Yahoo Music! GM, Michael Spiegelman hosted today’s panel on Social Media and Revenue at the Winter Music Conference 2009. Guest panelists included Andrew Fox from ClubPlanet.com, Ron Sperling from ConcertSceneTV.com, Micahel Lucero from Microsoft’s Zune digital music platform, Jim Mahoney from A2IM and Ron Suarez from LoudFeed.com.
Most of the discussion centered around using social tools to build an audience and then take your perceived reach to brands to capture discretionary spending dollars that brand manager have to play with. Andrew Fox implied that in today’s music market, brands are were the dollars are coming from, taking up where major labels have cut back.
The colorful Ron Sperling from ConcertSceneTV.com gave his perspective as a media producer and former ad agency executive who has created experiences. He impressed upon the room the importance of the live element of music and how larger dollars are won because of the importance of the fans personal connection to the music and how that effects what they’ll spend.
Yahoo Music! GM, Michael, Spiegelman did an excellent job in his first year moderating the panel, pulling an impressive list of guests to the table. In year’s past, WMC has had a difficult time pulling executives from this level of the Internet industry, but this year was an exception.
Micahel Lucero from Zune briefed the audience on brand deals with artist through Microsoft products like the X-Box and let artists know that Zune does have programs for new artists to get exposure through the service.
Rod Suarez was making his first ever WMC appearance both on a panel and as a delegate to the conference. His company, LoudFeed, is providing artists with viral marketing tools.