Case Study: Real Hip Hop

Small Business Application

John Huffman, IV

Listen to an interview with Real Hip Hop’s John Huffman, IV about how Real Hip Hop utilizes EchoSign

Company Overview

Real Hip Hop signs independent musicians and markets their ringtones, music downloads, videos and other content to the mobile hip-hop community.

Workflow Challenge

Sales and marketing employees at Real Hip Hops interact with record label CEOs, investors, talent agents, and producers to sign independent musicians – on average managing 75-100 contracts per month. The traditional process for managing contracts included delivering a paper contract and a PDF version to an artist; waiting for the artist to sign the contract and fax it back to Real Hip Hop; waiting for the CEO to countersign the contract and fax back the final contract to the artist; faxing the completed contract to the Real Hip Hop technology partner in Boston; and finally faxing the signed contract back to the artist. The whole process took two weeks to complete.

EchoSign Solution

Using EchoSign everyone gets a copy of the contract at the same time, each party is instantly notified when someone signs the contract, and the final contract is emailed with a PDF version. Typically, Real Hip Hop uses EchoSign's legally binding e-signature capability, but if an artist wants a handwritten signature on a contract, all they need to do is print out the contract, sign it, and fax it back to Real Hip Hop's EchoSign account. Even with a written signature, the contract is automatically turned into a digital copy, copies are emailed off to all parties, and archived online in the EchoSign account. Everyone at Real Hip Hop has access to the online digital archive and can quickly see the current state of a contract that is out for signature, and can instantly access past contracts for reference purposes.

Results

Real Hip Hop tried EchoSign and immediately the benefits became evident. EchoSign’s e-signatures reduced the contract time from two weeks to three days. “EchoSign has changed the way we do business.”

EchoSign has changed the way we do business. It cut our contract processing time from 3 weeks — to 2 days.

— John Huffman, IV, CEO