Hello, everyone! Welcome to the beginning of another new work week. We are thrilled to learn that you managed to find a few minutes of free time to spend exploring the modern music industry. We have been looking forward to sharing this feature for a while and are thrilled to see it finally materialize.
This blog exists to promote the future of the entertainment industry, and to do that we need input from people like you and your entertainment-loving friends. If you have any questions about the content in this article, or if you have an artist you would like to see featured on this blog, please contact james@haulix.com. We can also be found on Twitter and Facebook.
For the better part of the last few years, it has been almost impossible to look up tour dates for your favorite band without interacting with the BandsInTown platform. This one company, which has been growing since inception in 2007, is the number one concert discovery app for Facebook, iTunes, and Google. At least 50% of all Billboard artists have already embraced it, and an even greater number of indie acts rely on the its customizable embeds to make their Facebook pages a bit more eye catching.
We wanted to learn more about the company and how it came to be the powerhouse it is today, so recently we interviewed Social Media Community Manager Sam Christie about his experience and where the company is headed in the future. It took a while to hear back, but that was only due to the fact the Bandsintown team never slows down. They have developments rolling out regularly, and they seem to be doing everything in their power to increase their productivity as often as possible. Work ethic like that is hard to come by in any industry, especially the music business, and it’s something we hope to gain insight into through our conversation with Sam. You can learn about his journey, as well as the ways Bandsintown keeps indie artists in mind, below.
If you would like to learn more about Sam and the efforts of the entire Bandsintown team, please follow the company on Twitter. You should also download the app, which is available now in whatever digital store your smartphone/tablet relies on. Additional questions and comments may be left at the end of this post.
H: Hello there! Please help us begin by introducing yourself to our readers?
S: Hi Haulix Readers! My name is Sam Christie and I’m the Social Media Community Manager for Bandsintown.
H: It’s great to have you with us, Sam. From what I can tell life at Bandsintown is incredibly busy these days. Thank you for finding time to fit us in.
S: Indeed! Thank you for your interest.
H: Our blog’s goal is two-fold: To promote future thinking company and individuals while also informing aspiring industry professionals about the realities of working in the music industry. I know Bandsintown is more in the tech sector than music directly, but the same concept still applies. With that in mind, I’d like to begin by learning a bit about your role. Have long have you been with Bandsintown?
S: My three year Bandsintown-aversary (not an official term) is October 24 this year. I started out doing a lot of support for our Concerts app users (fan side of our app) as well as the Manager app (which was then called our Artist Platform). I also did some company wide analytics for a while, and I transitioned into some marketing duties as well a bit later.
H: Were you always interested in the music business, or are you more of tech person? What drew you to this company in the first place?
S: I grew up playing in bands, and most of my adolescence centered around either playing shows or going to shows. I always had this mentality that I would jump at the chance at a record deal, or music for a living, “if it came to that”. Our band had a good run but we learned as we all grew up that it wouldn’t have “come to that” unless we had worked specifically towards that goal. I’ve always been interested in tech and I’m obviously passionate about music, so when the opportunity to work on this side of both industries came up, I figured this was the best way to turn my passion for music into a career. To me it’s a way to be as involved as possible with the music world without actually playing music every night for a living.
H: What other tasks does your job entail?
S: I handle support through all channels, for artists and fans, including Facebook, Twitter, socials etc, and serve as a bridge between our users and our product and development teams. It’s up to me to figure out what a lot of the big issues are and prioritize them with our product & dev teams as far as new features, fixes, and general health of the app. I also handle a lot of Tour Diaries, photo posting, and social strategy. More generally, I’m usually the guy to come up with some off the wall new ideas for social media stuff and then once the rest of our team checks it out they reel it in a bit so that it’s scalable for us since we are a fairly lean team.
H: Do you have any advice for people who may be reading this and considering pursuing a career in social media marketing?
S: Definitely. A few things come to mind. First off, when you are in college or headed down a certain career path, you may see the same types of companies popping up at job fairs and things like that. These will typically be your giant corporations and massive brands, which is awesome, but you have to remember there are social media and/or marketing jobs out there in every industry at every company. Don’t be afraid to look for those long tail companies that may not be your first thought—find a culture that suits you in an industry you can grow with and go from there, even if you’re just trying things out as an intern. Just as an example, let’s say a lot of music-loving journalists out of college may think “my first job has to be at a newspaper” when there are tons of music blogs, PR companies for labels, tours, artists etc that you can get involved with.
Second, don’t wait until you are jobless/out of school to start doing what you want. If you want to be a social media marketer, go find some small Facebook pages, blogs, or anything like that and try to work with them on their strategies. It’s never been so easy to create cool stuff on the internet, whether you are blogging, doing a YouTube series, or anything in between. Start small, find your niche, and grow from there and you can easily put a blogging experience or YouTube series on your resume, especially if you are keeping tabs on all your important metrics and KPI’s (key performance indicators).
