An Online Business Klara Auerbach, Fadri Attamimi, Rachel Khan
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Music lovers look out! There’s a new place to find new music. Vibe.com is an online business that allows new music artists to upload their songs to the web and increase their popularity around the world. There are many people around the world that are trying to get their music heard but don’t have a solid outlet to get their talents noticed. There are also millions of people that are looking to listen to new music and would love to participate in finding the next stars (just take a look at the popularity of American Idol). This is where we come to play. We will offer music artists a user-friendly website to showcase their talent, and allow consumers to download to their music for free, rate their songs, and share their opinions and their favorite music with their friends and communities. But what sets us apart from our competitors? Yes, there are websites that feature music – iTunes being the leading example. And, yes there are sites that allow artists to upload music. But our online business will be different. We will take advantage of the global trend towards social communities, and digital music, to build “digital music communities” – communities of consumers that listen to, recommend, share and enjoy similar types of music. We will try to position ourselves as the Facebook.com of the music lovers community. We will initially focus on unknown musicians, and we will use social communities to “break new artists” and to “create hits”, that will allow music artists to cross over to iTunes, once they are known. We won’t charge music artists or listeners anything at all, and we won’t promote advertising in the early years. Our objective will be to build our community AS FAST AS POSSIBLE. Because, our ability to make money will be dependent entirely on our scale. How will we make money? Well, initially, we won't make a lot, as we are building viewership. Initially, we will create contracts with all the music artists that use our sites to allow us to be their agents once they’ve made it big – to take 10% of their revenues for their careers. Eventually, we will sell advertising, ring tones, and other digital services. BUSINESS DESCRIPTION We are site for all music lovers and more. Our site allows new and upcoming artists to upload their music on our site with the hope of exposing their music to a larger population than they would currently have. Vibe.com helps expose new artists to the people on the site and potentially to all Internet users. Besides allowing people to upload their music to gain exposure, our company also allows consumers to upload their entire music collection online. With ever evolving technology, its not enough to have your personal collection stuck on one device. By letting consumers keep their music collection online they are able to access it from any device that has access to the Internet. Sharing music is another feature that separates us from our competitors. Everything you download or already own can be shared with anyone in the world. This allows listeners to easily distribute and expose the world to the music there are listening to, rather than having to go through extensive processes to simply share a song.
MISSION STATEMENT Letting your Vibe be heard, shared,
MARKETING Marketing Strategy a) Product i) ii)
iii)
iv)
Brand Name- Vibe.com Features- Vibe.com will provide music lovers, listeners and musicians with a service to showcase their music while allowing them to store their entire collections online so that they can access it from anywhere in the world Benefit- The benefit provided is giving unknown musicians a real chance to get themselves known. Also, listeners can download songs from their favorite bands while also letting them access their personal music collection from anywhere in the world where wifi can be accessed. Costumers wont be limited to their personal computer because they can access and share their music with anyone. Level of Quality- Our company will provide musicians and their fans to listen to high quality music and download it for personal use. While also advertising vibe.com musicians so that they can become more popular.
b) Place i) ii) iii)
The beauty of an online business is that it can be run from anywhere in the world. The vibe.com “headquarters� will be based in Mumbai, India. Although we are not providing a tangible good, it is essential that our technicians and other employees are able to work together so that everything is able to run smoothly We chose India as our base because the real estate is less costly, and there are countless amounts of people who are gifted with technology that we can hire to set up the website.
c) Price i) ii)
We have set up the site so that there is no price for artists or listeners to use our site. When our viewership has grown to a sizeable amount we plan to create apps, ring-tones, and sell advertising so that we can create a source of income.
d) Promotion i)
For promotion we plan to target multiple market segments, ranging from indie trendsetters to young and traveling
ii)
businessmen, to college and high school students . The message we are trying to convey to them is that Vibe.com is a community of eccentric, talented, passionate, hip music lovers. All that is needed is the passion for music, a computer and internet connection. We want our slogan to be “Share music, Create a vibe” to give people the idea that they can create and share their vibes with the world. To advertise our product we will target online sites which our target market regularly visits- while also placing ads in strategic areas where our target markets often go to or use like public transportation hubs, or coffee shops and hangout areas. We will also be advertising in music and entertainment, and technology magazines like Juice and Wired, and also through websites like Facebook and youtube.
