The reason that mainstream music is losing money is that the labels became complacent, un-reactive and uncompetitive and this never works in the consumer’s best interest. Illegal downloads are not killing the music industry, they are shaking it up, and this is only a good thing.

The music industry has maintained a fairly static business model for the last 50 years, and it is only within the last 10 that it has been required to change. Record labels, if they want to keep up with the file sharers and pirates, need to come up with a strategy.

This does not mean cutting off the internet connections of file sharers (Digital Economy Bill) or taking file sharing websites to court (Pirate Bay.) It means upping your game and an A-Grade example of this happening in action is Stones Throw records.

Stones Throw is an indie hip hop record label that is, in my opinion, one of the most brilliant and forward thinking in the world.

Stones Throw have an incredibly active message board community of around 4,000 fans, with an average post count of 60 posts per user.

They have a facebook page with 21,000 fans, and each receives around 100 likes and 15 comments (around 1/5^th the activity that adidas originals receives from 2.5m fans.)

Their twitter account has 23,00 followers and a Tweetlevel rating of 63 (compared to Universal_Music with a measly 52)

Search for any Stones Throw album torrent or rapidshare file and you will struggle greatly to find high quality versions. This is because they scour message boards, blogs and music communities and get the links removed.

How is this different to what the major labels are trying to do? Well the main difference is that they give something back. Stones Throw have created an incredibly strong presence across Social media and they use this to distribute content to their fans.

You can’t download an album for free but they will often give out free tracks as teasers of upcoming albums, or post the album on youtube so you can stream it there or from their website often before it is released. They also produce a regular podcast and offer exclusive mixtapes to their audience.

The audience reaction? They love the label. Stones Throw explain their actions, and the audience are happy because they have a level of transparency that all the big record labels lack. They are engaged with the brand and happy to pay for the music they love.

This is how I see the future of the music industry, and I think that major labels can learn a lot from Stones Throw’s strategy. Of course it is going to be tricky to scale this method, but if successful, the ones who benefit are the consumers and that in the end will help you sell more music (3 of the last 5 CDs I bought were on Stones Throw.)

Qube recently ran a benchmarking survey into Social Media use, attitudes and budget in the travel industry.

With nearly 100 key players in the industry taking part from travel organisations large and small, Qube has gathered key insights into how this sector views and engages with the challenges and benefits of Social Media.

Social Media Benchmarking

81% of marketeers and directors in the travel industry say they use Social Media due to pressure from customers. And despite the fact almost two thirds of respondents felt Social Media was important for the future of their business, nearly 50% still use non-expert staff to deliver Social Media marketing.

Platforms

Bebo and MySpace, perhaps unsurprisingly, were the least popular social networks for marketing activity within the travel industry, while Twitter is by far the most popular tool in use for this sector.

Setting Key Performance Indicators (KPI)

Whilst there are many ways to measure Social Media activity and quantify ROI, difficulty in measuring direct impact of sales was far and away the greatest reason cited for not engaging with Social Media marketing.

Interesting, a large proportion of respondents don’t actually set any Key Performance Indicators for any of their current digital marketing activity.

Round table event

Qube will be releasing and discussing the full benchmarking report at the Social Media for the travel industry round table we’re holding on the 17^th February.

This is a chance for people in the travel industry to discuss the findings of the report and talk to each other about the particular challenges travel companies face in this ever-evolving digital era.

If you work in the industry and would like to attend, you can find more details here.

Back in the days of paper and ink, publishers would make books, documents, reports, newspapers etc and the people who wanted to consume them would purchase them for a price that covered the retailers’ and publisher’s overheads.

These days however, readers are used to consuming information, news and opinion online for free. The main problem with this is that the publishers don’t make much  money from giving things away for free.

It is very hard to suddenly start charging for something that people have become used to receiving for free, it will only serve to create a black market (piracy) or push your customers to alternative, innovative (and free) sources (you can ask the music industry about this one). There are however ways that you can charge people for content online, here are three interesting methods publishers are using to charge for their content online:

E-Consultancy – You can get a great selection of content about the digital world from the E-Consultancy website, and a lot of it is available for free. They offer samples of reports so you know exactly what you are getting, and you can purchase individual reports for £150. You can also subscribe for £195 and get access to all reports. This approach shows people the value of what they can get from membership before placing the barrier there.

Financial Times – The FT offer a staggered subscription package. You can access 2 articles a month as a guest and 10 if you sign up. Standard subscriptions get you access to all the articles and archives, while premium will get you everything plus a digital copy to put on your mobile reader. This approach offers a level for everyone. You won’t be stopped from looking at the odd article, but to read it daily you must pay for the privilege.

Economist – The Economist allow you to view most of the articles from their latest edition for free. If you want access to the whole site however, including archives, audio stories and the search feature you must pay for the subscription. You can read it weekly for free, but if you want to do any research, you need to pay up.

These examples raise two interesting points. The first is that you can no longer charge for everything. If you want to get people to become card-carrying, fee-paying members of your community, you have to offer them something genuinely of value – for nothing.

The second is that there is no perfect model yet. The days of simply paying for a newspaper or magazine and getting a hard copy are gone. There are hundreds of different monetisation models, and the publishing industry needs to work out which ones work best for different types of media and audiences. It is however very refreshing to know that publishers are not simply sticking their heads into the sand in the way some other industries have approached digital media.

PSFK have released a new report on Good Brands, if you want download the full report click here.    This report has been compiled by shortlisting all brands that have been mentioned the most across their trend reports and then they have asked a panel of industry experts from the Purple List to vote on which they thought were ‘good’.  Good being based on an average score for innovation, responsibility and community.

No suprises that brands like google and twitter appear up here but brands like The Good Magazine, Ikea and Amazon are not so likely winners.  (check out the Good Magazine as a particularly interesting brand)

PSFK also have pulled out what they think the most common traits are of the winning brands and it makes interesting reading for those social media believers among you as many of these traits come part and parcel with adopting a more social approach to branding and business.

Utility – Aim to enhance your usefulness for the consumer. In doing so, look not only at your product or service, but the eco-system that surrounds it.

Experimentation – Constant innovation is the essential element of growth. Continual- ly push the boundaries of your offering and create ancillary products.

Design – Premium aesthetics coupled with consistent delivery wins every time. A premium experience can be applied to any product or service, no matter where it sits on the price spectrum. Make your audience feel valued, encouraging them to include you as part of their identity.

Community and listening – Create a sense of community for your customers. Actively engage them and listen to what they have to say. They are the best source of guidance for improved service.

Change the model – Look at your consumers’ eco-system of needs and change your business model to suit them.

Beyond the 30 second ad – Of the top 100 largest advertising spenders in 2008, none of them made it onto this list. Instead of spending money on advertising, leverage the existing community that’s involved with your brand to promote your products and services.

Environmental priorities - Brands in the lower half of the list lose points prizing innovation over environmental responsibility. Build in sustainable practices wherever you can in your brand’s eco-system.

I think its a worthwhile exercise to judge your own brand – or your clients brands – against these traits and determine where you are, and where you want to be on the ‘Good Brand’ or sociable brand scale.  Then think about how social media can help you get there