Interview – Rox

In February this year, we published a series of interviews with singers, musicians, DJs and other music industry insiders as part of Music Week. Some interviews weren’t quite ready for that week – and our chat with Roxanne Tataei was one of them.

Rox’s is a life in music, singing in Church every Saturday between the ages of 5 and 10, at Jamaican family gatherings, at the National Music Theatre. A love of Joni Mitchell and a passion for complex, jazz-tinged arrangements inspired Rox to form an acoustic jazz group in the spring of 2007. The shows and songs soon began attracted the attention of the A&R fraternity, leading to a deal with Rough Trade.

Rox’s debut album, Memoirs, which she describes as the “fortuitous result of hard graft and a singular minded headspace”, is released today.

Cision: How important is the use of social media as a promotional tool when reaching out to your target audience? And why?

Rox: The use of social media is of great importance to me as it is a very effective and an easy to use tool to maintain and increase my fan base whilst sharing my passion with them.

I am a young artist and my generation is increasingly technologically dependent. Through the use of social networks such as Facebook, Myspace and Twitter I am able to maintain a “virtual relationship” my fans.

C: What are the pros and cons of using traditional media outlets and social media platforms when targeting and communicating to your audience? How do you think this will affect corporate label marketing?

R: Pros:

1. Simple to use
2. Effective way to reach out to your fan base and have a direct feedback from them
3. Messages can be transmitted instantly to a huge number of fans
4. Fans choose to follow you on these platforms; it is a new form of advertising that is less intrusive compared to posters or TV advertising.

Cons:

1. If not used effectively it can hinder relationship with fans.
2. Overusing it can be annoying to users
3. Only generation tend not to be very savy with social networks, so you may not connect with that demographic.

I think that my use of social media platforms will help me maintain a good relationship with fans. I enjoy using them and hopefully they do as well. Also it is a great way to get fresh feedback from fans.

C: What challenges do you face when positioning yourself as an artist/DJ/promoter/producer, now that social media plays such an influence in today’s media landscape? How do you feel about marketing becoming a skill required by artists?

R: The main challenges are keeping in touch with all my fans. At the moment my fan base is growing steadily and when, hopefully, it will become very big it will be hard for me to maintain a one-on-one relationship with each fan.

Marketing has always been an incredibly important skill for any artist trying to sell itself and get its message through. I think that social networks have made life easier for artists as most people know if they want more info on an artist, all they  have to do is type their names in the web.

C: Would you know how to strategically use the variations of social media outlets to promote yourself? How are you involved in the communication process of promoting yourself as an artist/DJ/promoter?

R: I believe I have been able until lately to effectively use social media outlets to promote myself. Nevertheless I have decided to start a collaboration with an online Pr company to get professional advice to improve this side of my marketing campaign.

C: Which social media platforms do you currently use? And for what purposes?

R: Twitter – day to day info. sharing with fans

Facebook – weekly info sharing with fans

Myspace – Music sharing with fans

This Is Rox

MySpace

Twitter

Facebook

Cision – MusicWeek