With Medallion, musicians can have their own dedicated online store to sell digital collectibles, share unique material, and promote tour dates, album releases, and merchandise drops, all while building stronger relationships with their fan base. Today, the firm reported that Dragonfly and Lightspeed Faction led a $13.7 million Series A investment round that was concluded.
Artists increasingly seek direct control over their communities and steer clear of third-party platforms, where fan interactions can be challenging. Although there are many options for fans to follow and communicate with artists online, these interactions may be somewhat limited.
According to Matt Jones, co-founder and CEO of Medallion, “the full potential of direct artist-to-fan connections has not been realized, even though streaming has opened up access to music and social media and created new channels for direct distribution.” “The focus on digitally native fan experiences and medallion-centric approach are ushering in a new, transformative era for artists.”
With this massive sum of money, Medallion hopes to close what many musicians see as a significant gap in the music business: a lack of control over internet interaction with fans and an inability to communicate directly. In addition to other member incentives like “video premieres or new updates,” the firm wants to use the additional funding to launch new early access chances like prerelease music listening and presale ticket purchases. Soon, artists will also be able to market brand-new, limited-edition digital collectibles (NFTs), such as trading cards and poster bundles.
Recently, Medallion introduced “Digital Deluxe,” a brand-new revenue stream that enables artists to sell a digital version of an album with an embedded music player and downloadable audio, images, and video. Artists may use a Shopify connection to sell tangible goods as well.
Although Medallion does not reveal the exact amount it takes from each sale made on the site, it is accessible to artists. Users may sign in using an email address or with one of the wallet providers, Rainbow, Coinbase, or WalletConnect. It is constructed on the blockchain.
Furthermore, Medallion is a white-label platform that allows artists to add their backdrop, color scheme, and other customizations to their digital workspace. Upon creating an account, fans are awarded a “Medallion,” a digital collectible or membership card that allows unrestricted access to the community. For example, a rotating, three-dimensional golden ring represents Greta Van Fleet.
Through social media posts, artists interact with followers, who may respond in the comments. To encourage community engagement and share concert footage and images, some musicians even ask for entries from the locals.
Currently, twenty artists—Jungle, Greta Van Fleet, Illenium, Disclosure, Tiga, Mt. Joy, Tycho, My Morning Jacket, Girl in Red, and Sigur Rós, among others—use Medallion to fuel their fan networks.
Over the past year, we have worked directly with a select group of artists to test and improve our main product features. We’re still investing in our technology and platform, even if they’re not currently available to all artists, to expand throughout the industry eventually. According to Jones, We mainly collaborate with independent-minded musicians who rank in the top 10,000 on streaming services and have devoted followings.
2024 the business intends to make the platform available to several hundred additional artists. It won’t be readily accessible until at least 2025.
A group of seasoned professionals from the tech, e-commerce, and music industries, including Jones, Mark McIntyre (CTO), Josephine Yu (CPO), Jesse Bellin (VP of Operations), Adam Ray (CFO and general counsel), Ash Pampati (VP of GTM), and Tom Milway (VP of Design), led Medallion. They have previously held positions at Songkick, Instagram, YouTube, Spotify, Grailed, Warner Music Group, and Live Nation.
Along with investors from the music industry, Bill Silva Entertainment, Black Squirrel, Foundations Artist Management, Method, and TAG Music, other investors in the round include Coinbase Ventures, Infinite Capital, J17, The Chernin Group, Third Prime, and Zeal Capital. Prominent musicians Jungle, Mt. Joy, Guy Lawrence (disclosure), and Tiga also support Medallion.
Thus far, the firm has raised $22 million. According to Rob Hadick, general partner at Dragonfly, “artists are starting to understand they are not just content creators but brands themselves, and as a result, they are building multimodal businesses that go beyond simply music and content.”
