mikhailsujan

[mikhailsujan]

For bookings contact @soleagencydubai #Repost @marshallrobotuae (@get_repost) ・・・ Pinch punch first of the month! #Dubai #Dubailife #Dubainight #wtcdubai #mydubai #Dubaiblogger #dubaitag #visitdubai #repostdxb #dubaiinstagram  #downtowndubai #ilovedubai #lovindubai #livingindubai #timeoutdubai #dubailife #instadubai #igersdubai #igdubai  #dubailifestyle #lifeindubai #dubaiexpat #expo2020 #Dubaicars #Marshallrobotuae #Giant #Robot (at United Arab Emirates)

[mikhailsujan]

#Throwback #withthegang #happilyevertravesso #weddingvibes #Goa #India (at Goa, India)

[mikhailsujan]

When the big brother came to visit @mosessujan #warehouse #lemeridien #catchup #mydubai #UAE #Throwback (at Le Meridien Dubai)

[mikhailsujan]

#waffles #breakfast #foodie #citywalk #mydubai #Throwback #uae (at Clinton Street Baking Company, Dubai)

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#sinquerimbeach #Goa #sunset #beach (at Sinquerim Beach)

[mikhailsujan]

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#HappyNewYear #2018 #burjalarab #fireworks #mydubai #Dubai #UAE (at Jumeirah Al Naseem)

[mikhailsujan]

Stars Wars Premier at DIFF #Throwback #mydubai #SoleAgency #Repost @saxdubai (@get_repost) ・・・ #lastjedi #starwars #premiere #diff #dubai #filmfestival #redcarpet @mikhailsujan @soleagencydubai still trying to make sense of some of it all!! Thanks @houseofmoiraibridal for the #weddingsuit again!! Love it! (at Madinat Jumeirah)

[mikhailsujan]

Business Plan Development

This month, like every other month here at Full Sail University went fast. The assignments were intense and strictly focused in our business plan. Steve Burhoe, helped us individually with our assignments. His lecture was emphasized with respect to each of our business plans. Our first chapter was company description and industry analysis. In this chapter, we had to explain the main purpose of the company and had to conduct a detailed research on our industry. World Stage Production, is the name of my company and is located in Dubai, UAE. It is an audio equipment rental company for live events. I had to do my research on other audio rental companies in the area. Our next assignment was target market, competition and market analysis and sales of the live events industry. World Stage Production is catering to the millennials of Dubai. Our last two papers were on operations, technology and management and financials. We had to provide estimates for 3 years on an excel spreadsheet with respect to number of staffs and their salaries, income statement, cost of goods sold, start-up costs and marketing budget, amongst the others.

Steve, helped me develop my business plan. I had a lot of doubts and concerns at first. But he gave me assistance with what the potential investors are looking for and with the numbers on the spreadsheet. I am more confident now in starting my own business as I am aware of the different parameters I have to consider and fix before I speak to potential investors or clients. I am looking forward for the last month of my Master of Science in Entertainment Business. We will have to prepare the company’s executive summary and financials. We will be having our final presentation towards the end of July and then we will be done. I am super excited about it.

[mikhailsujan]

Marketing Reflections

“A business has to be involving, it has to be fun, and it has to exercise your creative instincts.” Richard Branson

The goal for this month was to learn how to digitally market yourself and/or your business plan. Kristin Stewart, did a fairly good job in making us aware of most of the tools that are available online. She showed us how to link google analytics to our blog or website, to show us the traffic in our blog. Google analytics shows us the number of viewers hourly, daily, weekly and monthly. She taught us the different digital marketing channels such as social media, digital PR, SEO, paid search, digital advertising, affiliate marketing and email marketing.

In our second week, we were taught how to create a digital marketing canvas for our business plan. We had to write about our business concept, revenue streams and pricing strategy, industry analysis, value proposition, competitors, customer segments, channels and campaign pre-planning. Each of these parameters were helpful for my business plan. I was able to narrow down the sole purpose of my business plan, World Stage Production, Inc., which is an audio rental company for the live events industry. I used three digital marketing channels for this assignment, social media, digital PR and SEO. The main purpose of my marketing campaign was to focus on increasing awareness of the audio rental company in the live events industry across a time period of a year.

The main goal for the social media campaign is to use social network to show our in-house audio equipment and various live setups in different venues. For digital PR, our goal is to use digital PR to educate the audience by writing blog posts about the company and our equipment. Our goal for SEO is to use SEO to gain recognition for live event searches. Kristin Stewart, helped us narrow down our goals for each parameter by giving us practice questions in class which made it easier for us to find our goals for the digital channels.

