Using online video as a means of musical promotion

Video is quickly becoming very important when promoting goods or services and that means your band and music. Your music is an important service to humanity and is doubly important because it brings you an income. Youtube is of course still the most popular of the video hosting sites and you can use this site to promote yourself and your bands website.

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Stevie Wonder and Barack Obama say your music isn't good enough to just have people show up at a gig.

Have you heard of Stevie Wonder? Have you heard of Barack Obama? If you knew that a free Stevie Wonder concert was being staged at your local University would you go? Would you at the very least tell someone else about it? Is this too many questions to start an article with?

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Amplage: 0.8 Push Your Music 3/4: Magazines & Print Media

Magazines & Print Media This will play a very important role in any publicity campaign for and up and coming release. Even though many people think that people are consuming a lot of information from the internet print media still plays a very VERY important role in the agregation of information to the public. Having a solid unique press kit and professionally getting in contact with journalists, writers & editors of local, niche music and larger print media will start you off well

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How To Market Your Band Successfully

With the state of today’s music industry, most fledgling bands have to achieve a much higher level of success than before for labels to even consider signing them. They need to show proven sales and a loyal fan-base, not to mention a certain amount of drive and initiative. This means a great deal of promotion is necessary to get the word out and get people interested in the music.

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Practice Makes Perfect, But Promotion Makes Success In The Music Business

One of the most advantageous relationships an artist or band can have is with a promoter. At the local level, there seems to be a mystery as to what exactly the promoter does. “Does the promoter promote? Shouldn’t the promoter be responsible for bringing all the people if I’m putting everything into the music end?” These questions resemble those I hear from local artists on a semi-frequent basis. While that logic may seem like it makes a lot of sense, it can ultimately hurt the artist in the long run.

To answer the question; yes the promoter promotes. However, the promotional push varies at different levels based on the expected effectiveness. For example, a large national act or regional touring band has a recognizable name. If I’m promoting a show with a headlining act with a solid fan base, investing in print ads, radio spots, and other means of advertising may make a lot of sense. The average concertgoer will see that name and make it a point to go to that show. The context of the promotional push is much less important at this level. Whether you see a facebook post from your favorite band or a flyer at your bus stop, you’re going to that show regardless of how you found out about it.

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Microphone Marketing

A microphone is actually a miniature speaker. It works like the human ear; it “listens” for sound waves, then translates and reproduces the signal to send it to the brain (or sound system). Until a microphone is used to magnify a person’s voice, it is just a speaker. A microphone is great for certain applications: events where a speaker or singer need to be heard or for grabbing someone’s attention. The problem is that unless it is a message that a person is listening for or wants to hear (such as a concert that the person has paid for), the message can get tuned out just like all of the other noise in our lives.

Think for a moment about the messages you hear when you fly somewhere. Every two minutes in the airport terminal, a voice interrupts the music playing overhead to announce a “high priority security alert,” only to tell you that it is important to watch your bags. These messages tend to get ignored. When you board the plane, flight attendants ask for everyone’s full attention while they go through life-dependent emergency procedures (they even ask for you to follow along in the safety guide). However, if you look around the plane, you’ll see that hardly anyone is listening – people are reading, listening to music, or distracting themselves with little games. Even though our lives may depend on knowing these procedures, our eyes tend to glaze over and we think “I’ve heard it all before.” Yet, we music marketers kid ourselves into thinking that certain ads will be given the attention we hope simply because it’s being broadcasted.

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Ten Tips For Do-It-Yourself PR and Publicity For Bands

1. Learn how to sell yourself.  Want media coverage? Ask.  Don’t be afraid to pick up the phone and ask to speak to the person in editorial who handles music or entertainment.

2. Be Creative.  News doesn’t happen.  News is created… and develop a sense of humor, especially about yourself.  If they’re laughing, they’re listening.  Let’s be real… you’re playing music, not curing cancer.  Try not to be so serious, but don’t be a buffoon either. 

3. Grammar. Learn how to spell and know the fundamentals of grammar.  (Use the spellchecker).

4. Proofread your work.  Then have someone else proofread your work… and then have someone else proofread your work.  Then let it ‘marinate’ for a few hours or overnight.  You’ll be amazed at how many spelling and/or grammatical errors will appear, as well as glaringly required edits, when you come back to it with fresh eyes.  Sloppy, incoherent press releases or introductory pitch letters will result in their instant deletion.  You only get one chance to make a first impression. 

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BandPages Turn Facebook into a Viable Home for Musicians

RootMusic is proud to announce the launch of BandPage Plus, an extended version of the BandPage Basic tool that launched last month with great success. BandPage Plus enables bands to personalize their BandPage so the look and feel of their Facebook presence matches their music and individual style. By utilizing BandPage Plus musicians can easily create a fan page that includes the option to upload a custom banner and edit the background and text colors via a simple visual editor.

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Does posting up flyers really get people to go to shows?

Remember the first time you ever put up flyers for a show? I’ll bet you were probably pretty excited.

I know I was. I felt that if we put up enough flyers that even if half of one percent of all the people who saw the flyer went to the show then we’d be pack the venue and be well on our way to being famous within a few months. So we posted flyers everywhere. Big ones. Eye catching flyers that everyone would take notice of. How could it not work?! We were going to be huge.

So what happened? All our friends showed up for the first couple of shows and we had a great time. So we kept putting up flyers. More, bigger, better etc. After a while we realized that we weren’t getting anyone coming to our shows from our flyers, so we started to lose interest in putting them up. There were conflicting opinions as to whether or not they served any purpose. We never really got the whole thing worked out.

So what’s the deal? Do flyers work or not?

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