Wolfstar to work for a superstar DJ

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I thought we better announce our latest bit of new business on the blog formally as I know not everyone needs to read our newsroom. We (Wolfstar) have won the contract to run a social media campaign for Chris Lake a world renowned DJ and dance music producer.

Chris has received critical acclaim and even managed to get into the UK charts last year with his track changes, in fact it reached number one in the dance charts in the US.

You can view our news release on this story here. Needless to say I and my colleague Seb can’t wait to get cracking on this because we both live and breathe dance music.

In the meantime, I have added a video of Chris in action at Space in Ibiza.

Have a good weekend.

File sharing public relations - download now for free!

I’ve recently been talking to a good friend of mine who works in the music industry. A conversation that crops up more than any other is that of file-sharing. A term most people believe to be synonymous with ‘free-music’. At the somewhat naive age of sixteen, I myself downloaded Napster onto my parents computer, pulled off a few tracks before I accidentally added a nasty virus to their play-list. I forget the name of it, but needless to say, the PC was out of action for a long time!Based on this experience I swore never to indulge in ‘file-sharing’ again.

My friends main point was this; "if you see a car that you like the look of do you think you can just take it?" An ideal thieving opportunity presents itself - the key’s in the ignition, the door’s open, nobody around… Granted, this situation physically doesn’t compare to a few clicks on a mouse, but surely it becomes a question of morals…

When a CD cost £15-£20, 15 years ago, you did feel that it was a tad expensive, but it was a luxury good, so you paid it. You bought music when you could afford it, and it was special. Now the music industry is saturated. As a result you can by a whole album for next to nothing, be it on download or in the shops - this is one product that’s price hasn’t increased with inflation…. shhh… don’t tell Gordon B!

I’m aware there are several more debates to be had here, but I’m trying to drill down… So, how does this all relate back into public relations?

Well after having the afore mentioned conversation, I then brought the topic up with a couple of mates, who also work in public relations. At first they disagreed wholeheartedly… they believed artists to be "well paid", and "what was the problem?" … "It’s like lending a CD to your mate for a week." The obvious problem I had with this was that allowing several thousand people to share your files is a hell of a lot different to lending a CD. Then I found an analogy that had them both questioning their long-standing views:

How many times had they researched a brief at work, put together a high quality presentation and/or worked on a detailed proposal document? The answer was obviously lots! They immediately knew where this was going. I asked how many times, despite failing to win the new business, they’d seen their ideas, their concepts and sometimes even their very own time-plan and strategy, used and abused by an in-house team or competing agency post-pitch…

It makes me feel nauseous. If you want to hire an outside agency to do some work for you - then honour the process. If you decide to make your sourcing process competitive, fine, by all means do so, but don’t sit through a bunch of presentations and then rip off all their ideas. Word of mouth is a powerful thing, and before long you’ll earn yourself a reputation, and bad rep’s tend to stick….

Plus I’m a big believer in karma - and - what goes around comes around… try and do something on the cheap, and at some point or another it will go wrong… such is the way of the world.

Is 21 the perfect age?

Hi my name’s Beth Jones and I’ve just started a work placement at Wolfstar.  Although I have almost finished studying for a Broadcast Journalism degree at the University of Leeds,  I have decided that PR is the way forward and what better place to start learning than at Wolfstar.

Finishing uni is just starting to sink in and it’s a horrible thought, despite this I have come to the conclusion that 21 is the perfect age, or at least with my limited experience I think it is. After my holiday in Atlanta this Easter visiting my folks I realised that I must appreciate every minute of being 21. I could see the nostalgia engulfing my dad as he rattled off stories from the good old days. The one which stuck in my head, and probably the one he was most passionate about, was his drunken antics on his 21^st birthday while posted by the RAF in the Borneo jungle.

Clearly I have already had the brilliant experience of visiting Atlanta this year. Apart from the lovely weather and friendly people, there is so much else that makes it such a great city. Firstly there was the scintillating dinner at the renowned Sundial restaurant, then there is the endless number of shops in Lennox Square but my favourite activity, which any visitor to Atlanta must do is visit the Turner Field  for a Braves game. I was a baseball virgin before this trip but having watched my first game, I’m hooked! Even if you don’t want to get immersed in the game itself there is so else much to do, the best part had to be watching the crowd on the big screen, laughing and waving desperately once they realised they had been caught by the camera. Ahhh good memories!

