Nora Jones: New Marketing Strategy or Sign of the Times?

[Chris H]

Went to buy the Saturday Age here in Melbourne and there was the offer of the new Nora Jones CD in a cardboard sleeve for $5 with the paper. What does this say about the state of play?

As an aside, i have just purchased a pair of Duntech PCL 15 monitors for my studio and this CD is making interesting listening..... those speakers seem so analytical compared to my usual B&W 602's

[Mickstape]

thanks for rubbing that in there Chris, i wish i had some duntechs. then i could play screamo metal at max level and analyse how the engineer managed to make such a wash of distortion bearable.

[Chris H]

thanks for rubbing that in there Chris, i wish i had some duntechs. then i could play screamo metal at max level and analyse how the engineer managed to make such a wash of distortion bearable.

hey Michael these arn't the big duntech's....still paying them off. These are the smaller ones i got off eBay...at $750, 2nd or 3rd hand, they are a great option for good quality monitoring on a budget.....and i'v been listening to a lot of the screamo metal CD's in my son's collection and a lot of it is poorly recorded and mastered, the most common problem being the highs are nasty and over the top...... Though most of these sound ok in the older sons car system with the sub thumper cranked up. Some of the bigger name bands from the US don't have the same problem and sound good on the duntechs.

[musikwerks]

Chris, newspapers have been doing that for years. giving albums away free or for a reduced cost.

[Chris H]

Chris, newspapers have been doing that for years. giving albums away free or for a reduced cost.

Really!! I should get out and buy the paper more often! :)

I was really commenting on the fact that Nora's last CD sold well and she's a high profile artist, so to sell her new CD at that price before it has had time to sell in regular retail outlets at the normal full price....is aluding to something...what are your thoughts?

[headman]

Most of the CD's in papers are not a whole album from a former Grammy winner. They are usually pretty ordinary classical recordings or Frank and Bing at Christmas. The concept is interesting at least, but the most expensive part in the manufacture, the case and artwork is not there, probably a sign of things to come.

headman

[Chris H]

Most of the CD's in papers are not a whole album from a former Grammy winner. They are usually pretty ordinary classical recordings or Frank and Bing at Christmas. The concept is interesting at least, but the most expensive part in the manufacture, the case and artwork is not there, probably a sign of things to come.

headman

I would think that the artwork and case and duplication is relatively speaking quite inexpensive.

.....so you're saying a Nora Jones CD with paid session muso's, producer, engineer and studio time is not expensive? What does that say then?

[musikwerks]

I'd say they newspaper has paid a hefty fee for some "exclusivity".

At $5 bucks the label can still cover royalties and pressing.

[jkhuri44]

Chris, newspapers have been doing that for years. giving albums away free or for a reduced cost.

Really!! I should get out and buy the paper more often! :)

I was really commenting on the fact that Nora's last CD sold well and she's a high profile artist, so to sell her new CD at that price before it has had time to sell in regular retail outlets at the normal full price....is aluding to something...what are your thoughts?

err, that the music industry is coping it....is that new news tho?? this is just a sign pointing to what we already know right?

[musikwerks]

Prince gave his last album away through a newspaper. When your average readership is xxx million people then I see it as a smart marketing strategy.

[Chris H]

Prince gave his last album away through a newspaper. When your average readership is xxx million people then I see it as a smart marketing strategy.

Bingo! One of the nails have been hit on the head. I posted this same question on an OS forum and a reply contained some very relevant info on the subject about details of Prince's marketing strategy.
..so i will copy and post it here:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/musi ... ns....html

How a 'free' album makes millions...


Neil McCormick
Published: 12:01AM BST 19 Jul 2007
Prince - gave away his latest album with the Mail on Sunday
Prince: the smartest-working man in Pop?

Prince's idea of giving away his latest release is not as eccentric as it first appears, writes Neil McCormick

Did you know the Prince album given away with last week's Mail on Sunday was his 46th official release? Even given that it includes compilations (five) and live sets (two), that is a lot of albums - almost two a year since 1978. And some of them are doubles.

There surely comes a point when the world doesn't really need another album by any artist, a notion sales figures certainly bear out. Elton John, Paul McCartney and the Rolling Stones are quantifiable superstars enjoying some of the best reviews of their long careers and regularly touring to sold-out stadiums, but their latterday albums only graze the upper reaches of the charts, and singles vanish without trace. The artist may feel compelled to keep creating, but for most fans even the greatest musicians are defined by a few classics and a hits compilation.

Nearly 20 million people worldwide bought Purple Rain in 1984, when Prince's intoxicating, eccentric mix of rock and funk sounded like the future of music. By 2001 the fan base willing to shell out for Rainbow Children was a hardcore 300,000. UK sales of last year's heavily promoted 3121 were just 80,000.

Mind you, at least that's 80,000 who actually wanted to listen to it, not just newspaper subscribers who might stick it on in the background while reading about the Beckham's latest adventures in Hollywood. When the market is saturated with something, people tend to say "you can't give it away". But the Mail on Sunday's distribution of three million copies of Prince's Planet Earth suggests otherwise.

Whatever the Mail's traditionally reactionary readership made of this association with a cross-dressing musical satyr who conflates sex and God into a highly personal mythology of erotic spirituality, the music business was certainly not amused. SonyBMG, the label scheduled to release the record, cancelled its commercial release. Record stores threatened to remove Prince's back catalogue: "The Artist formerly known as Prince should know that with behaviour like this he will soon be the Artist Formerly Available in Record Stores," said Paul Quirk, co-chairman of the Entertainment Retailers Association.

