Devo Foregoes Record Label Marketing for Ad Agency on New Album

This Billboard article about Devo using an ad agency for marketing their new album further exemplifies how a traditional record label’s usefulness has been reduced to only physical distribution (and artist development, when they care to do that).

It is relatively cheap and easy to get music distributed online and be on the same exact playing field as the top selling artists – there’s no barrier to entry. Once the music is online though, it needs to be marketed. Ad agencies are better than labels at researching the target market, getting creative with the marketing, and testing the outcome. They have the experience of launching big brands’ campaigns and answering to all clients with their value added. Labels, on the other hand, treat is as a gamble:

An ad agency’s agenda is getting things in front of people that they might miss. They have to sell one car out of 50 that are coming out that season, and there’s no room for failure,” Mothersbaugh says. “Record companies have this whole other trajectory. They shoot all this stuff against the wall to see what sticks, and if they get one success out of a hundred bands, they high-five each other.”

I believe that the future of the music industry lies in a hybrid record label/ad agency. A single destination that could manage all sides of the music distribution and marketing equation. Stay tuned for more news on this topic!

Most Commented Posts

• A Great Solution to the Age-old Webcasting Problem
• Working with a Web Marketing or Development Freelancer: Part 1, Setting Goals and Understanding the Landscape
• My First Flash Project – a Virtual Drum Machine and Sreaming Music Player
• B-mac is Back!

There are no comments yet, add one below.

Leave a Comment

Name (required)

Email (will not be published) (required)

Website

CAPTCHA Code

Click here to cancel reply.