more info, or head to the new site to sign up for your custom account today.