November Update

Wow, the last few weeks have been extremely hectic. 

The good kind of hectic.

To summarize:

1) We launched the music video for “The Candyman” on October 27. I will post a thorough analysis of what that was like in the next few days.

2) We’ve tried a few different marketing channels to get The Mustache Club known out there. Essentially, we now know what works and what doesn't. That's a major win.

3) We’re in pre-order mode for 7 inches of bliss until November 15. So far, the pre-launch has been very positive and we've moved 20% of our copies. That provides the drive to continue.

4) We’re getting some attention: http://listenwithmonger.blogspot.co.uk/2014/10/pantaloon-descendo-single-review.html

All in all, the last few weeks were very interesting. I'm extremely eager for the ones to come!

Creating a promo campaign for The Candyman video

Due to the recent spike in visits and interest sparked by unexpected attention on /r/vinyl due to this post, I had to improvise a lot. I wasn’t ready to take orders for Pantaloon Descendo's upcoming 7-inch EP, I was even further away from releasing it.

So, I had to rush everything and figure things out on the fly: I need to capitalize on this surge otherwise I'm going to miss out on this opportunity.

As a result:

• The official release date for 7 inches of bliss has been set for November 15, 2014.
• In order to support the release, The Mustache Club will be releasing the music video for The Candyman, a song featured on 7 inches of bliss. This has been set for October 27, 2014. 

Because the video will be released so damn soon (10 days from now) -- and I tend to be kind of clueless when it comes down to marketing my own art -- I had to figure shit out reeeeallllyy quickly… So many questions…

• How would I get organic engagement?
• Would I annoy the crap out of my friends and family asking them to share the video on social media the release day? I always hate it when people I haven’t talked to in years try to do that.
• Would I go for paid advertising? That can be a bit overwhelming when your advertising budget isn't super high...

In the end, this is what I ended up going for:

In order to figure shit out, I went on /r/WeAreTheMusicMakers and asked the following question: Bands/Artists who tried paid advertising through Facebook, what was the experience like?

I’m extremely grateful for everyone who took the time to answer me back, it really allowed me to figure out what I need to do. The feedback went from “Waste of time and money” to “It really works well if you do it properly”

I understand some people's campaigns didn't work properly. But I feel like maybe the value they provided didn't

Based on redditors’ comments, I was able to identify these few key points:

• Do not fish for likes.
• Targeting is key: interests, location. Not doing so will attract click-farms and devalue your Facebook page’s worth. 
• Creating engaging posts 
• Testing over a few days helps understanding/identifying what variables work and which ones don't
• “Boosting” posts (paying to make Facebook push your post to more of your organic “fans”, since it automatically ) is what works the best, as long as it provides good value. Ads and “sponsored posts” do not work as much
• “Boosting” to “friends and family” instead of targeting people by interest/location provides engagement through peer validation

As a result, I will run different campaigns over 5 days that will help me identify what works best (if it ends up working at all) for all future releases.

The last few days have been extremely intense, everything is moving at lightning speed. 

But it’s very exciting!

The small-scale value of a targeted Reddit link

Last week, I had a sudden spike in visits on this blog after a post thanks to Reddit.

If you have no freaking idea what post I’m talking about, itwas a blog post that discussed the economics of DIY vinyl. 

Over the last few months, I've been working on hand-drawing 100 sleeves for an upcoming vinyl release by Pantaloon Descendo. After I was done drawing everything, I thought it might be interesting to share the numbers with people because they’re not numbers we typically tend to be privy to. 

(Pantaloon Descendo’s hand-drawn sleeve for "7 inches of bliss")

The post made it all the way to the top of /r/vinyl. Probably because:
1) it was targeted right: it was a blog post about DIY vinyl that I showcased on /r/vinyl, so I reached the proper audience there
2) it provided valuable insight about DIY vinyl production, and
3) it had a good title that hooked people and made them want to click through

I can tell the blog post fared well because of the upvote/downvote ratio, which was over 80%. If 4 out of 5 people liked it, I consider this a success.

Over the course of 3 days, the Reddit post directed roughly 2,400 visitors to the blog.

Initially, I really wasn’t prepared to convert potential visitors into sales; The Mustache Club’s Web site isn’t even fully set up to accommodate sales. 

In order to actually be able to take sales, to improvise and invite people to e-mail me and then proceed to invoice them via PayPal, instead of having the convenience of a Web store. Old school shit. It worked.

The whole thing has been very educational.

