8-26-14

Musician as Athlete

~A by-artists-for-artists online streaming entertainment site created by multi-dimensional musician/actor/author/entrepreneur Sherese Chrétien pays artists 100%, while audience enjoys free.~

An individual professional athlete’s career lives or dies based on the endorsements and sponsors they are able to attract. Why not musicians?

This is the question multi-dimensional musician Sherese Chrétien asked herself and set out to answer by creating Ever Entertainment®, an online streaming entertainment site by artists for artists, with “whatever, whenever, wherever entertainment, where artists make the money and you enjoy free.”

In surveying the contemporary music landscape, Chrétien decided to cut to the chase and design a direct relationship with her audience, supported by sponsorship — PERIOD. You won’t find her music on Spotify, Pandora, LastFM or any of the other online streaming services. You won’t find her music for sale in ITunes, or at Amazon, or any of the other online or brick & mortar music retailers, for that matter. She has accounts at YouTube, Myspace, Reverbnation, LinkedIn, Facebook, etc. — but you’ll only find song clips directing you to listen free at Ever Entertainment®. You can purchase her songs as digital downloads from her store if you want to — but why? Thanks to her sponsors, you can listen to all of her original music free.

She’s going for broke with her sponsorship approach, believing all she needs is her audience and sponsors who want to get in front of her audience to make it with her music. She has no plans to hang her songs on a wall, and turn into a tech executive. This is a means to an end — making a great living making music — and she intends to keep it that way. And Chrétien plans to capture her progress step by step for other artists to follow.

“How are we any different than pro athletes?” Chrétien says, pointing out that not only is sponsorship the way an athlete makes their living, but sponsorship was the way musicians first made their living, too. “From the beginning of time until the advent of recording, musicians, artists, authors and athletes all made their living by attracting sponsors.” Back then they were called patrons or benefactors and were usually wealthy families seeking the prestige of supporting the finest talent. Think Michelangelo.

Today, brands seeking to get in front of music audiences know more and more the value of music sponsorship. Sponsorship is serious business, and according to IEG, the largest global sponsorship consultancy, music sponsorships hit $1.28 billion in 2013, and is the fasted growing sponsorship segment. Artists only need to become as serious about sponsorship as pro athletes (many major label artists already are) and realize that working directly with sponsors to create imaginative, win-win-win sponsorship contracts around their live events, online content, co-branding and endorsement opportunities puts them in the driver seat to control their destinies and their creative work.

Right now, Chrétien only has her music on the pilot Ever Entertainment® site (eight music personas so far with as many genres — we said “multi-dimensional,” but that’s a whole other story!) Bootstrapping the whole thing so far, she’s currently seeking out a House Channel sponsor so she can upgrade to a proprietary build after piloting the current site for the last couple of years. “It works, and I remind myself a lot that Facebook started out as just a blue box.  I’m certainly no Mark Zuckerberg — I definitely need a Steve Wozniac, but I’m very excited to put my final vision into play.”

Once the new design is in place, she’ll invite all professional musicians/labels to create their own free Artist Channels. In an effort to maintain the highest quality of music in the House Channel player, she’ll ask for a link to audition new artists’ music. But she points out, ” ‘Good music is good music’ as Louis Armstrong said — doesn’t matter what genre. If you make music people like to listen to, you’re in,” she says, adding that, “as one of the biggest diverse music fans out there, I personally can’t wait to hear it!” She’s also toying with the idea of adding an audience panel for auditioning music for featured levels in the House Channel.

Chrétien has an automated sponsorship system in place, as well as encouraging musicians to create custom sponsorships on their Artist Channels that can tie into their live events. She even plans to include a “Main Stage” Live Concert venue in the House Channel, allowing Artists to perform live with links to their Artist Channel at zero cost to the Artist. The entire concept is designed to be zero cost to the Artists — and — Artists receive 100% of the sponsor revenue generated by their Channel, as well as 100% of the revenue generated through their own Channel store.

“We will keep the lights on with the House Channel sponsorship, which contains the player that plays all of the Artists’ music & videos, with plans to also include a live venue,” she says. Will the streaming player include an algorithm to feed listener’s music? “To be honest, after listening to music on nearly every online site out there, I get frustrated being fed music I don’t want to hear.” She’s opting instead for a deep, rich search function that allows you to easily and freely explore all of the music from every angle she could imagine. If she ever does include an algorithm, she says it would need to be way smarter or more flexible than any she’s heard so far.

She guarantees, though, that audio/video ads will never be included in the House Channel player. “After all,” she says, “I’ll likely be the biggest fan on the site, listening to everyone as much as I can — so I’m designing the listening experience with that in mind. I just want to hear what I want to hear when I want to hear it — uninterrupted.  I assume everyone else does, too!” She adds, “I think it was Dick Clark who said, ‘music is the soundtrack of our lives.’ That is certainly true for my life. Unless I’m outside listening to crickets, I always like a background of music for every mood or thing I’m doing.  As a musician, I’m also learning and yearning to listen, listen, listen, and I’m always peeking to see who it is. Maybe I can have the artist & song name projected big on the ceiling or wall, so I can quickly see wherever I am!  Hmmm…hold on while I make a note to myself! (Chrétien laughs) Right now, I’m listening to a mix of Ethel Waters and similar feel artists.  Springing an ad on me, or an artist who isn’t in the same mood is just jarring!  Please no!  Building an ideal listening/viewing experience is definitely paramount.”

Music is not the only entertainment Chrétien has in her grand plan. “I want to enjoy all types of entertainment!  I want this to become my Home Theater on a computer, where I can listen, I can watch, and I can read and I can view!” she says.  All types of creatives can come aboard — from filmmakers to visual artists to authors to dancers to comedians to magicians.  In fact, she has other entertainment personas she is launching as well (see them at Eliyora Entertainment™).

-Creating an online entertainment portal by artists for artists-

-100% channel sponsor & store revenue to artists at zero cost-

-free to audiences who will always get to enjoy all of the entertainment uninterrupted-

-the best possible entertainment target market for brands all in one place, with the added ROI of sponsorship packaging over just online advertising-

In attempting to solve her own dilemma as an emerging artist in today’s landscape with Ever Entertainment®, Chrétien may well have struck on the very formula to solve the entire entertainment industry’s dilemma. Achems razor, right?

Eliyora Entertainment LLC.  Ever Entertainment® © Paradunai LLC.  All international rights reserved.  All trademarks property of Paradunai LLC.  All personas, concepts and original songs created and performed by Sherese Chrétien.