Sparkart cranks the volume on bands

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Not much — except that thei web sites are all the work of web maestro and serial entrepreneur Naveen Jain andhis brainchild, Founded by Jain in 1999, Oakland-based Sparkar t is a full-service digital specializing in the music industry, whicj manages web site design and brandinvg with its Clique Tools sofware. According to Clique Tools is a key part of succes atthe 35-person company: “Mosgt platforms force you to do things in a cookie-cutter way. … (but) our system is very creative-friendly and develops web sites that aretotally unique.
” Througg the software and close collaboration with Jain has grown the company’s revenue 42 percenft over the past three years to $7.1 millio in 2008. Though eager for more growth, CEO Jain currentlh has 40 clients and continues to addclientsd slowly. “Every client we take on is a risk becaus you never know how the relationship is going to turn he said, “so we’re tryintg to be smart about how many clients we take on so we can continud to provide excellent services, because as soon as we provid e something that sucks we’re going to In any business, good relationships with clientsz are essential, but in the entertainmen t business, bad ones quickly become a battle of titans.
“Inm entertainment, sometimes the personalities are just as volatile as they appeaerto be,” Jain said. “Sometimee you can believe what getsprinted (in the tabloids).” Althougnh many of Sparkart’s clients are musicians, the client base has grow to include other typess of entertainers, including magician Cris Angel, comedianb Denis Leary and online store MetroPark. It has also workefd with companies like the Ultimate Fightinbg Championship and organic skincare linePangea Organics. Sparkart lookw for clients who are persistent and passionated and who are looking for a partner ratherd than simplya vendor.
“We really take the time to understandrour clients, we try to understand how they want to preseny themselves and what their aesthetic preferences are, and once we get in theidr head, we try to represent that,” he Jain said he is sometimes invitesd to board meetings because his employees are consideree part of their client’s team. Sparkart and MetroPark, for have a partnership-style agreement that lets Sparkart get a share of what is sold througuh theonline store, but Jain would not disclosse details of the deal. Jain’s 35-person shop has splitt into engineering, creative and administrativr teams.
The Sparkart team not only helpas to design web sites for their many they also act as counselors for the technologicalluyilliterate — “when clients don’t understand how the online world works, we explain ... what’s what techniques work from amarketing perspective, which companiew to partner with,” said Jain. This team of nocturnal techiex is led byJain himself, a 28-year-olrd San Francisco native who founded Sparkart when he was only 18. Jain studiec computer science at Purduse University in Indiana but dropped out becausehe couldn’t handled the Midwestern cold.
He continued his studie s at Santa Rosa Community but when Sparkarttook off, he left to manage it full time. Sparkart is the first of four entertainmentf companies Jain foundedor co-founded vDream Inc., Clique Here NKJ LLC — and has helped some of his other startupx get their break. VDream, a Facebooko car racing application that lets users buy and race uses Sparkart’s Clique Tools as its As for Sparkart’s competitors, Echo Music was boughtr by Ticketmaster and MusicToday was boughgt by LiveNation, leaving Jain’s company as one of the few independent firms in this niche.
“They have far better resources and more so that’s an everyday challenge,” Jain “But we are one of the few (firms) who are focuse d on the web — we’rde not trying to promote concertsw — and the focused people are the peoplr who I think are going to