Third, be yourself!
H: Thank you for filling us in a bit about you. Moving on to Bandsintown, I noticed there is not a ‘history’ page on the site. Can you give us a little background on the origin of the company?
S: Bandsintown started in a Boston apartment between two best friends, the app’s co-founders. They participated in a startup accelerator and were able to get some first-hires from that, then a few years later the app was acquired by the app company Cellfish Media. I joined the team shortly after we were acquired. We have had amazing growth since the acquisition and recently Cellfish, our parent company, rebranded as Bandsintown Group, which is pretty huge and exciting for the app, and for the company as a whole. Bandsintown Group’s co-founders, Fabrice Sergent and Julien Mitelberg, are our CEO and COO respectively. They’re also childhood best friends, and co-founders of Cellfish Media.
H: How would you explain the Bandsintown app to a music fan who has never encountered the app in the past? What about a musician?
S: For fans, we take all your music preferences and tell you when your favorite artists are playing in your area. For artists, we help you display and promote your tour dates around the web and connect with your fans.
H: Something I have always admired about Bandsintown is that all the messaging I’ve received has blended top 40 headliners with regional talent. I know not only the acts playing the local arena, but also the groups playing the bar down the street. Is unsigned/indie music something Bandsintown developers are very passionate about?
S: Absolutely. We’ve always focused on the longer tail artists existing alongside top 40, because that’s how it should be—we want to see every artist have a chance to be heard and seen live. So we’ve built our tools in a way that can benefit any artist in a meaningful way depending on their own promo and touring strategies. Anyone can go to a massive ticket site and find out about top 40 artists, but we wanted to make sure you’re also in the loop about the next big thing, that artist that is underground today but may break out tomorrow.
H: As popularity for the app continues to grow, it’s not hard to imagine why some indie artists fear there may one day be a drop promotion given to smaller acts in favor of highlighting major label talent. Have your developers taken any steps to ensure local/regional talent gets exposure through the app?
S: The best way to make sure that indie artists get exposure is to not play favorites—we take what you give us and give you suggestions based on that. We don’t weigh any one artist for you based on their size, just on how relevant they are to your music tastes. We also work directly with both higher tier and smaller artists to make sure they are using the Manager apps in a way that can help their unique situations.
H: I’ve recently become a big fan of your company blog. Is that something you are responsible for? There is a lot of great content there for music fans to enjoy, but I’ve noticed it’s not something that is highlighted too heavily on the front page.
S: The blog started as sort of a pet project way back when and has become its own thing over time. We regularly post Tour Diaries, some photo sets, and any content our users and fans may find useful or interesting, and even some artists are seeing it as an outlet to share their tour experiences. We know our artists have interesting stories to tell and we want to continue to grow the blog to facilitate those stories and those interactions between artists and their fans.
H: Bandsintown was one of the first apps featured during the marketing for Android smart watches earlier this year. Can we assume there will soon be a new app ready for the watches Apple recently unveiled?
S: We don’t have anything to announce at this time and we can’t comment on rumor or speculation J. But I can tell you we’re always looking for opportunities to get fans to the shows they love, so if we feel there is something unique we can do that will bring value to the fans/our users, we will definitely consider it.
H: How are developers currently working to improve Bandsintown? What kind of updates can we expect in the coming months, or even in 2015?
S: We are working on updates to the mobile Manager apps that will allow artists to change their Bandsintown profile image manually—an oft-requested feature, so we are excited about that. We have some bigger things in the works so keep an eye out. We’re always listening to our users of both the fan-centric Concerts app and the artist-centric Manager app, so if you want to see a certain feature or need help with something, please get in touch!
H: Bandsintown released a very famous study of concert goers a couple years back. Is the company actively working on any new reports regarding music and/or concert attendance?
S: We have nothing to announce at this time, but we’re always analyzing how our users interact with our products and inspecting the concert landscape as a whole to identify trends and draw meaningful conclusions.
H: That’s all I have for now. Thank you for taking a few minutes to speak with us. Before I let you go, are there any final thoughts, observations, or promotions that you would like to share? The floor is yours:
S: Thanks for providing a platform for us to share our story! Fans can get Bandsintown Concerts on the App Store and Google Play, and artists can get Bandsintown Manager there as well. Give us a like on Facebook and Follow on Twitter, and let us know what you think of the app! If you’re lucky I might be the one to reply, and if you’re really lucky I might even throw a meme or goofy picture into the response. We’ll also be at CMJ in New York from October 21-25, hosting some Speakeasy’s and Artist Meetups, so keep an eye on our socials for more info.
