Fans, we want to hear about who you picked to share your FairTradeMusic downloads with. When you downloaded music from an artist from NoiseTrade, who did you choose to share their music with and why? How did you pick the specific friends?

Did you pick friends who would be new to the artist, or who might already have heard them? Do you use the same friends all the time, or do you send specific friends certain kinds of music? Did you also embed the widget on your blog/facebook/myspace page? Tell us in the comments!

Thanks!

posted by Josh

dropped in: For Fans around 2:00 pm

EMI.com is being retooled as a hub for fans and to gather information. “What you’ll see is less of a focus on sales of individual tracks or the conceptual equivalent of little round shiny discs, and more about helping artists learn things about their fan group that they can’t directly see … ,” new EMI digital president Douglas Merrill said in a recent Billboard interview. “The value of a label going forward is to be the platform to connect artists and fans and teach each more about the other.”

we agree.  :)

(read the whole article here)

posted by Derek

dropped in: For Artists, For Fans, General around 12:59 pm

We’ve seen a couple of clever uses of YouTube videos to promote an artist’s NoiseTrade widget. These are good examples of how to have some fun with your promotion.

David Dewese wrote a song about giving his music away on NoiseTrade and filmed himself playing it. Clever boy. Using a music video to promote a music sampler to promote a new CD. He even included the song from the video in the sampler he’s giving away. It’s playful and fun. I like it.

And check out Katie Herzig’s news spoof from last July. She turns her album giveaway into breaking news. Again, playful and fun. This is one of the reasons she is one of our most downloaded artists.

So David and Katie have shown us the way. We’d love to see some more artists putting on their director’s hat and make a NoiseTrade video for YouTube. Send us the link and we’ll post them here.

Oh yeah, and be sure to download David’s music here and Katie’s music here.

Joe

posted by Joe

dropped in: For Artists around 11:30 pm

Direct Link: http://www.noisetrade.com/justinlittle

Leave your reviews in the comments!

posted by Josh

dropped in: NoiseTrade Music around 10:00 am

Direct Link: http://www.noisetrade.com/laralandon

Leave your review in the comments!

posted by Josh

dropped in: NoiseTrade Music around 9:30 am

Direct Link: http://www.noisetrade.com/jonabel

Leave your reviews in the comments!

posted by Josh

dropped in: NoiseTrade Music around 9:00 am

If you follow marketing trends, you’ve probably been hearing a lot about “tribes” lately. It’s the idea that our culture is a collection of groups with a shared identity, mission or leader. Seems obvious enough. We’ve all seen Braveheart and have a pretty good idea of what a tribe is. But what does it mean for an artist in the 21st century? I think it provides one model for how an artist can have the freedom to create their art and make a living doing it.

One of the main ways people identify their tribe is by the music they listen to. If you tell me you are a huge fan of Bright Eyes, Brand New and Manchester Orchestra, I immediately know something about who you are and one of the tribes you probably belong to. The NoiseTrade widget was built to give artists a way to grow their tribe. We’re not telling artists to give away their music as an act of desperation. We’re giving artists a way to know who the members of their tribe are, where they live and how to contact them. And we give the tribe members multiple ways to spread the word.

Our pdf one-sheet of NoiseTrade info has a quote by Seth Godin that says it better than I can. “Many musicians have understood that all they need to make a (very good) living is to have 10,000 fans. 10,000 people who look forward to the next record, who are willing to trek out to the next concert. Add 7 fans a day and you’re done in 5 years. Set for life. A life making music for your fans, not finding fans for your music. The opportunity of digital distribution is this: When you can distribute something digitally, for free, it will spread (if it’s good). If it spreads, you can use it as a vehicle to allow people to come back to you and register, to sign up, to give you permission to interact and to keep them in the loop.”

You can download a FREE audio copy of Seth Godin’s new book “Tribes” here. It’s a thoughtful book that will give you a good overview of the tribes concept and begin to stimulate your thinking about the tribe your fans are in. I also like that Seth is using the same model as NoiseTrade. He’s giving away his book as a way to build his tribe. I highly recommend it.

Joe

posted by Joe

dropped in: For Artists, NoiseTrade 101 around 12:05 pm