Bob Cramer, Chairman and CEO of Nimbit to Join The Music Biz Weekly Podcast this Week.

Posted on September 27, 2011 by Michael Brandvold

A few weeks ago I wrote about some customer service issues I had with Nimbit. I am happy to report that immediately after writing the article Bob Cramer the Chairman and CEO of Nimbit reached out to me with great concern about the problem. I met with Bob a couple weeks ago at the SF Musictech Summit and I am happy to pass along this update from Nimbit on the problem.

After you pointed this issue out, we identified how automatic tweeting from our support ticketing service, was causing more confusion than benefit.

We changed our process so that now when someone tweets @nimbitsupport, that issue is still captured and tracked with our ticketing system, but there will be no auto response made.

Any responses we send out will be personally coming from a member of our support team. Once a ticket is created, our support team gets the ticket issued to them, on both on their computer and smartphone, and is deal with promptly.

I would also love to announce that Bob Cramer from Nimbit will be the next special guest on The Music Biz Weekly podcast, this Friday, September 30th. In addition to discussing the earlier customer service issues, Bob is going to talk about the brand new fan commerce store for Facebook, MyStore. MyStore is a new way to sell music, merchandise, and etickets directly from a band/musician, fan club, or record label’s Facebook Page. The new MyStore for Facebook is available to users of any Nimbit plan.

MyStore for Facebook Features:

Have a store on your Facebook Page in minutes: free sign-up & fast set-up
Promote & sell directly within Facebook without sending fans to external websites
Sell digital music, CDs, merch, and etickets for shows
Flexible pricing: items can be set to a fixed price, name-your-price, or free to build your fanbase
Social sharing: fans can easily share products on Facebook, Twitter or email
Sharing music on Facebook embeds the new Nimbit Player on friends’ News Feeds
Fan comments/reviews made on MyStore appear throughout all your Nimbit storefronts as well as post to your fans’ Facebook walls.
Facebook-optimized layout with carousel for product browsing
Product images and info enlarge for detailed viewing
Streamlined cart, checkout, and personal receipts
HTML5-based for faster performance & iOS (iPhone / iPad) support

Bands, Social Is Not Just About Sharing It Is Also About Commerce – CommerceSocial

Posted on November 3, 2010 by Michael Brandvold

Bands, Artists, Labels, Management Companies… it’s time to move beyond a single stand alone online store and bring your online store to where your fans are hanging out; Facebook, MySpace, Blogs, Websites. Don’t just post your new CD on your Facebook Wall and link your fans back to a typical online store. Post your new CD on your Facebook Wall, MySpace Page, Blog or official website and let your fans buy it right there without even leaving. Let your fans share your new CD as a Wall post with all their friends, while including the ability to buy your CD in every single one of those Wall posts.

STOP, think about what I just said… every single Wall post by all your fans could be a store with the ability to buy your CD. What could that mean for sales?

It is time to bring your commerce to the world of social. CommerceSocial is a new tool that is extremely easy to setup and lets your CD spread virally through the social networks.

Here is how it works:

Imagine that the next time you post a product on your Facebook Wall that instead of it just being a image that links off to your website where you need to get your fan through the entire conversion process to complete a purchase that now when they click on the product image a small window actually expands right inside Facebook with a mini shopping cart embedded,. This mini shopping cart allows the fan to instantly make a purchase right in the Facebook Wall… while they are still the most excited and interested in the product. Now what if your fans could become your sales force, they are your biggest supporters. There is a Share button right in the cart that allows the fan to further Share the product on their Facebook Wall. All of a sudden your Wall post is being spread across Facebook by all your fans, and every one of those Wall posts is a online store.

A major shift is happening in online commerce and advertising, consumers in ALL social networks and communities are relying heavily on peer word-of-mouth recommendations for their purchases as they chat about brands and products – it’s happening every minute of every day.

90% of consumers online trust recommendations from people they know; 70% trust opinions of unknown users. 67% of shoppers spend more online after recommendations from their online community of friends. A product posted on a Facebook Wall or shared in a user’s blog is a recommendation of trust.

CommerceSocial even has a full affiliate program built right into your store. If someone posts a product on their Wall and makes a sale you can choose to pay them a small finders fee. Even more incentive for your fans to start posting your products… they can make some money selling your products!

I have been talking all about Facebook, but all of the same functionality works on MySpace, Blogs and Websites. You can post a complete working store wherever your fans are.

Check out the CommerceSocial store for Crash Music below, a little bit of code just pasted into a blog post. Play with the share links and see how slick it works.

Check out CommerceSocial. Signup as a merchant if you are a band and have some physical goods to sell. Contact me if you have questions about how to best implement social commerce or have questions about CommerceSocial.

Does Your Product Page Need Help? Turn Them Into Content.

Posted on September 20, 2010 by Michael Brandvold

The product page is where you HOPE you can get your customer to click to buy. It is also the page that if you can have direct in bound deep links you will improve your chance of conversion. But, so many product pages are just plain boring… a picture, generic description, price and a add to cart button. I know from experience that when I visit a product page on Amazon I spend a lot more time on the page because of all the other content they have made available. I use Amazon for product research; I read user reviews, how popular is the product, did users end up buying the product.

The video below is a great introduction to some basic things you can change on your product page to make it more interesting, more unique.
SEOmoz – SEO Software

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Is Your Band Building Community and Generating Commerce?

Posted on September 18, 2010 by Michael Brandvold

The playing field is being leveled in the music industry. If you don’t start building a community to sell your product to; product beyond just music, you are selling yourself short.

Patrick Sullivan, CEO of RightsFlow had this to say,

With the music consumption model that exists today, the winners are the set of artists who take advantage of the building blocks to generate community and commerce. Given the ease of access to distribution channels and the toolkit available to artists today, (CD Baby, DiscMakers, ReverbNation, Topspin, Tunecore, etc.), opportunity exists for all musicians to successfully create and connect globally. This digital evolution has created a new set of winners who are creatively and artistically stimulating perception of their music… perception that equals value by actually fueling a reality of revenue. The tools are available to all: drive perception; drive value; drive success.

In the old model 90% of artists didn’t make money and had to keep their day gig. In the new environment, 100% of artists can be winners by creating positive income streams and finding some level of success.

“While they may still need to work the day gig, a real choice and a real opportunity exists to play and be heard that just wasn’t available before.”

The system now allows the set of “winners” to maximize the perception, drive perceived value, and generate real value that cuts through the clutter and makes people want to listen. The new system gives the 90% that didn’t make money previously a real shot to be heard, connect and make — at least and at last — a bit of their own money. The revenue streams are out there… develop your blueprint to success and claim them for yourself.

via “The Winners Take Advantage Of The Building Blocks To Generate Community And Commerce,” Says Patrick Sullivan, CEO of RightsFlow – hypebot.