What I've learned

The Reddit post directed 2,400 unique visitors to the blog. Out of those 2,400 unique visitors, 8 contacted me saying they were interested in the product. Out of those 8, I managed to convert 6 into a sale.

So, it took 2,400 unique visitors in a highly-targeted context (blog post about producing DIY vinyl record that reached a vinyl-focused group) to make 6 sales.

And, with 6 sales out of 8 leads I have a 75% conversion rate, for which I can only assume that the price ended up being prohibitive ($10 for a 7-inch record is on the higher end of the scale). If a 75% conversion rate of leads into sales is where I'm at, I'd say I'm faring pretty good. 

Overall, it takes me 400 unique visitors with a highly-targeted message to a specific audience to generate one sale. 

Not bad at all. 

Always be ready for a sale - I wasn't

Yesterday, I blogged about the economics of producing a DIY vinyl sleeve for Pantaloon Descendo’s “7 inches of bliss” and posted it on reddit in the /r/vinyl subreddit.

To my surprise, the post did really good and was upvoted way more than I thought it would. That means the post gained traction and went up in visibility on reddit, driving good amounts of traffic to this blog.

To put you in context: before I published the post on DIY vinly sleeve economics, I had 187 pageviews total for this blog. After I posted it on reddit, this is what happened:

You can see a spike. 

That's definitely a spike.

At the moment of writing this current post (24 hours after the article on DIY economics), it had been viewed 2137 times (so far). To a lot of well-established bloggers, this is nothing. But for me, this means worlds. 

It's been viewed way more than any of my previous posts:

In all honesty, when I posted on reddit, I wasn't trying to make a sale. 

My aim was simply to provide information on the mechanics and costs involved; if other people can learn from my experience, I thought it could help them.

However, I was not ready for people to actually be interested in ordering copies. The release date isn’t set for at least another 2 months. I just thought it would be cool to showcase the product and provide some metrics. 

Man, I wasn't ready for that.

In fact, the web store isn’t even ready yet; the simple option of ordering through a few clicks is not even functional yet. 

That’s dumb, I know. I should’ve been ready. I wasn’t.

But then again, surprise customer interest is a good problem to have.

I had to come up with a solution.

I offered interested people to e-mail me at The Mustache Club's email address, which would then allow me to invoice them via PayPal. Thankfully, my PayPal account was already set up.

Or so I thought.

After I created my first PayPal invoice, it asked me to confirm my e-mail address: can't send the invoice yet.

Crap!

I don't have access to my The Mustache Club e-mail account at work; I will have to wait until tonight to confirm my PayPal account. 

Re-crap!

I hate to make people wait.

Re-re-crap!

That will be a valuable lesson: always, always, always, always, always, always, always, always be ready for a sale.

***

As a way to counterbalance the fact that the ordering process was a little bumpy, I decided to mail advance copies to all redditors who order by Friday. Instead of asking customers to wait until it's actually released in 2 months, I thought it would be a nice gesture to send it now.

The product: 7 inches of bliss

I realize I’ve been talking about building marketing strategies and release plans, but I haven’t exactly explained what the product will be.

That would probably be quite helpful; it would definitely help you understand what I’m attempting as a label.

So…

The release I’m currently gearing up for is “7 Inches of Bliss” by Pantaloon Descendo.

“7 inches of bliss”, because it’s on 7-inch vinyl, but also because it refers to … uhm… the male apparatus. So, there’s a cool double-entendre there which I consider to be rather novel; I've decided to exploit this in the artwork:

It’s a short release: only 3 songs. Funny light-hearted songs. And there will only be 100 copies, all of them hand-drawn, hand-coloured and hand-numbered in order to increase collector appeal. It was a painstakingly long operation involving drawing 100 copies, colouring 100 copies, hand-writing 100 copies. It took me countless hours to get it done. Months. MONTHS!!!

In order to help promote the release, The Mustache Club will be releasing two official music videos.

I already shot and edited both of them, I’m just waiting to build my promotional plan for the release and for the music videos before I roll them out.

Essentially, until it’s released, all promotional initiatives described in this blog refer to “7 inches of bliss”.

Creating a brand identity – Band

Yesterday, I laid out the key points to The Mustache Club’s Brand Identity.

First and foremost, Pantaloon Descendo’s music is the product. Without Pantaloon Descendo, there is no need for The Mustache Club.

Yet, the branding strategy for Pantaloon Descendo isn’t that different from the one I laid out for The Mustache Club. 

It revolves around three key principles:

1) A good name : Pantaloon Descendo

I like the name.

