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Archive for the ‘Youtube Music’ Category

NEW YORK (Reuters) – In a grainy black and white Web video, similar to footage from an in-store security camera, you can make out the muscular frame of rapper 50 Cent, smashing dozens of TV sets with a baseball bat.

None too subtle in its message, the clip is part of a advertising blitz by Vivendi’s Universal Music Group and Sony Music Entertainment, two music giants hoping that their new website, Vevo.com, will finally put to rest any idea that TV is a place for top flight videos.

Launched on Tuesday, Vevo offers music from both Universal and Sony, as well as EMI Music, and contains programing from CBS radio stations and Last.fm, both owned by CBS Corp. In all about 30,000 videos are available.

The idea is to create an MTV for the digital age, a music site where all the latest and archived videos can be found. It’s a business model similar to that of Hulu, the popular TV and movie site.

Vevo’s debut comes as music companies are losing revenue and profits at a rapid tick due to the combined impact of falling sales of CDs, online piracy and evolving methods fans discover new music.

Moreover, MTV Networks, owned by Viacom Inc, is no longer considered a major outlet for playing music videos, and while Google Inc’s YouTube has been an important music discovery tool for the record companies, it has failed to attract premium advertising dollars.

But Vevo has landed just the sort of blue-chip brands that have shied away from YouTube and its the random user-generated clips. That’s largely because of the high production value of the videos, and the top flight artists they feature.

Indeed, Vevo launched with the support of nearly 20 new advertising partnerships, including names like Colgate-Palmolive Co., MasterCard Inc., McDonald’s Corp., and AT&T Inc.

These advertisers will pay a near premium rate of around $20 to $45 for every 1,000-page views, Vevo Chief Executive Rio Caraeff said in an interview.

“We’re offering advertisers opportunities that they can’t buy off the rack,” said Caraeff, who has hired more than two dozen executives to sell ads.

CHANGING THEIR TUNE

Across the industry, music companies and their technology partners are increasingly banking on the idea that fans are prepared to either pay for access to a site or will tolerate targeted advertising in exchange for their favorite songs.

Owning music, either in a physical format or even as a digital file, is also no longer as important as it once was, the thinking goes.

One indication of this came last week when Apple Inc’s iTunes Music Store bought Lala, a digital music service that streams songs on a variety of sites.

The move surprised many long-time Apple watchers because iTunes is easily the dominant online music retailer, controlling about 70 percent of the U.S. market.

Apple is also not known for buying technology companies, preferring instead to painstakingly develop its own software to seamlessly fit within the Apple ecosystem.

“Apple’s music strategy is always primarily about delivering a differentiated, high-quality music experience on its devices,” said Mark Mulligan, an analyst at Forrester Research. “But social music and other streaming services have shifted the momentum of digital music away from downloads.”

What has changed for iTunes is similar to the thinking behind Vevo: Modern music fans expect to have access to their songs on demand.

Services like Europe-based Spotify, News Corp’s MySpace Music and YouTube have done well with fans because of the ease with which they can find their favorite songs.

The challenge is making the all-you-can-hear model work. Spotify delayed its launch in the United States till next year because it is still working out agreements with music publishers.

“It’s like having your entire CD collection and that of all your friends with you wherever you are,” said Daniel Ek, founder of Spotify. “That being said, music should be about choice – there will be some who will continue to prefer ownership over access for a time yet.”

The internet continues to revolutionize the music industry and the creation of music networks has helped musicians to promote their bands, sell their music, find band members, buy and sell musical instruments, chat to fellow musicians in the forums, post photos, their music, videos and so much more.

There are many benefits to joining one of the top music networks. It is best to focus on two or three at the most and create, as well as maintain, a standout profile page for your music or band. If you spread yourself too thin and try to join every music site you come across then you will find yourself struggling to maintain an active profile. If you join one of these music networks then you will gain a massive amount international exposure for your music.

Try to devote 30 minutes each month in updating your profile with new photos, gig dates, videos or music samples. On a more regular basis you may want to respond to forum posts, reply to comments posted on your page and also respond to any emails sent to you. You need to treat these music networks as an advertisement and great way to promote your band. Therefore spending some time on the site could bring about some lucrative and life changing publicity for you.

The key point to gaining the most exposure for your music on these sites is to be proactive and make the most of the features available to you. You will want to post recent photos of yourself or your band. You should add some new photos each month. Try and add some bright and colourful photos of each of your band members as well as some group shots. Ask a friend or partner to take some high quality photos of you while performing.

Music videos are all the rage due to YouTube. You can use a camera to take some footage of the band performing one of their most popular songs. Just as a great video can make your band; a bad video can have a negative impact on your music. If a music venue manager is not the network to look for a band for a gig and they listen to a poor quality live performance then they will just move on to the next band. So make sure the video you submit is one that will impress your viewers.