Not only does being 21 and a student allow the freedom to travel, it grants you the luxury of time. So my next venture is likely to be a festival. As an avid fan of Global Gathering (having been three years on the trot) I think it’s time to spread my wings. However this poses a problem, as I look to fellow friends hoping for some guidance in what to do, I end up torn between Barcelona’s Sonar festival  and Benicassim near Valencia. Hmmm who knows? Any advice? Either way it’s going to be an experience not to be missed!

If your looking for something a bit different, check out the Guardian’s guide to ‘20 British festival’s you’ll never have heard of’.

All I know is I won’t stay 21 forever and as my final summer of ‘no work and all play’ draws nearer I am on a mission to make it the best yet before I embark on my journey into the depths of the world of PR.

Up and coming bands should benefit from social media

As part of my public relations degree, I have to put together a portfolio of work to be submitted in a couple of months. My sister’s boyfriend is in a band called ‘Billy the Kid’ and they are doing really well at the moment, they’ve just been signed by Oasis’ management ‘Ignition’. As they are just starting to get their feet in the door of success, they haven’t yet had any real public relations work done for the band. Therefore I got really excited at the thought of doing some work for them and started brainstorming some ideas. I really wanted to do a stunt of some sort; something different and exciting, but then I became stuck. What sort of stunt could I do that was unique and completely free? Celebrities such as Paris Hilton get caught drink driving (arguably a PR stunt) which excites the press, but surely it’s a bit too extreme to ask the lads in the band to risk their lives in order for some coverage. They might be eager to promote themselves but they’re not that desperate!

So this got me thinking, my target audience is people aged between 17-35, what sort of PR works best for them? I believe the answer lies mainly in social media.

They already have their own Myspace page where friends can listen to their songs and so on which is a start. Young people nowadays want to be able to talk to each other about their favourite bands, share in discussion and swap information about them which is why I think creating a blog would be really beneficial for them.

Technology such as ‘Technorati’ (a blog search engine) also makes it so much easier to find the blog you want to be part of. Other methods of social media I could use would be to create a bespoke YouTube channel for them and upload videos of the band and creating groups and profiles in the social networking sites such as Facebook and Bebo.

It will be interesting to see if the boys do gain anymore popularity (however small) after I take advantage of the huge audience these sites have to offer. This would again prove the potential the world of social media has to offer.

Some other cool up and coming bands from the North East are:

· The Cutters (indie)

· Twisted Wheel (indie)

· We Start Fires (punk/electro)

The space cowboy returns and joins in the social media revolution

At Wolfstar we are always looking out for interesting stories which get us all talking, and we often like to cherry pick the best and closely examine them to see what is good and what is bad.

Yesterday, we saw a great story about the disco, funk and pop band Jamiroquai, who have launched a new social media website. Seb and I both love the disco funksters, so we found this very intriguing and had to check the site out ourselves.

The band, who have always been known for being forward thinking in their music and marketing, already have a myspace, Facebook group and YouTube channel. So to enhance their offer to their fans they have developed a new website which has incorporated all of these mediums.

The website looks great as it is packed with interactive elements. In fact, the group themselves will all be blogging when they are next on tour - so if you are into Jay Kay (no relation to our Beth) and the guys, make sure you look out for that. I am positive there will be some interesting stories to come out of it. Hopefully, there won’t be anymore expensive car crashes like when Jay Kay last totaled his Lamborghini - see right.

We have been working with a number of musicians recently and reading this article, we noticed that some things which were in our proposals were also included in what they did. If we are honest, there were also some things that we didn’t propose but we will be using them in future as good examples. I personally love the fact that people can download Jay Kay widgets and use them on their own blogs. There were also some things which we proposed which weren’t in what they did, so its good to see we still have some good ideas which will benefit the music industry.

Anyway as it’s Friday, here’s one of my favourite videos of all time which features the guy with the big hat - Virtual Insanity! Obviously, please watch this in your own time and not in your employer’s but that goes without saying.