Marketing Segmentation Segment 1 i)
Description Indie Hipsters, who either listen to or create the music that Vibe.com will provide.
ii)
What they want? Since these “hipsters” have subscribed to set themselves apart from mainstream society, and therefore have become major trendsetters for today’s youth- they have made it their goals to discover the new and trendy bands that have not yet infiltrated the charts. They want something that is cool, hip, simple, and most importantly, free.
iii)
How would they use this product? What is most important to them about this? These people would use this product to listen and find new music that hasn’t yet been publicized by the entertainment industry. It is important to them that this service is free and simple and can be accessed from anywhere.
iv.)
How to deliver the service to them? We wil deliver our service to them through our website.
v.)
How/where to reach them with advertising? Because these ‘Hipsters’ have become part of this “non-culture culture” they have made it increasingly difficult for them to be advertised towards. They tend to reject all advertising because they believe that only mainstream society would react to it. However, when strategically placing advertisements in places where they regularly would see them, we can find ways to impact them.
Segment 2 i)
Description Young adults and teenagers- Today’s youth have become major influences on today’s entertainment and music industry. They mostly live in western nations and have constant access to the internet.
ii)
What they want? This generation of technology craved individuals has become the steppingstones for the digital music and entertainment industry. They want to be part of the discovery of new stars ( take a look at the popularity of American Idol) and they want to be able to do it easily.
iii)
How/ where to reach them with Advertising? In order to reach these young adults we can advertise through popular websites and through magazines and on billboards, etc. This generation is practically taking over the advertising world because they have become “hittargets” to advertise towards.
Competition a.
Our company’s market position is a challenger as well as a pioneer. We must challenge the giants of Itunes, Youtube, Hulu and Pandora, However we are pioneering in the fact that not only are we allowing consumers to download, share, and discover the newest and most talented artist the world has to offer. b. Our strengths are the facts that we have a combination of everything other music sites have to offer. None of our competitors have all services in one place- making our company a much better alternative. c. Our weaknesses are the fact that we are entering an already booming market, which will make growing our company a bit more difficult. Also, getting all the legal issues sorted out may prove to be more complicated than we would have hoped. d. Because we are not earning money from our listeners, we will have to find another source of revenue. However, our pricing for apps, advertising, ring tones and other digital services will aim to be more sensitive to consumer needs. Itunes, our biggest and strongest competitor charges quite a bit for its music and other services, as well as only advertising and promoting the artists who have made it to the “top 40”- vibe.com will not only advertise the most popular, but also the talented artists who deserve the same attention.
Vibe.com main STRENGTHS are its user friendliness and easy accessibility. Vibe.com’s website will be user friendly enabling all our users to browse through it without any difficulty and confusion whatsoever. Our website can be accessed from any computer and any device, providing our customers with easy access and without any hassle. WEAKNESSES that Vibe.com has are At first, We won’t be earning much revenue because we would be focusing on building up our viewership before charging for different services. OPPORTUNITIES that Vibe.com has: We would be based in India therefore having the opportunity to have low cost and expand without the burden of high expenses Vibe.com does face some THREATS due to other online music sources. There are a number of other competitiors out there such as iTunes, Youtube, Soundcloud that have some of the aspects that we will have. Our competitors are much more established than us.
Competitive Advantage Our unique selling points are geared to getting more customers. We set ourselves apart from our competitors to supply our consumers with all that they would need, all in one place. We have at least three points, which separates us from our competitors: Free Upload and Download of Music: We allow all our consumers to upload and showcase their talents online for free. By uploading their music online we are creating a solid outlet for them to be heard all around the world. Many talented artists have had trouble being heard and we are here to solve this problem. But why would they choose our sites instead of our competitors? Our site allows free download of uploaded music, which means that we will allow listeners to share the music they have heard through their portable music devices and listen to songs without having continuous stream or download. This can only help music artists get their songs heard and pass on to other people. Access of your music library on any device: People who access and have an account on our site will be able to upload their entire music collection on our site and access it on any device. We will be the first company to offer the services of letting people access their music collection online and on multiple devices. This is a new concept that none of our competitors have. This unique selling point will allow us to reach customers because of the benefits it provides to the consumers. Accessing your music collection on multiple computers and potentially on any device with Internet will be a revolutionary to the way we are able to access information and make life potentially easier. Share files with other people:
Send files to each other on our site. Our site allows the consumers to send music files with each other. This feature creates the benefit of easily showing something new to another person instantly rather than having to wait until the next time you see the person to show your newfound music. Convenience is the way we have decided to go on this feature and hopefully it will help us get people to go onto our site. We want to be able to make the listening and sharing experience as easy as possible and this will be a key way in which people will be able to share and create a music community arou