Why spend time in the forums? Because you never know who is online and who is reading the forum posts. Many of the top music forums not only allow bands and musicians to sign up and create a profile but also music promoters, managers, music venue owners, music producers and professionals from the music industry. As a result, you may just catch the eye of one of these promoters who could give you the lead you need. Post positive and informative posts that will require a similar response. Avoid getting into any personal attacks or conflicts with other forum members. Maintaining a high level of professionalism is of the utmost importance in building the reputation you want to succeed.

What about writing an article? It is quite easy to write an article about a topic you are passionate about and have knowledge in. How can this help you? Well in a music network you have members who are musicians and are therefore craving information to help them with their band or music. As a result you can gain some valuable exposure by adding your name and active link at the bottom of the article. You can basically piggy back these top music networks who already achieve high page rankings in the search engines for your own benefit. Search engines love quality content about a specific topic. As a result these search engines will pick up the keywords used in your article and rank it highly as the article is located on a reputable site. Both these combined will give it a good chance of being spread throughout the internet.

One of the best features is the ability to post your upcoming gigs or events. What other way can you get free advertising for your gigs! When posting your gig make sure all information is correct and if any of it changes be sure to return to your profile and update it. There will be fans that listen to your music samples, watch your videos and then decide on attending one of your gigs if they like what they hear. You don’t want to upset them by having them go out of their way to attend your event only to find that the details were changed and there is no gig! Try to include the date, time, cost and location of the event. Some of the top networks will have a feature where your fans can “subscribe” or add their name to an attendance list. This will also allow you to send emails with specific details to these members. This is networking and building a fan base.

Classifieds are also a great way to buy and sell instruments, equipment, search for new band members, post jobs or look for a gig, sell tickets to events and so much more. Make sure you only add the information you want people to see and only use a respectable payment solution provider in the transaction. Most sites leave transactions up to both parties and are not responsible for any disputes or problems with the sale.

Are there dangers associated with music networks? Yes, but only if you post personal information that hackers or people involved in criminal activity can use to spam you or rip you off. The top sites will have internal email systems where your personal email address is protected. They also have a feature that allows you to block any members you wish not to correspond with. Remember that you use these music networks to promote your music and not your personal life and details as a lot of the “Social Networks” do. This is why you should stick to the top music networks that operate with the sole purpose of assisting bands and musicians in promoting their music.

If you maintain an active profile you may just be lucky enough to gain additional exposure from the site. For example, the music networks highlight and profiles a new band each month. This profile puts the band on the front page, generates extra hits for the band’s profile page, spreads their band across the internet due to the quality content in the profile and provides a reputable promotion for the band by a music industry leader. Want to make your own luck? Then be proactive and contact the site team and let them know that you would like to have your band or music be considered to be profiled.

One more great tip is to use “Keywords” in your title for photos, events, profiles etc as these keywords will appear in that page’s URL. This will help for better search engine exposure as they love keywords and targeted content.

The key is where to start when selecting which music networks to join? There are many ways to promote your music and three of the best methods for music and band promotion is by creating a profile on MyBandMate and MySpace Music or posting your music videos on YouTube Music.

So if you want to showcase your music to the world and are not active in these top two music networks then you better get on to it. It takes time, some effort and a desire to make your music reach a global audience. Be proactive, utilize all of the key features to gain maximum exposure and build a fan base by responding to their emails and comments. Don’t include any information in your profile that you don’t want the world to see. Treat your profile page as an advertisement for your music. You may only have one chance to catch the eye of a music promoter, producer or music venue owner looking for a band so make your profile look professional.

I use YouTube all the time I also came across an interesting program that allows you to download YouTube videos straight to your computer.So I have the ability to: watch YouTube videos offline, store my favourite movies on my BlackBerry Bold, I even send funny videos online to friends and family through email. Not to mention I Watch Music videos online through my ipod touch with out hassle or knowing a single thing about file extensions.

The program I use is YouTube2Drive you can Download Videos From YouTube, Google, Metacafe, iFlim, Dailymotion plus other video sites. Easy as 1-2-3!

With this software you get:

Convert any YouTube video to more formats like WMV, MP4, MP3, AVI, Mpeg, Divx and Xvid. Download music videos and watch them on your iPod, iPhone, PSP and Zune. Convert Music Videos to MP3’s, listen to them on your MP3 player. Watch YouTube videos on your PC in Windows Media Player. Embed YouTube videos into your PowerPoint presentations.

Now you can do anything with the best YouTube videos anytime you want – Just think about the benefits. You can listen to MP3 music videos, entertain the kids with DVD movies, watch videos on your summer vacations and road trips…

The best part of this program is once you download it you can be using it within 3 minutes. In addition, This software comes with a money-back guarentee if your not satisfied. Although I am more than satisfied with this program, atleast its a Risk-Free purchase.

Try YouTube2Drive here: http://hotshorturl.com/uo83

Image courtesy: Video Maker & Hardcore Rap.