The first Fabric podcast

Last week I downloaded the first Fabric podcast recorded by Craig Richards, long term resident at the famous club and one half of Tyrant. The intro was a compilation of digital sounds and samples - kind of what you’d expect from such a well known underground establishment. Less than thirty seconds later, I was totally disillusioned. Instead of moody, thought provoking house music, the presenter gently eased into Latimore – ‘let’s straighten it out’, a beautiful track from the 1970’s. This continued throughout the entire forty six minute set in musical education, as Richards introduced each carefully selected record, based on his influencers and what “made him happy and sad”. The only slight resemblance of the dance beat I’d been expecting, came from Deux with ‘Game and Performance’ made during the French synth wave in the late seventies.  It was a pleasure to be allowed into the mind of such an inspiring DJ, but even more so to find such an eclectic mixture of simply great records hiding in there. It was almost like a lesson in musical appreciation, the kind you’d have actually enjoyed back in the school days.

Wolfstar enters negotiations with international record producer

The day has finally arrived for me and my colleagues to get our teeth sunk into the world of dance music! An old contact of mine, who also happens to be a chart topping record producer in the UK, met with me on Friday night for a fine blend of Pad Thai and a couple of Coronas. I knew he wanted to talk PR business alongside the usual catch up, but I honestly thought he was just on the prowl for some quick new media pointers. However, after I introduced him to his new social media toy – twitter - he was brimming with excitement about what this all could mean for interacting with his fans….

As it has turned out, he (and possibly his management team) has approached Wolfstar for a full scale social media and word of mouth campaign, ahead of his massive record launch in summer ’08. Apart from two months PR activity for the Gatecrasher brand in 2006, I haven’t really been involved with the music industry since my uni days. Suffice to say I’m totally buzzing about writing a plan, delivering it and the actual opportunities and doors this project could open for us all at Wolfstar.

For the time being his name will have to remain hush hush, but rest assured as soon as I can, I’ll be raving about this non-stop!

WAX 2.0

After six months of heavy hints from the Wolfstar pack, several beers, and serious company growth, one of my favourite UK nights, Wax On has finally got its web 2.0 act together by matching its online offer to the artistic design work it has long been known for.

The team have worked so hard to develop the business and are in my opinion, leagues ahead of most of their competitors. So far the new site contains videos and excellent podcasts (although the RSS feeds appear to go down when being updated) from the likes of the Riotous Rockers and Nightmoves, but my favourite by far comes from Simon Lister, one third of People Get Real, who, along with Oli Pattern and TC Monkton make up Wax On’s resident line up.

Whilst I still believe there is a massive need to keep the underground pioneers away from commercialisation, Wax On has in my eyes, simply always been about the craic and good tunes. And for this type of brand, social media is exactly what’s needed. By brands and promoters restricting themselves to only the night itself, they could be losing tens, hundreds and in some cases thousands of potential supporters. Once online, they have the potential to build on their relationship with current fans, but also develop a global profile and increase their awareness throughout the market.

Dan - see you on the 27th!

Music part II

Continuing with my musical contribution, I’m highly recommending Resident Advisor (RA) to all lovers of electronic musical culture. Started by a group of Aussies in 2000, they’ve certainly realised the market potential and totally capitalized on it. Now in 2007, they are showcasing some of the finest musical journalism kicking about.

Rolphus’s latest comment on a review by The Guardian’s Charlie Brooker on club culture is a classic example of an RA user speaking their mind and in doing so, contributing what’s ultimately on the mind of most music lovers. This form of expression and knowledge of the industry is standard throughout the whole site and probably why it gets over 280,000 hits a month.

The site itself allows you to create a profile, enter competitions for massive events, read reviews, join forums and yes… free, quality, honest podcasts are available for download on a regular basis. Even if a particular act isn’t to your normal taste, give it a go – the mixes don’t ever disappoint.

Mixing with the stars

Yesterday Stuart and I met with the ‘mystery third director’.  He claims to have been rubbing shoulders with Bono and George Clooney at the weekend in Monte Carlo.  This very glamorous impression should throw anyone off the scent of his real identity!  Meanwhile here on our building site in Horsforth I get to hob nob with Sebastian and Beth today.  Talking of which the new office is actually pretty flash and we may be moving in this month!

I’m still struggling to know what to blog about.  There’s so much going on setting up Wolfstar, looking after clients, pitching for new business and recruiting new staff to service them once they’re on-board, that if I emptied my head here - which is tempting - it would go on and on and on. 

Or I could moan what’s going on more personally like my embarrassing incident with an opening toilet door on a Virgin train last week or the fact that Sainsburys Energy have been stealing from our household to the tune of nearly £550!  Will blogging about my issues with these companies preclude us from ever working with them?  I’m not very worried at the minute - I’ve got enough to do!

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