It’s unique (which makes it Google-exclusive, a very important aspect today).

The name is a personal creation, which comes from the French “Pantalon Descendu”. It translates into “dropped down pants”.

It sounds like it could be a magical formula or something.

But it definitely foreshadows something naughty.

Which is great, because I like to brand my style as “Naughty folk!”

2) A strong logo

The logo combines a heart and an inverted cross. It’s a different spin on something universal, the heart symbol. It is easily recognizable. 

It is easy to reproduce by hand, and easy to slap everywhere as a watermark. 

3) Visual image: make up

I chose to hide my face under black and white make up for one reason: plausible deniability. I have a good career and don’t want to fuck it up (yet) by having colleagues dig up some dirt on me.

At the same time, I enjoy the ‘mystique’ of hiding one’s face.

In an age where everyone’s super accessible all the time via social media, posting selfies and all, I like the idea of maintaining some sort of distance between my personal life and my artistic endeavours.

Creating a brand identity – Label

Pantaloon Descendo and The Mustache Club are meant to walk hand-in-hand.

Both are a part of a same component: Pantaloon Descendo creates the music, The Mustache Club releases the music.

While Pantaloon Descendo is the product, The Mustache Club is the engine.

So, I need The Mustache Club to have an identity of its own.

To start with and establish the brand, I identified three key components:

1) A good name : The Mustache Club

The Mustache Club is an evocative name. You think of a mustache club, you think of a bunch of mustachioed gents in suits. I like the image it conveys. 

But I wanted the name to make you chuckle, which I think it does.

Plus, being a “Club” makes it a bit more exclusive, and opens up a lot of options along the way when it comes to marketing initiatives and promotions, especially on social media.

2) A strong logo

What’s the manliest thing you can imagine?

A mustache with big fucking muscles has to be pretty high up there! 

Sure, if it were shooting guns, it would be manlier. Or if it were ripping a snake in half.

But a kickass mustache with giant biceps is pretty fucking manly!

I actually designed this way before the whole hipster craze, way before mustaches were brought back into fashion. I just drew it one day for the fun of it.Turns out I was able to repurpose it when I came up with the concept for The Mustache Club.

I like the logo: it’s easily recognizable. But, coming up with a final version wasn't that easy.

I found a font I liked

But it created dead space I wasn't too fond of. 

The solution was to write out THE MUSTACHE CLUB with an upwards curve that fills in that negative space.

There. That's a logo I can stand behind. It's easily recognizable, it makes you smile when you see it, and it's easy to slap on merchandise if need be.

3) Editorial policy: full disclosure

A part of the brand’s identity is a “full disclosure” approach via social media, and in general.

I don’t have anything to hide: I’m going into this whole ‘music label’ thing pretty clueless.

Looking for information online on how to build a label, I found some information, but not a lot ended up being really helpful.

This blog is a part of the “Full Disclosure” approach/policy. I want to document The Mustache Club’s achievements and failures so you can use it as a blueprint for what to do and what not to do if you’re running a record label.

I want to detail what worked for me, what didn’t work for me, what I learned from it and what I’d do differently next time.

Furthermore, and this is key, consistency and frequency.

I have to stay consistent with the branding; I have stay frequent with the publishing if I want this to have any pull.

***

That being said, if you have any questions, comments or suggestions, do get in touch! Did I miss something in my branding strategy? Let me know what your thoughts are!

Current hiccups: Web site and Marketing Campaign

At this point, Pantaloon Descendo’s debut vinyl “7 inches of bliss” is ready to be released:

1) The EP has been recorded, mixed, mastered and pressed
2) All 100 sleeves have been hand-drawn, hand-coloured and hand-numbered
3) The music videos that will support “7 inches of bliss” have been shot and edited

I’m almost there.

At this point, there are two things I need to do for this ride to truly begin:

1) Establish a web store

There’s no point in releasing a 7 inch EP and advertising it if no one can buy it.

So, I need to build a decent web store.

I can build the backbone of a Web site, but the “store” component is what I’m going to struggle with.

But I need to figure it out if I want to be able to actually sell the albums when they’re released.

2) Build a robust marketing plan

I can record an album. I can shoot a music video.

But getting the word out… Spreading the news that Pantaloon Descendo is releasing an album, and that Pantaloon Descendo is releasing a music video is where I’m going to struggle the most.

I’ll need to create a good marketing plan in order to get the word out there.

Any suggestions? Tips? Things to avoid? 
Let me know, I could use your help!