Bandsintown.com's COO Julien Mitelberg explains how the live music service started, and what new features we'll be seeing in the not so far distant future.
Bandsintown.com recently celebrated hitting the highly significant 13 million users mark. The music service's President & COO, co-founder and serial entrepreneur Julien Mitelberg will be appearing in an depth Q&A at ADE Pro on October 16. We had a chat with him about the future of the concert experience, 'Music DNA', entrepreneurship and more.
Like all great ideas, Bandsintown as a concept is also blindingly obvious. How did the eureka moment come about?
Mitelberg: "Bandsintown sprang from the frustration of its founders who were constantly missing shows by their favourite bands. It’s incredibly difficult to uncover mid-tier or independent artists who aren't big enough to warrant the attention of Ticketmaster, and even harder to find shows by underground DJ’s. We created Bandsintown to fix this fundamental problem for music fans: never miss a show by a band or a DJ you like.
Were there any particular events/moments which crystalised into what we see today?
"We knew we had to make it easy to share personal music tastes with us while building the largest and most reliable database of live music events, no matter the size of the artist. To do this, we created what we call the fans' 'Music DNA', which is a combination of your music preferences from services like Facebook, Twitter, Spotify, iTunes and Rdio. Your Music DNA informs our algorithm of which artists to Track. We aggregate concert data from hundreds of sources (ticketing companies, booking agencies, promoters); then we invite artists to contribute and edit their tour dates directly through Bandsintown Manager. That was a turning point for us: artists using our service to better display and promote their tour dates contributed to the growth of our user base. We had created a virtuous circle. Today, we have over 230,000 artists that actively participate in making our goal a reality. We crunch all this data every day and every week to send tens of millions of personalized emails and mobile notifications when an artist you track is coming to town. We also provide concert recommendations based on the artists you track to enhance music discovery."
As a serial entrepreneur, what factors influence which projects you get behind and those that you pass on?
"In business, the first question I always ask myself is, “Are we solving a problem?” It’s easier to fix an existing need rather than create a new one. The second question, which is just as important, is whether the leader of this project is passionate enough. It’s very hard to create a new business and it will come with ups and downs – you need people with vision and a strong passion to weather the ride.
Once I’ve answered those two questions, I evaluate traditional questions: Is the market for this project big enough? Who is the competition and are they doing a good job at solving the problem? What’s our unique competitive advantage/value add? How do we scale the business, in other words, how will we reach those for whom we solve a problem? And of course, how do we monetize?"
What areas are you working to improve/refine?
"We’re now extending our mission to help artists and fans connect better than before, during and after each show. Knowing about a show is just the beginning of the concert experience. We want to be part of this journey with our fans and keep them in contact with their friends and their favourite artists along the entire journey. Connecting Bandsintown to more streaming services to perfect Music DNA, helping artists directly communicate with their fans going to a show, improving artist discovery, and permitting fans to share their concert experience with their friends and other music fans – all of this is part of a new set of features we’re building. Stay tuned!"
Julien Mitelberg will focus on how the live scene is responding to, and benefitting from, the digital world, what concert goers might see in terms of add-on experiences, and how his website will be seeking to add value to both bands and their fans in an in-depth Q&A at ADE Pro as part of the Shape of the Future series.
ADE Conference: ADE Pro: Shape of the Future - What's Next For Bandsintown.com?
October 16, 1pm - 1.45pm, The Dylan
Tickets available here
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