Michelle

Michelle Fiddler, founder of Artisanal Management, is a music marketing and management expert with more than 19 years of experience fueling revenues and market visibility for music, film, home entertainment, publishing, lifestyle brands, and digital media platforms.  Michelle specializes in artist career-building.

She has carved out a niche in artist development from startup to A-level in the country and indie rock genres, having worked with leading artists during her years as Executive Director, Music Industry Relations with AOL Music.  Throughout her career, Michelle has held media-centric marketing roles of increasing responsibility in magazine publishing, home video, independent film, television, music, and lifestyle/luxury brands at companies such as AOL Music, Live Nation, WarnerVision Entertainment, SonyBMG, and SpaFinder.

With such extensive strategic marketing and management experience, Michelle brings a brand-focused, career-building perspective to her current music marketing and management practice.  Right now, Michelle works with a number of Nashville-based artist management firms, to whom and through which she provides specialized artist services such as: creation and implementation of marketing plans; managing online presence; creative agency supervision; merchandise consulting and sales; promotions planning and execution; formation of strategic partnerships; and business plan development.
Unlike others in her field with purely label or artist management experience, Michelle leverages her considerable background in consumer marketing of art and entertainment products to offer a fully-packaged, brand-focused approach to her clients.  She sets herself apart from other music marketers by cultivating the artist as the brand, using her keen ability to translate the artist’s essence into a comprehensive, integrated, effective marketing campaign.  Michelle’s artist clients love her method because, as they have told her repeatedly, she “gets” them: their motivations, creative drive, and career goals.

This artist-centric, handcrafted approach results in a mutually beneficial understanding between Michelle and her clients.  Tapping her extensive book of industry contacts, she can assemble just the right support team for each artist, and her experience in all forms of media – film, television, video/DVD, digital, and print – further enhances her suite of client services, enabling her to match the any format’s best practices to the development of each individual artist.

Prior to launching her own firm, Michelle was Vice President, Marketing, at SpaFinder, a media company designed to locate and promote the global spa marketplace via vertical search, magazines/directories, reservation technology and gift programs.  While at SpaFinder, Michelle drove brand growth through strategic partnership, experiential consumer events, and online and offline marketing campaigns.

Earlier, Michelle was Executive Director, Music Industry Relations with AOL Music, where she spent more than four years building and running AOL’s now-considerable country music presence (now a popular blog and social network known as The Boot).  Michelle established and cultivated key relationships with Nashville record label executives, managers, agents, and artists, and was integral to the launch of a new crop of stars including Keith Urban, Sugarland, Dierks Bentley, and the Grammy®-nominated Little Big Town.  In this role, Michelle also drove development/negotiation of exclusive agreements with artists such as Britney Spears, Aerosmith Tim McGraw & Faith Hill, and Elvis Presley Enterprises, encompassing marketing commitments, content, programming, and revenue streams.  She created live concert events streamed on AOL by working collaboratively with label, management, and producer/programmers throughout planning (advertising, promotions, logistics, and VIP servicing), and was the key liaison between AOL’s music group and corporate marketing department.

Michelle holds a B.A. in American Studies from the College of Arts and Sciences at Brandeis University.  In 2005, Michelle won Best New Artist Launch from Radio & Records magazine for the original web series This IS Shannon Brown, paving the way for other artists to use a web series as a vital tool for music marketing.  She is a member of the Country Music Association (CMA), the Academy of Country Music (ACM), the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences (NARAS), and the Film Society of Lincoln Center.  Michelle is also a proud alumna of Nashville’s Leadership Music program, a nonprofit educational organization with a mission of establishing a knowledgeable, issue-oriented community of music industry professionals.

Based in the New York City area, Michelle resides in New Jersey and spends as much time as possible in Nashville.

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