LAB RecordsLAB Records is an

independent record label operating from Manchester, England and founded by Mark

Orr and Nathen McVittie in 2007.

LAB Records – Online Followings• On Twitter LAB Records have a following of just over 6,500 compared to a

Flagship label of a Conglomerate such as Columbia Records who have 400k followers. This highlights that Columbia is much more widely known than LAB records who are targeting a niche audience, where as Columbia has an audience on a global scale.

• On Instagram where LAB Records post clips of their artists performing at local gigs and photos of any magazine articles that they are featured in etc, have a following of over 600 people. Where as SYCO Music who are also a Flagship record label of Sony Music Entertainment, post pictures of their artists on their worldwide tours and performing on live TV shows, and they have a following of 66.5k followers.

• Their online profile consists of Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, Tumblr and Soundcloud. They also stream a lot of their music onto Spotify.• It is crucial that they use these online profiles to then enable their niche

audience to access their music and starts to build a fan base around certain artists.

• Lab Records have 13 artists signed to them such as Natasha North, William Beckett, Jacob & Goliath, Fort Hope and more.

• Compared to a conglomerate, online profiles are crucial for an independent artist because they have to network and gain contacts for themselves. As no one else is going to do this for them, unlike an artist that is signed to a

major record label where it would be someone’s job to run the artist’s social media accounts. So the only chance an independent artist has in

building a fan base is to put their music out there onto their social media in order to have the best chance to reach any sort of audience.

Lab Records – Distribution (Web 2.0)

LAB Records – Production• The founder of LAB Records is Mark Orr founded in 2007.

• They also have employed 3 other people Scott Brothman (Director), Duncan Howsley (design and videos, he is also the founder of LAB

exposure) and Matt Sayward who handles A&R catalogue management.

• LAB Records use free software such as Soundcloud to promote and produce their music.

• When they have the money they outsource and rent studios for recording, when they don’t have that level of income they use

software such as Logic-Pro.

LAB Records - Marketing• Along side a visual merchandise store which promotes clothing and digital downloads, they also own a marketing and management agency called LAB

Exposure.

• LAB Exposure deal with the visual creativity behind new websites, music videos and merchandise designs or a whole campaign for an artists next release.

• They market their music online by posting videos from live gigs and links to their online streaming archives.

• When comparing LAB to major artists such as Justin Bieber we see, the difference in their marketing strategies. Whilst LAB are posting live gigs and streaming links,

Justin Bieber will have a marketing team posting adverts hyping up his upcoming album release or dropping dates for when he tours and when the album artwork will

come out.

LAB Records - Exchange

• I The Mighty who are signed to LAB Records recently did a Q&A on MySpace where they answered questions

about the band that fans wanted to know. This is therefore a more personal response as the band is responding to questions the fans have submitted

whereas Justin Bieber sells special tickets where you can meet and greet him. This shows the difference of a

major artist and a independent artist because it shows how large Justin’s fan base is and how much people are

willing to pay to meet him.