STUFF BY ME WEEK-ENDING 28 NOV 2009

So this week saw the release of the new Mariah Carey album, notable less for its music and more for its packaging.

The first 1.5 million copies sold in the US and Europe come with a special edition of Elle magazine advising fans on how to live the Mariah lifestyle, and filled with ads for the sorts of luxury products such an endeavour would require (we reported on it in CMU back in August). The advertisers have paid handsomely to appear, and that money has pretty much covered the costs of recording, distributing and marketing the album, or so Mariah's record company Universal Music say.

It's perhaps the most obvious manifestation to date of the record industry's new interest in the worlds of advertising and sponsorship, and for 'interest' read 'hope advertisers will help prop up dwindling record sale revenues'. Record companies have been talking for years about the potential to boost declining profits by striking up partnerships directly with brands, though its only recently that the major labels have seriously invested time and effort into this area; over and above stepping up their 'sync rights' efforts, where advertisers pay labels for the right to soundtrack their ads with recordings owned by the record label.

Some of those 'ad revenue ambitions' lie in the record companies becoming media as well as music owners, ie labels will launch their own music websites, populated by the music videos they already own and maybe some new interview, behind-the-scenes or comedy content. Basically their own versions of YouTube. In fact Warner Music are doing this within the YouTube platform, while the new video site being developed by Universal Music and Sony Music - VEVO - will also utilise YouTube technology.

A lot of this effort has been motivated by a belief among record industry chiefs that YouTube are underselling the ad spots that appear alongside music videos. They reckon that record companies will be able to charge higher rates for their 'official content only' channels. In reality the majors will farm the actual media sales out to agencies. Whether those agencies will find advertisers - many of whom are still trying to cut their ad budgets - willing to cough up extra cash to appear on these premium music video platforms remains to be seen.

The other way record companies hope to make money out of brands is through artist partnerships, whether that be creating artist-specific media, like with the Mariah-mag, or just taking a brand's cash in return for an association with a pop star. The problem with this, however, is that when a brand is 'buying' a link to an actual artist, rather than that artist's recorded material, the label isn't necessarily in the best position to do the deal. Labels generally having rights over its artists' recorded music, but little rights over said artists' other affairs, including live music, merchandise, fan clubs and product endorsement.

And while some labels are trying to negotiate such expanded rights into new artist contracts, some artist managers (who generally negotiate said contracts) will wonder why - if a venture like the Mariah-mag is covering the costs of a new album, costs traditionally covered by the record company - they need to do a label deal at all.

Managers like ie:music's Tim Clark and David Enthoven, who negotiated multi-million dollar sponsorship deals for Robbie Williams themselves, would be right to wonder just that. If brands are willing to cover the costs of Robbie's new album as well as his other activity, why not cut out the label completely and do the sponsorship deals directly? That way you won't have to share recording rights ownership with the label, who you can then hire to do the more tedious distribution and marketing aspects of an album release on a profit share basis.

Of course not all managers have the skills or contacts, or the artists, to do major sponsorship deals, and they might be more willing to work with record companies in this regard. Big record companies, after all, have major artist relationships and back catalogue content that can be leveraged to open doors with key ad and sponsorship agencies and execs.

That said, that doesn't necessarily mean major record companies are or will be the primary players when it comes to monetising artist-fan relationships through brand partnerships. Actually, more expertise in this regard probably sits within the live music sector, who have tapped into sponsorship as an income stream since the eighties.

Clearly there is an opportunity to work with artists on brand partnerships - and other ways to leverage their fan relationships - but, actually, I'm not sure any of the existing parts of the music industry are particularly well equipped to capitalise on these opportunities. Management perhaps, though many artist managers probably wouldn't want to.

This means there is possibly a temporary gap in the music market where one or more new companies could rise and ultimately dominate. Not a record label, or a music publisher, or a tour promoter, or even an artist manager. But a fan relationships exploiter. Though if said theoretical companies are going to rise and dominate, they probably need a better way to describe themselves!