Prince was accused of "devaluing music". Yet he himself simply called it "direct marketing", with a view to promoting his upcoming 21 shows at London's O2 arena. The newspaper paid a rumoured £300,000 for the album, which is more than any advance Prince would receive from a record company given his current sales profile. He has also been giving away CDs to everyone who buys a live ticket. Fifteen shows have sold out. If the remaining six follow suit, the concert series will gross almost £15 million.

And that's before merchandising is factored in. Not a bad haul for someone who is devaluing music.

What Prince is doing is not really so different from U2 linking up with Apple to promote their 2004 hit Vertigo, or Paul McCartney releasing his latest album through Starbucks. The reality for most musicians, veteran or otherwise, is that pop radio won't playlist them, so they have to use a little imagination to get the message out.

Last month, London band the Crimea (recently dropped from WEA despite being hugely creative and critically lauded) opted to make their excellent new album, Secrets of the Witching Hour, available free on the internet (http://snipurl.com/crimea). More than 53,000 fans have downloaded it at the time of writing, with the counter still ticking over. The payback is that their recent tour has been their best attended and most profitable.

And this is what the music business is really worried about: the spectre of free music. CD album sales are declining, down 9 per cent in the UK so far this year and 20 per cent in America, but legal downloads are not taking up the slack. According to a recent US survey, last year fans acquired more than half their music from unpaid sources, whether that be illegal downloads, free downloads from promotional and networking sites, or covermounts stuck to the front of magazines and newspapers.

But everybody knows you can't really get something for nothing. This is an advertising-led model of music distribution, paid for exactly the same way we pay for commercial TV - by exposure to messages from sponsors.

And if Prince can make the Mail on Sunday seem funky, I expect we shall see a lot more of the same. Even after 46 albums of drifting focus and steadily declining sales, it seems the royal badass might still be capable of shaping the future of music after all.

[Chris H]

However.....i don't see any talk of an imminent Oz tour for Nora so along with the other obvious factors of economy of scale, there is a limit to how the Prince scenario above is applicable to the Age $5 Nora Jones CD in revenue terms.

[musikwerks]

It's been a long time between Nora Jones albums.... the public has moved on and the musical landscape has radically shifted, for better or worse. it's not the same game anymore. If the paper was offering a good enough fee for the rights to sell it, like in the Prince example, then it will probably make the label more money than a traditional release.

For what it's worth, I think Prince is a genius. How better to get out of a shitty record label war than to change your name to an un-pronounceable symbol? How the heck are you gonna market that? You can't. So Prince became a "problem" for his label and then got dropped. Which is exactly what he wanted!

I saw him live in Sydney a few years ago, sitting in the 7th row. I'm not a hardcore fan by a longshot but was very curious to see him in action. The man had 10,000 people under a spell the entire time. He can play and sing like a mofo and knows what performance is all about.

[jkhuri44]

so, the financial value of recorded music is zero...and money is in touring...

[musikwerks]

Since Napster.

[Chinagraf]

[quote="jkhuri44"]so, the financial value of recorded music is zero...and money is in touring...[/quote]
Touring and Merch table, hence the advent of the all evil "360 Deal".... f*&^ that they will want part of your spleen soon.

[RustyO]

Did you know the Prince album given away with last week's Mail on Sunday was his 46th official release? Even given that it includes compilations (five) and live sets (two), that is a lot of albums - almost two a year since 1978. And some of them are doubles.

Wow. Learn something new everyday.

Thats a crapload of releases... I can only think of one Prince album (Purple Rain), and a couple of loose tracks... (1999, Raspberry Beret, When Doves Cry, Cream etc)

[headman]

"I would think that the artwork and case and duplication is relatively speaking quite inexpensive.

.....so you're saying a Nora Jones CD with paid session muso's, producer, engineer and studio time is not expensive? What does that say then?"

Sorry Chris, I meant that the plastic case and artwork and sleeve are the most expensive part of the final package, not the recording/mixing/mastering. The CD on the front of the SMH/Age is the least expensive part of "The Product".
I paid the three bucks (plus $2.00 for the paper)and would never have bought a Nora Jones album, so in my case the promotion worked.

headman

[Chris H]

"I would think that the artwork and case and duplication is relatively speaking quite inexpensive.

.....so you're saying a Nora Jones CD with paid session muso's, producer, engineer and studio time is not expensive? What does that say then?"

Sorry Chris, I meant that the plastic case and artwork and sleeve are the most expensive part of the final package, not the recording/mixing/mastering. The CD on the front of the SMH/Age is the least expensive part of "The Product".
I paid the three bucks (plus $2.00 for the paper)and would never have bought a Nora Jones album, so in my case the promotion worked.

headman

No need for sorry's Richard, i'm just throwing it all out there for the sake of discussion and other's opinions as i thought it was a significant issue at a very local level. I guess a lot of people will be listening to this music who would never have otherwise done so. Many CD's will end up as they usually do..as drink coasters, but a significant few will have their ears opened to music and a production style they haven't come across before.
......How about a free John Law CD recorded with his gold Neuman with each six pack of Sorbent Toilet Paper? This week only at Safeway!

[musikwerks]

I don't reckon a NJ album would run more than $100k... maybe $150k tops. If they do a deal like this in every territory possible they'll be rolling in it in no time. Whether or not Ms. Jones actually gets a cut is another story.

Gotta stop thinking about the old way of doing things... ie retail. Sure, sell at gigs etc but forget traditional retail. Floor space allocated to music is shrinking in Target, Big W, K-Mart etc. Find a new way to reach your audience or perish. Music is just another commodity in a long line of products baying for our attention these days. With the market flooded with so much Idol-esque crap, how does an artist get traction?

Think outside the box... do deals with cereal companies and newspapers. Remember when you used to get trading cards in your Weetbix box? Pretty soon it will be the new Fallout Boy album. You watch.