Q: A little bit more than 100 days ago you took over the job of SellaBand CEO. Do you regret this step with hindsight?
A: Not at all! It has been and still is a great challenge and I´m happy that we´ve managed the takeover and the first 100 days together with a vast majority of the Believers and Artists.

Q: What was the hardest challenge for you after the new start?
A: I would say that all the regulatory and legal issues have been most challenging, since this is something you can not completely influence. On the one hand you have to follow certain rules and requirements and on the other hand you are looking for a creative an positive way to realize a workable solution. Beside of this it wasn’t always easy to find the right priority because there are so many demands and interests we have to take care of.

Q: Are there any issues you wanted to tackle but haven’t solved yet?
A: Yes, I would love to be faster with the progress of the front-end and usability. Everything else is in a good situation. Things could happen faster – as always, but right now I would say “we are on schedule!”

Q: A lot of (active) believers and a few artists have left SellaBand after the bankruptcy. How do you plan to bring the community back to SellaBand?
A: We have to offer new features – we need more marketing power, and support the artist as an consultancy, provide proper distribution partners, promotion activities… We will have some nice new features, TV shows and are expanding into foreign markets. This will give a lot of attraction for our former believers. We will setup satellites around the Sellaband Planet. Those satellites will create a 360 degree full service for Artist and should be very attractive for all our “old” believers.

Q: What are your plans for the next months regarding the website, promotion and SellaBand in general?
A: As said we are working on the TV appearance, we will have some more competitions like Rocken am Brocken or the Intro co-operation. There will be some nice changes to the website, functionality and appearance in general within the next 6 month, but of course we don´t want to spoil anything right now.

Thanks Michael for the interview.

After a short period being offline SellaBand restarted its business and returned to the web. A lot of speculations and later questions raised among the members of SellaBand community. Last Thursday I asked Michael Bogatzki, the new SellaBand CEO, to answer a few questions about how SellaBand will run business in the future.

And here are his answers:

50K MM: The acquisition of SellaBand ran quite silently. Could you please unveil some details of the deal?
Michael: Actually, the whole process went really straightforward and transparent involving all stakeholders. We sat together with the management-team in mid-January and were talking about the possibilities and challenges for SellaBand. After that we moved really fast into the discussion of specific solutions. In a short time, we balanced our concerns and found a mutual basis for our partnership. It was in everyone’s mind that we would not waste time for the new setup of the platform. Especially in order not to raise any fears of the SellaBand community. It would have been inexcusable, if the website had been down for several weeks or anything like that. We are glad that all necessary steps went fast, accurate and very cooperative with everyone involved.

50K MM: Make Music is rather a music agency with focus on marketing and promotion, I suppose. How does SellaBand fit to your business strategy?
Michael: Our core business is to market and promote music – just like SellaBand does. All people working here have a strong background in the music industry. My team is set up by professionals from labels, publishing, live business, merchandising and internet commerce. Everyone here can contribute in a special way and can help to bring SellaBand forward in a highly skilled way.

50K MM: The new HQ will be based in Munich. Who will work in the new SellaBand team there?
Michael: Our whole team will work together from Amsterdam and Munich. Amsterdam and the known staff is still the creative HQ. Munich represents the legal and business side of the partnership. In the next days the team will introduce themselves to the community.

50K MM: Believers and Artists have lost trust in SellaBand due to a number of unsuccessful projects and activities, e.g. ArenaFest, several website relaunches, … and not least due to the bankruptcy. What are your plans to build up their trust in SellaBand again?
Michael: The main focus is to rebuild the trust in SellaBand by concentrating on the essential issues:
+ Bringing together Artists and Believers from around the world by creating the best technical environment for SellaBand.
+ Offering professional support in all questions concerning funding, recording and selling records on physical and digital ways – also in legal manners and by using the new network.
+ Getting focussed on spreading the idea of SellaBand worldwide, adapting the platform in different languages and so to raise the number of Artist and Believers.
+ we will prepare marketing packages the artists will be able to make part of their funding
+ another innovation will be a better CRM system, cooperation and collaboration in regard of content with media partners and maybe Joint Venture with sales & marketing of major label like structures.
+ Open Air and Festival partner are going to be part of the planning as well.

50K MM: A number of Believers have announced to withdraw their money from SellaBand once it’s online again. Do you have any plans to prevent this? Could you give us some details please?
Michael: One serious issue inside the community is the modification of the Terms & Conditions (T&Cs). We had to do this in order to save SellaBand. Here are the reasons: Firstly, the possibility to withdraw your money at any time would make SellaBand a Bank, what we aren’t and what we don’t want to be. This matter wasn’t clarified by the old T&Cs and therefore had to be specified and changed so no authority can stop the community immediately because of that. The second reason is a clear financial reason. This acquisition saved SellaBand – we can technically run the platform and keep our team together. But now we have to adjust the business model for a lasting future of the platform and community – to make sure that in 6 or 12 months time there won’t arise the same problem as there was one week ago. To do so the shares on incoming payments by the believers and the payout to artists had to be adjusted. Furthermore we need more communication, more coverage, more Artists and Believers. All this needs money in advance and continuously for building up the infrastructure to achieve our goals. Plain spoken, it is no fun to change the T&Cs and therewith raise the irritation of our Believers but we all have to understand that we cannot keep SellaBand alive without any changes. All these changes follow one goal and that is making SellaBand the most successful platform in the range of crowd funded Music. We want SellaBand to become a real music marketplace. With the upcoming results of our new setup we will assure both, Believers and Artists to get back to the platform, to the idea and spirit of SellaBand. It´s all about the trust of the community towards us and the platform. Unmistakable is that our mission for the next weeks.

50K MM: Speaking about the Artists. There are a few Artists recording their album at the moment. Will they be able to continue their projects?
Michael: Of course! They will be able to continue their projects as planned!

50K MM: A lot of Artists haven’t reached their budget yet. Some of them announced that they think about leaving SellaBand. What are your plans to hold them back?
Michael: In the same manner we are speaking about strengthening the trust of the Believers, we are building up features and news for the Artists. Let me introduce that in detail in the next weeks.

50K MM: Believers and Artists do worry about the Limited Edition CDs, stored in SellaBand’s office in Amsterdam or elsewhere. They have paid for these CDs in advance. Can you guarantee that these CDs will be sold and Believers get their revenue shares?
Michael: The Limited Edition CDs are saved, no one has to worry about that. I guarantee that all Believers get their revenue shares for sold CDs.

50K MM: And at last: One thing you want too communicate to the SellaBand community.
Michael: Thank you for your belief! We are really happy to work with you all. Please understand that we need a few weeks to activate and implement our ideas and strategy.

Download SellaBand’s official statement here (pdf – 144 KB)

Talentcast has interviewed Michael as well. Listen to their radio show here: www.talentcast.nl