Billboard K-Pop Masters Concert:

Working as the Social Media Manager for my first ever K-Pop event was definitely a wonderful experience. I am amazed by the level of support K-Pop fans have for their artists. It was very rewarding for me personally as I got to work with the likes of G.NA, Brown-Eyed-Girls, KevJumba, and the Billboard Korea team. Although I personally feel like the event could have been better produced, I do feel that this concert is a HUGE step in helping bring K-Pop to the mainstream market. It was also really cool seeing the human side of all the artists. In the media and videos, they are always shown as huge stars and role models. To me, they all just seemed like regular group of people and friends. From YunHo (TVXQ) joking around with my friend and I outside the venue, to 4Minute running around playing funny tricks on the security guard’s, it was really rewarding seeing that these stars that millions look up to, are simply just regular people like us deep down that love having fun too. Sometimes I feel slightly sorry for them because their life is based on never-ending studio sessions, performances, and catering to fans that they rarely have time just for themselves. But either way, I definitely hope to work on a project like this in the future as it was a very enjoyable experience.

NewMediaRockstars:

As many of you know, I recently started a new online magazine called NewMediaRockstars, I came up with this idea in late October because I realized that there were many social media sites, but all of them were too technology directed, and not entertainment. NewMediaRockstar aims to be the number 1 New Media Blog for the independent online creatives community. This will be probably my main focus for the next year or 2 assuming that it works out (I hope it does!). Starting a company is definitely not easy, but aside from all the hardships and stress, it is honestly a very rewarding experience. I am blessed to be able to work with such talented individuals. I hope that with this new online publication, independent new media artists will use it as a hub for the latest tips on expanding their brand online, current industry news, and a place to open discussion of perspectives. The new media industry is still very new and we are all struggling everyday to try to figure it out. If you are interested, check out the articles I wrote on how to drive traffic to your YouTube channel and how to sell your YouTube channel.

TheOtherAsians:

Having more of my focus directed toward NewMediaRockstars does not mean I will be abandoning TheOtherAsians project. In fact, we are currently in the works to revamp the site and are hoping to do a relaunch within the next month or 2. Our fans continue to grow everyday and I am very thankful for all the support the community has given us. I am also grateful I have been able to meet and interview some of the most amazing people in the Asian American community. OA is currently still recruiting volunteer writers/bloggers so please email theotherasians[at]gmail.com if you’re interested! Hopefully once we relaunch, the OA site will be better than ever! Until then, check our our latest interview with AJ Rafael.

I have a feeling this year is going to be quite an eventful one. Thank you again for all my friends and supporters for believing in me. Thank you especially to my current partners Melly Lee and Ryan Philip for making my dreams a reality. ROCK ON!

As you all know, I was recently brought on the Social Media team for the 2011 Billboard Kpop Masters. I am extremely excited to be apart of this event as it allows me to help bring Kpop to the mainstream audience. I am making this blog post today to as for all your help. The KpopMasters has just launched the Facebook Million Likes campaign. The goal for this campaign is to get 1 million or more likes by the event on November 25. The idea for this campaign is not to boast proudly of our brand, but to make a unified statement about the music we love, and push the limits of where it can go with some of the best musical minds from the United States.

With one collective voice, let’s put an authoritative stamp on the newest milestone of K-Pop – hitting the legendary US stage of the Grand Garden Arena. We believe that this will foster more collaborations, and the push the next generation of K-Pop with the likes of Wil.I.am, Ludacris, and other noted producers that believe in an ever shrinking, global music scene.

Our goal is to hit (or exceed) 1 Million Fans of this page, so that we can use this as a unified petition to bring the acts we want to see to the US and make a statement that KPOP is here to stay.

Let your voices be heard. Join us in making history together, as fans of the music we love!

Like this page NOW at: http://www.facebook.com/KPOPMasters

Follow KPOPMASTERS at: http://www.twitter.com/kpopmasters

Follow me on Twitter at: http://www.twitter.com/bennyluo (I will be tweeting pictures in real time of the event!)

This is probably the biggest question for any YouTube artist starting out. While there is no set formula for success in this industry (especially since the market is so saturated nowadays). Aside from the obvious tip of producing great content, I wanted to share 3 tips that I have used in the past for my clients that have helped increase traffic to their YouTube channel.

1. Integrating the Right Keywords – Have the right keywords integrated to Coming up with the right keywords typically takes about 30 minutes – 1 hour. You need to do research in seeing which keywords have a high search rate AND also have a low competitive rating. So how do you get this data?

*DISCLAIMER*  - Keep in mind that data produced by these 2 sources are not entirely accurate, so please use these numbers just as a small aid in finalizing your keyword list for your video.

• YouTube Keyword Tool - This is a pretty good tool in figuring out the searches a specific keyword gets monthly.  If you using a keyword as a tag and find out that this keyword gets no monthly searches, then whats the point of wasting space and keeping it? This tool can save you time and increase your exposure rate in YouTube organic search since you know which keywords you come up with gets higher monthly searches.
• Google Keyword Tool – As some of you may know, Google now display YouTube videos in their organic search results. This tool gives you monthly search data for specific keywords AND it shows how competitive they are. Use this tool and choose the keywords with high search rates AND has a low competitive score (this measures competitive these keywords in Pay-Per-Click campaigns). Targeting these types of keywords will help propel your video quicker in the Google organic search rankings.

When you have your nice list of keywords, now you need to integrate them into the 3 hot spots. The beginning of the TITLE of your video should include your TOP keyword for the whole thing. The rest of the keywords should be integrated into your description space, and the rest on to your tags. Doing so well help increase your video ranking both the YouTube and Google search results which translate to more targeted traffic to your channel.

2. Integrate your own custom social media share buttons to your video – Here are 2 custom share buttons for your video and where to place them:

• Twitter: Use ClicktoTweet to generate a link to the message you want your audience to post on Twitter when they share your video. Be sure to remember to include your YouTube link into your message because a lot of people forget that part. Then use bit.ly to shorten the link.
• Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/share.php?u=<INSERT URL YOU WANT TO SHARE>. Take that and shorten with bit.ly.

Now that you have your 2 share links. Here is the crucial part. You need to make sure to put BOTH buttons on the FIRST line of the description box, that way the viewer will see it without having to click the “Show More” button. I would use CAPS or asterisks between the words to drive more attention to the buttons. Doing this should increase the click-through-rate of your share buttons. Refer to the image below for reference:

3. Submit Your Video to Crowd Sourcing Sites – My top 2 crowd sourcing sites would be Stumbleupon and Reddit. I have gotten thousands of hits alone through submitting contents through these sites. Make sure that you have catchy titles for each our your submissions to help increase CRT% (Click-Through-Rate) .Research on “getting more exposure on stumbleupon/reddit” so you know how to utilize these tools in the most optimal way.