The Latest and Greatest in Artist Web Sites: Virtual Communities

The Latest and Greatest in Artist Web Sites: Virtual Communities

By Edward Morris

These days, the most effective artists' Web sites combine the colorful variety of an oriental bazaar with the giggly intimacy of a pajama party. The aim, according to Web designers, is to create a community, a sort of virtual hometown for fans where they will visit often, linger for awhile, interact with other devotees and - oh, yes - buy things.

It wasn't long ago that sites were basically static bulletin boards posted with the artist's bios, photos, tour dates and little else. Nowadays, one can still find all this essential press kit stuff, but the sites also bristle with videos, music samples, message boards, street-team recruitments, ringtone and icon downloads, games, contests, newsletters, artists' journals, Q&A columns, merchandise stores, customized "radio stations," pitches for favorite charities and myriad related attractions.

Most of these features are accessible to the casual browser without strings. Some require the user to register and a few, notably the fan club option, call for registration plus a membership fee.

"A Web site is all about being interactive," observed Dawn Gates, Director of New Media Marketing for Capitol Records Nashville. "If you have a Web site that's stagnant, fans aren't going to keep coming back to it. Constant updates lead to frequent visits, which build a community."

Most site designers agree that the current push is to involve their artist-clients in the global reach of MySpace.com, the riotously popular site that bills itself modestly as "a place for friends." Ideally, if some of these "friends" are channeled right, they will whip up excitement for the participating artist and lure battalions of newfound buddies back to the artist's own community.

"We encourage artists to have pages on MySpace," Gates said. "We try to cross-promote from the MySpace page, pointing back to the official Web site for the artist. And from the official site, we say, 'Join our MySpace community.' You're able to spread your music in a grassroots manner to fans."

At Dierks Bentley's page on MySpace, one recently could have seen this notice: "Win a rare DB custom iPod Nano loaded with every DB album and music video."

A click on the contest button transported the user to Bentley's official site and the homefolks who were mingling there.

Tony Harris, founder and President of Deliberate Marketing Services in Los Angeles, sees unlimited possibilities via these MySpace tie-ins, and his Web site promises the following: "We will maximize your presence on the phenomenally influential and massive online community, MySpace. This encompasses designing and building out your profile and using creative methods to increase visibility and drive targeted consumers to this page."

Lynette Garbonola, Marketing Director for Warner Bros. Records Nashville, oversees sites for Big & Rich, Shannon Brown, Cowboy Troy, Faith Hill, Lori McKenna, Blake Shelton, The Wreckers and The Blue Collar Comedy Tour, among other Country artists and comedians. She agreed that cross-promotion with MySpace was an important element for every artist. Well-run sites, she said, lead to active street teams, larger fan clubs, increased merchandise sales and measurable career benefits. Sites can also gather useful demographic and geographic information, she noted.

"The Web is becoming a distribution mechanism for music," said Mark Montgomery, Managing Partner of Nashville-based echomusic. "Artists need to look at this as the mechanism that's going to support their careers."

echomusic creates and manages sites for record labels Big Machine and Dualtone and Country Music artists Bentley, Eric Church, Guy Clark, Rodney Crowell, Josh Gracin, Alison Krauss, Patty Loveless, Brad Paisley, Rascal Flatts, LeAnn Rimes, Sugarland, Wynonna and more. Montgomery asserted that the factor most basic to Web success is "building a one-to-one relationship directly with fans. To facilitate that, we've built a patent-pending technology that allows us to build community over time. And as we build these communities, fans give us information."

Montgomery has helped recruit and direct numerous street teams on his artists' behalf, and he appreciates their usefulness. "If you have a Web site with reasonably sophisticated technology, you can attract them and retain them online just by asking, 'Hey, you wanna help us?'" That help, he added, can take the form of voting in online polls, calling in requests to radio stations, putting up posters or checking record stores to see if an artist's albums are in stock.

Sites can be tailored, Montgomery said, to show content on cell phones that is different from the content viewed on a regular Web browser, another new wrinkle for Web communities. "All you have to know is that it's there, and you have to bookmark it on your cell phone, just like you would any other Web site."

This easy access came in handy when Montgomery was in New York for the CMA Awards in 2005. "We couldn't remember where the Nokia Theatre was that Dierks was playing at," he recalled. "So we jumped on the cell phone and went to his Web site to get the address while we were standing in Times Square. That's how the Internet is changing fans' relationship to the artists."

Sites are becoming an important source of revenue in Montgomery's estimate. He noted that this year, Bentley sold out the Gold Circle VIP tickets to his first show, which were available only to fan club members, within an hour. Last year, the Christian music group Third Day sold 15,000 albums on its Web site within a week.

"Almost every site we manage on behalf of artists is cash-flow positive," Montgomery contended.

Those aren't bad communities to live in.

November 21, 2006