Social Media And The Four Major Record Labels

EMI, Warner, Universal and Sony have always seemed to lead the way in terms of how music is marketed and which platforms work best for getting the artists music to the audiences, but it was only in the last few years that social media and the online digital revolution has led way for artists to take a lead in the game. But how are the major record labels coping in the world of social media? Are they fully utilizing its capabilities, or like many musicians are they still not fully convinced that social media is an optimum platform for music?
Well, the signs show that the probably are convinced of its power (all four majors are active users of Twitter and also run frequently updated blogs) but as the following statistics collected by The Musicians Guide shows, only one record label is actually using Twitter well EMI.

Twitter Followers
@Universal_Music are clearly in the lead with 43,000 followers, while EMI are a long way behind with just 4000 followers. However, this means nothing as quantity of Twitter followers does not reflect interaction or quality of those followers for all we know all 43,000 of Universals followers could be bots or inactive Twitter accounts!

Number of retweets
Retweets are one of the best metrics on Twitter to work out how much your followers agree with or enjoy your tweets. Interestingly we found that EMI are by far in the lead with an average of 24 retweets per tweet! See what I mean about quality of followers now? 🙂

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Nike’s Marketing Strategy

Nikes marketing strategy rested entirely upon a brand image which is favourable and has evolved into a great multinational enterprise over time. The favourable brand image has been kept afloat due to the strong association with the Nikes logo which is quite distinctive and the slogan Just Do It which has been used in advertisement for quite some time. The company has been known to invest heavily in advertisements and brand promotion (Fill C, 2005 p.54).

Market Segmentation
Most of the consumers of Nikes products are mainly sportsmen. This is so because of the utility that comes with the products. An athlete is more likely to go a sports shoe designed and marketed by Nike more than a person who detests sporting and exercises. Nike targets these consumers by agreements between Nike and athletic teams, colleges athletic teams1 etc for product sponsorship and eventual promotion to the members of these teams. In this way, Nike is able to reach a wide number of consumers and consumers who are more likely to buy. Even though others are likely to buy the products, Nike pays specific emphatic targeting to the athlete more than any group of individuals even though it also targets the youth who have embraced the hip hop culture (Mercer David, 1996, pp 171).

Targeting strategies
Nike lays a number of strategies to target their immediate consumers; athletes and other sportsmen. The targeting strategies include among others the sponsorship of products by professional athletic teams, celebrity athletes and college athletic teams. This strategy is specifically successful because of its ability to reach a large number of athletes. If the athletic team manager prescribes a specific type of track shoes made by Nike, the trainees have no option other than to buy them. The teams can as well buy the track shoes in bulky and supply them to the team members.
The second strategy that Nike applies is the designing of product destination. It does this by associating success with the product. For example, when a celebrity athlete sponsors a specific brand of athletic shoes, the brand will be associated with success. This psychological effect is reinforced with advertisements that affirm this position.
Finally, Nike targets the consumers who are likely to develop product intimacy; those who care more about the utility and quality of the product than the price. In this way, the pricing is not affected too much in a bid to accommodate a large number of consumers. However, price has also been factored in Nikes marketing strategies as shall be seen later in this paper (Frank, 2004, p.173)

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Social Media Pros And Cons

The benefits of social media do outweigh the associated risks if used properly and responsibly. Something such as a Facebook or Twitter post is no longer just gossiping with a friend. Many people use these sites for professional reasons. Politicians, advertising companies, and manufacturers use social media sites to network and expand their fan and customer bases.

Recent events in the news have shown what the risks and consequences are of using social media web sites irresponsibly but the benefits still outweigh the risks. These benefits include news updated almost immediately, timely public notices, and awareness of important causes. Staying updated on family and friends that live many miles away is another benefit. If precautions such as anti virus protection and common sense are used, the risks of using social media web sites are drastically reduced.

Social media has made a strong positive impact on our culture. It has led to many advancements in our society. One way is to improve the way people may communicate. It is now easy to keep in touch with relatives and friends who live far distances away from us. Before social networking sites became popular, it was often necessary to write a letter and put it in the mailbox or make an expensive long distance phone call if you wanted to talk to a relative that lived far away. Now we are able to go onto a site such as Facebook and post a message to them in seconds.

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Social Media Sites Pose Information Security Risk for Organizations

Organizations tend to attract best talent in the industry. Employees now expect flexible working hours, remote access, facility to work-from home, and access to social media sites. As such, businesses now face the challenge of providing anytime anywhere access to information. Therefore, organizations are now embracing new technologies such as cloud computing and enterprise 2.0 among others. However, information sharing must be secure to avoid disclosure of sensitive business information, unauthorized dissemination of customer information and leakage of business policies and practices. While access to social media sites facilitates networking, collaborations and establishing new contacts, they also pose information security risk for organizations.

The latest global information security survey by Ernst & Young has revealed greater use of third-party services and new technologies among organizations. While surveyed organizations are aware of the security risks involved, majority of them are not cognizant of their implications on information and have no plans to increase their expenditure on information security. Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region has witnessed increased customer interaction by government enterprises through Internet making them vulnerable to new security threats.

The increased use of mobile devices for official purposes has also raised concerns of data security. The proactive nature of businesses and transnational operations has created demand for remote access to privileged business information.

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Your Path To Financial Freedom

Social Media Marketing: Building A Bridge To The Future With Solid Advice/p>

You must take advantage of new and newest ways to use social media marketing techniques before they become ineffective.

Put a Facebook “like” button on the homepage of your website. This makes it easy for readers to “like” your content on the social website. Having this directly on your blog lets your page without having to navigate away from your site. This will give you greater exposure to your site.

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