By willm on January 7, 2009 6:29 PM

Soulja Boy Tell'Em – Social Media SuperStar

-Soulja Boy Photo- CES 2009 (Consumer Electronics Show) – Billboard Digital Music Live

Soulja Boy Tell’Em Social Media Success

Soulja Boy Tell ‘Em launched himself to success through social media. Soulja Boy is generating tens of millions of dollars in music and online digital revenue based on success achieved in social media. Soulja Boy told his story today at the CES‘ Digital Music Live, to a crowd of traditional record executives and digital media start ups. Soulja Boy started on SoundClick.com at the age of 16, uploading tracks that were downloaded 35K times a day at their peak.

His SoundClick success was the result of social media features, where the audience could tag his songs as their favorite, and the audience could see just how popular his songs were by the number of downloads. Soon his SoundClick comments were filled with requests from fans to build a MySpace page. In 2005 he did so with the help of his cousin, and a social media star was born.

Soulja Boy accumulated millions of page views, fans and streams that attracted the attention of Collipark and then a record deal with Interscope/Universal Music Group. Soulja Boy then used YouTube to launch highly popular dance moves, music videos, a Soulja Boy Tell’Em channel and a whole hip hop subculture of dress styles and words written on sunglasses. His millions of fans’ created a “whole world” in the social media sphere, that made signing him a no brainer, according to Soulja Boy’s manager.

Social Media and Traditional Music Industry

Record executives, artist managers and start ups are all asking themselves what the recipe for success is in social media, who should own the rights for communications such Twitter feeds and how they will all profit from the new music industry. It seems that artists will finally all be able to make a living thanks to social media. Artists can be their own “small business owner”, doing their own marketing, distribution and tour promotion online – primarily on social networks.

Major record labels were quick to point out that it still takes record label promotions teams to get on radio, which drive traditional CD sales that define the music industry. Soulja Boy is now benefiting from major label marketing and record sales, but his digital music revenues – benefiting him, online partners and his manager directly (outside record labels) are staggering. Soulja Boy now operates and profits from a many digital businesses, including a subscription based mobile media services that receives 30 million callers and has one million paying subscribers – all promoted with a phone number he sings in a song that is distributed via MySpace and YouTube.

Social media, 360 deals and Music 2.0

Soulja Boy figured out the secret of success all on his own from his bedroom in Memphis. He used social media – primarily MySpace and YouTube, to create a cultural phenomenon. He parlayed these into record deals, and received a Grammy nomination in 2008. Social media allowed the world to beat a path to Soulja Boy’s door, creating a super star. Labels are all scrambling to do ’360 deals’ where they get a piece of all an artists revenue – including online sales driven by social media.
Do you think social media will define the future of the music Industry?