New Release Tuesday throwing treasure hunt

Boise, ID – For the third year, NewReleaseTuesday.com (NRT) is offering a fun-filled and original holiday distraction with its annual NRTreasure Hunt. The interactive online game sends players on a quest to find 24 clues hidden across NewReleaseTuesday.com and partner sites that uncover a message worth NRTeam Points and prizes.

Those who complete the hunt can unscramble a three word bonus clue good for points they can spend on free merch and music. They can also unlock a hidden content, sponsored by Word Entertainment, that gets them an entry to win one of 8 incredible prizes like an Apple© iPad 2, a Playstation© 3 gaming system, an Amazon© Kindle Fire tablet, a Flip UltraHD Video Camera and one of four $25 iTunes© Gift Certificates.

Word Entertainment is offering everyone an additional 15% off orders in their artist’s merch stores, including Francesca Battistelli, Group 1 Crew, Chris August, BarlowGirl, Sidewalk Prophets, Points Of Grace, Big Daddy Weave, Meredith Andrews, Dara Maclean, Patrick Ryan Clark and their newest signing, for KING & COUNTRY.

“We jumped at the chance to partner with NRT for the interactive treasure hunt,” says Word Entertainment’s Adam Zinke. “This will be the second year that we’re involved. We’re always looking for new and creative ways to market our artists, their music and their merch online. Heading into the Christmas season, it was the perfect time to feature new holiday merch bundles and offer NRTreasure Hunt players a special discount to say ‘thanks’ for supporting our artists and loving Christian music.”

The hunt has begun and will end at midnight EST on Monday, December 26, 2011. NRTreasure Hunt can be played for free at http://www.newreleasetuesday.com/hunt.

Launching in conjunction with the NRTreasure Hunt is a new ministry opportunity for the NRTeam, NRT’s highly engaged community made up of over 55,000 Christian music, book and entertainment fans. NRTeam Members can now donate the points that they earn for various activities throughout the site to different ministries and non-profits, in addition to earning free artist merch and music. NRT will donate $1 for every 100 points that members choose to donate. Up to $1,000 will be available for donation through the end of the year.

“This is such a great opportunity for members to link together with NRT and provide a nice gift for these organizations at their greatest time of need,” says NRT Founder, Kevin McNeese. “We are thrilled to give members the ability to earn real world donations to the charities and non-profits of their choice through this program.”

Initial partnerships are with Compassion International, a Christian child advocacy ministry that releases children from spiritual, economical, social and physical poverty, along with To Write Love On Her Arms, a non-profit organization and apparel company that presents hope and findishelp for people struggling with depression, addiction, self-injury and suicide. More partnerships will be announced soon at http://www.newreleasetuesday.com/nrteam_points.php

“We are honored to be chosen as a launch partner for this program” says Paul Haddix of Compassion International. “All donations received from the NRTeam will be directly used to help the over 1.3 million children sponsored by Compassion!”

Since launching the NRTeam Points system in September 2007, NRTeam Members have earned over 1.3 million points towards free signed artist merchandise, T-shirts, CDs, DVDs, books, buttons and more. NRT is projecting to end the year with total pageviews of just under 10 million and total visitors reaching 4.9 million representing a visitor increase of 79% over 2010.

About NewReleaseTuesday.com
NewReleaseTuesday.com (http://www.NewReleaseTuesday.com) was launched in August of 2002 and offers the most complete and up-to-date listing of upcoming releases online, exclusive artist interviews, commentary from a variety of columnists, weekly New Christian Music PodCasts and the latest in Christian music news. It is also the home to the NRTeam, an online music community that maintains the largest online databases of Christian artist profiles, album reviews and song lyrics. NewReleaseTuesday.com is part of the FrontGate Media group.

FrontGate Media (http://FrontGateMedia.com) is the largest culture-engaged media group & marketing service reaching the faith and family values audience which represents $4.6 billion worth of Christian products purchased by consumers annually according to USA Today. The firm is celebrating its 10th Anniversary in 2011. The FrontGate Media group provides reach to more than 15 million email subscribers, 25 million monthly page views, and 600,000+ at annual events. The media group is #1 in reach to several consumer and leadership demographics in the faith and family values audience including entertainment fans, music fans, church musicians and worship leaders, youth leaders and youth group students, and political conservatives. The company plays a key role in the success of movie studios, non-profit organizations, publishers and authors, record labels and artists and more seeking “creative & emerging media” outlets.

A leader in the music industry, Word Entertainment (http://wordentertainment.com), a Warner/Curb company, is a unique, comprehensive entertainment company comprised of multi-faceted artist service departments including publishing, merchandising, booking, and online initiatives. Word Entertainment represents some of the top names and brands in music, including Meredith Andrews, Chris August, BarlowGirl, Francesca Battistelli, Big Daddy Weave, Patrick Ryan Clark, for KING & COUNTRY, Group 1 Crew, Dara Maclean, Point Of Grace and Sidewalk Prophets and is home to 25 LIVE, Word Distribution (representing Curb Records and Big Idea/VeggieTales among others), Word Print, Word Music Publishing and Word Label Group’s Word Records and Fervent Records.