I am excited for next month’s class, as it is business plan development. We have most of the information needed for our final business plan. We just have to put everything together and show finances. I am looking forward for it. Hope it goes well too.

Reference: -

Richard Branson Quotes. (n.d.). Retrieved May 13, 2016, from http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/r/richardbra173423.html

[mikhailsujan]

Entertainment Media Publishing and Distribution

Many people have asked me how to create a press kit and how to publish and distribute their personal content on to the internet without spending a lot of money. I was not able to answer them at that time. Kim Craft, did a really good job in teaching us these parameters in class. This month did go really fast, we are already in our third week and we only have three more months to graduate. I am super excited to graduate. Our first project for this month was how to create a pitch letter. I have never written a pitch letter until the first week of this month. So, I had a few doubts. Kim, helped me understand the purpose of a pitch letter and gave me few tips on how to do it. I did get a good grade on the assignment. Our second project was to promote an artist or a company. I promoted an artist and was thought how to make press kits for the artist. It was not very easy, a lot of thinking and creativity was involved which was fun. If at all, I work for an artist management company, I know how to promote my artist and his/her music. Our final project for this month is to create a business strategy for our content and digitally self-publish, promote and distribute it.

Kim, showed us a lot of ways to self-promote and self-publish our content on the internet. She gave us an example on how she published her book, Infamous Lady, she only spent one hour everyday on promoting her book and now she gets a lot of royalties. There are other third party companies who do the work for you. They publish and distribute your content all over the internet and they market your product. It is a little expensive but then you don’t have to worry about anything as they will manage all the different departments.

Kim, gave us a brief introduction about digital marketing and I am actually looking forward for next month. I am sure it will be very helpful and exciting. I will be able to learn how to market my business plan over the internet and won’t have a need to hire a social media coordinator. Isn’t that fun?

[mikhailsujan]

Advanced Entertainment Law

This month felt like a roller coaster; too much information was exchanged within a small time frame. I feel that I am equipped with enough legal information that if anyone approaches me with an issue, I will be able to voice my opinion. Our course director, Cassi Willard, did a really good job in teaching us, the importance of our rights and laws in the entertainment industry and how to protect it. I had a lot of concerns with copyrights, as I am a great believer of copyrights. Cassi, taught us in detail about copyrights, trademarks and intellectual property. I understand my rights and I know where I have to go to help someone if they have any legal issue with their content.

Cassi Willard, being an entertainment lawyer gave us real life examples on few of her past and current cases. It was useful, because now we understand our rights and we know how to approach tricky situations. We also learned how to trademark and copyright our business plan. She gave us a management agreement to look at and she explained, the do’s and don’ts when you prepare or sign an agreement. My concerns with regard to performance rights act has been cleared. In the long run if I organize a lot of small events, I will apply for a performance right license from ASCAP.

Being an intense month, at first I was a little worried, being entertainment law but I did enjoy every class and every assignment. Some assignments were hard but Cassi Willard, did explain it to me in detail and helped me understand the issue. The most important lesson to take off from this month is to always copyright your work and do not encourage piracy. If your lucky, you can earn a lot of money.

[mikhailsujan]

Product and Artist Management

This month did go really fast, I have to say. I was looking forward for this course since the beginning. I am very much interested in managing artists and at the moment, I am managing few artists in Orlando. This course molded me and taught me to think in a different perspective. Being a vast subject, our lecturer, Christine Winn, separated the month into two parts. 

The first two weeks was about how to manage an artist and the last two weeks was how to market your product. I did not know that artist was referred to any type of talent such as actors, athletics and sports players, amongst the others. We had to research on a well-known artist managers and learned from his/her success and failures.

In the last two weeks, we had to create a marketing plan for a product and our final project was a go-to-market strategy. We had to answer questions like why would clients buy our product and what makes our product different from the others? This exercise made me think creatively. We had to find our target audience on basis of demographics, psychographics and affinity groups. I wasn’t aware of this method of finding your target market.

I really enjoyed this month as Christine Winn, made the lecture very interactive. She kept asking us for our personal opinion and we built the conversation from there. I feel this way of teaching is the most effective. I am little worried about the next month being Advanced Entertainment Law, but let’s see how it goes.