Time will tell of course. Meanwhile, here's me talking about the Mariah-mag on 5Live's 'Wake Up To Money' last Monday.

'Wake Up To Money' is © BBC

--------------------------------------------------

STUFF I DID THIS WEEK
This has been the last week of the Brunswick Internship Programme, the hugely acclaimed training programme run by our partners Unicorn Jobs, designed to address diversity issues in the PR industry (more here). I've been running twice weekly sessions on the media and communication skills, though this week added an extra session entitled, simply, 'Yorkshire'.

The reason is that the six UEL graduates on the programme are heading North next week for two days of visits organised by a Yorkshire-based PR company considering a similar programme. As the only northerner involved in Unicorn it was my job to provide an introduction to the county (I possibly dwelled a little too much on Whitby, one of my favourite places in the world).

Anyway, I made a little Yorkshire Trivia Quiz to kick off the session which you can download here (then download this version with the answers). If you're a fan of Yorkshire, or trivia quizzes, or both, you might want a go! (Oh, and thanks/apologies to the websites from which I nicked pictures for the photo quiz)

--------------------------------------------------

STUFF I WROTE THIS WEEK
A round up of some of the news stories and articles I wrote for UnLimited's media in the last seven days...

--

MUSIC BUSINESS STUFF...

Gibson investigated over illegal wood claims [CMU Daily 23/11/09]

Robbie considering city funding for future albums [CMU Daily 24/11/09]

More idle EMI speculation [CMU Daily 24/11/09]

Is Borders on the brink? [CMU Daily 24/11/09]

Woolies might return to the high street [CMU Daily 24/11/09]

Speech Debelle quits Big Dada [CMU Daily 25/11/09] - this one co-written with CMU Editor Andy Malt

German live industry declining [CMU Daily 26/11/09]

Because do it their way [CMU Daily 26/11/09]

Borders goes into administration [CMU Daily 27/11/09]

Atlantic US doing rather well, apparently [CMU Daily 27/11/09]

--

COPYRIGHT STUFF...

Concern expressed over Digital Bill's increase of ministerial powers over copyright law [CMU Daily 23/11/09]

Lots of chatter about Spotify royalties [CMU Daily 24/11/09]

PRS reach deal with hotel industry over in-room music [CMU Daily 25/11/09]

Asda join IP awareness body [CMU Daily 25/11/09]

Japanese collecting society win lawsuit against video-sharing website [CMU Daily 25/11/09]

Spotify reply to Gaga STIM cheque claim [CMU Daily 25/11/09]

Three-strikes petition has over 24,000 signatories [CMU Daily 26/11/09]

Nokia do pan-European deal with BUMA/STEMRA [CMU Daily 26/11/09]

Mininova streamlines its service, shuts down infringing bit [CMU Daily 27/11/09]

--

DIGITAL STUFF...

Ek confident of Spotify model, and US launch [CMU Daily 23/11/09]

Merlin signs up to MySpace Music [CMU Daily 23/11/09]

--

POP COURTS STUFF...

Island Def Jam exec arrested after Bieber fans get out of control [CMU Daily 23/11/09]

Bronfman wins lawsuit over proceeds of Warner purchase [CMU Daily 24/11/09]

--

GENERAL MUSIC STUFF...

Jacko doc docs released [CMU Daily 23/11/09]

Jedward voted off X-Factor [CMU Daily 23/11/09]

Timbaland erases Chris Brown from new single [CMU Daily 24/11/09]

Jermaine says Jordy retracted molestation allegations [CMU Daily 27/11/09]

--

MEDIA STUFF...

Evans wants Stuart for news [CMU Daily 24/11/09]

BBC Trust limit BBC Worldwide expansion [CMU Daily 25/11/09]

Glambert outrage [CMU Daily 25/11/09]

Kennedy's Cumbria dedication [CMU Daily 25/11/09]

Absolute launch iTunes tagging [CMU Daily 27/11/09]

ITV buy Disney out of GMTV [CMU Daily 27/11/09]