[Manic Monday] Your Fans Are Your Monetization Strategy

I come from a corporate background, but somehow I really hate the word ‘monetization’. The word is somehow soulless in its way that categorizes everything into stuff that can make money for you, and those that cannot. As if, the merit of a certain idea, creation, program, strategy, or product, solely depends on how it can make money for you. And the people who are the object of monetization – the consumers – are somehow treated just as a factor, that they would mindlessly spend money for no reason. But of course, this is all in my head. The ‘monetization’ term is not a greedy capitalist term, but it’s a business term that we should get used to.

If you are a content creator, you should have some idea on your monetization strategy. In simpler words, you have to know how to make money from the content you create. It could be indirect or direct; it could be wholly dependent on a perception of value you convey to your target customers, or it could be dependent on bundling deals with other partners (i.e. get free content with every purchase of fried chicken). But if I ever hear a self-described “indie band” saying that they don’t want to advertise their music, or release CDs, sell merchandise or even charge for showcases/concerts because they aren’t “commercial”, don’t go complaining when you don’t have money to make ends meet. Remember, being true to your music doesn’t really mean you can’t make money from it – it just means that you might not make as much money as more popular pop acts.

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[Manic Monday] Perception Of Value For Digital Music

We live in times when actual value and perceived value are rarely the same thing. Even that piece of paper you use as money, has more relation to perceived value as to actual value, as the number written on the money is almost definitely more than the actual value of the paper it was made with. Money is represented by specially-printed pieces of paper as a form of guarantee from the government, that it represents the number printed on it; harking back from old times (as recently as the 20th century) where every piece of money was guaranteed its value in gold, kept safe in government safes.

Brands are also a skilfully-played game of perceived value – a good brand would be able to communicate values beyond ‘just’ the production price and effort to make their products, and thus are capable to charge prices, and even encourage customer loyalty. Some other brands play the “cheap” card, as they are usually in commoditized industries and can only compete by price or by feature, or a combination of price and feature.

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[Manic Monday] Why The Universal Music Purchase Of EMI May Turn Out To Be A Good Thing

The music industry was abuzz late last week regarding the approval from the European Commission and the US’s Federal Trade Commssion, regarding the planned purchase of EMI’s recording arm by the already-dominant Universal Music Group International. Many groups, including indie bands and indie labels, have stated opposition to the deal from the start, saying that Universal will have too much power in the market, and of course articles here and there have claimed that this is the day that the music died.

Now of course, the music won’t die, but it may well as be that the music industry will suffer somewhat when one major label is more dominant over the other players, virtually all over the world. Naturally, a dominant company in any industry will try to retain its dominance and also attempt to negotiate favorable business terms with any music service (now, the digital music services) for them and probably not think of the general well-being of the industry in general.

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