[mikhailsujan]

Negotiation and Deal-Making

Negotiation is very important and we do negotiate on a daily basis but at times we do not realize. Elizabeth Counsman, taught us the different tactics in order to have a healthy negotiation. She taught us how important it is to have a great understanding of interest, positions, mutual benefit, objective criteria and BATNA, amongst the others.

Interests is the reason why two parties meet to have a negotiation. I did my case study on the negotiation process of Disney buying Lucasfilm. Both were interested with each others brands and that was the reason for their negotiation. Positions is what you have decided you want. It should be concrete and specific. It also tells the opposing party what you really want and make you more defensive. Mutual benefit is important for both the parties. The negotiation must not be one-sided, the final decision made must be mutually beneficial for the two. Objective criteria will help you stay true to the industry standards. You must know the industry in which you are in so that no one can cheat you with respect to numbers. It is a must to do research before you start a negotiation. Best alternative to a negotiated agreement (BATNA) is your back up plan. You must always have a back up plan before you negotiate. In the case study, George Lucas’s BATNA was making the new Star Wars trilogy but Bob Iger’s deal was better. He offered to buy Lucasfilm, allowing George Lucas to retire.

In conclusion, these are the few guidelines we learned this month. I have already been using my negotiation skills. The other day I negotiated a price for a car at a dealer for my friend. I got a really good price for my friend and the dealer agreed to take care of all the documentation, instead of my friend going to the DMV which would have been inconvenient. All credits goes to my negotiation and deal-making class.

[mikhailsujan]

Entertainment Business Finance

To be honest, I was a little worried about the class because it was finance and I am not good with numbers. But our instructor, Mr. Bill Thompson made the course very interesting and easy to grasp. He gave us an overview of the different elements in finance and then broke it down to us. First, he showed us different financial reports of companies like Disney, Apple, Walmart and Time Warner and made us analysis each sector. He also made us analysis income statements, balance sheets and cash flow statements. He made us develop skills in analyzing financial statements using financial ratios as a main tool of analysis. He also made us familiarize on annual reports on different companies.

I always wanted to know how the stock market works. In this course, I learned in detailed how to buy or sell a share in the stock market. I have learned how to use the time value of money calculator, to calculate values for present value of lump sum, present value of annuity, future value of lump sum and future value of annuity. This information was important to me and showed me how to make more money when the invested amount is low.

Finally, the Pro Forma financial statement spreadsheet was an eye opener. This exercise showed me approximately how much money I will need to start my company. I wasn’t aware of few of the sectors which were important like depreciation, payroll taxes and insurance, amongst the other. We had to show sales for 2017 and 2018 which was fascinating. The spreadsheet we completed was an exact copy of the real world Pro Forma financial statement.

I want to conclude by saying, the finance class has molded me as business student and it did educate me a lot and will help me in my professional career as well as my personal life.

[mikhailsujan]

Learning how to Broadcast audio on the #digidesign #AvidS6 #Avid (at First Baptist Orlando)

[mikhailsujan]

Business Storytelling and Brand Development

This month has taught me the seriousness of a brand identity. From the first week onwards I have been working on my entertainment business plan. I have learned the importance of business storytelling through TED talks and other videos we were shown in class. I now know how to audit an entertainment brand and the parameters I have to keep in mind. Creating the entertainment business model canvas made me broaden my views on establishing my company.

Producing a logo and coming up with a brand name isn’t easy. The brand has to have an emotional connection with the audience to get their attention and to stand out. To have a strong brand name the name has to be fanciful, arbitrary, suggestive, descriptive or generic, which is very important. Same goes for the logos, the different categories of a logo are word mark, letterform, emblem, pictorial mark and abstract/symbolic. The type of logo depends on the type of service the brand provides to the customers and clients, it maybe in the social sector or the cooperate sector.

Towards the end of course I have learned the importance of having a positioning statement, creative brief, tagline, mission statement/mantra and a corporate culture. These are few areas I didn’t look into when I was thinking about by business plan. Having all these sectors on paper, on a written document. It will be easy for me to create my company website. This course played a major role for my business plan and entertainment brand identity. I will have to modify my business plan in the upcoming months because I will be learning about finance, deal-making, entertainment law and digital marketing amongst the others. I have learned he importance of business storytelling and brand development.

[mikhailsujan]

My #sticker collection. I need more. #dpa #fender #meyersound #dandb #audiotechnik #shure #sae #audioengineer #fullsail #fullsailuniversity #fsnation #microphone #soundguy #soundengineer #mikhailsujan #sound #livesound #Orlando #Florida (at Goldenrod, Florida)