Music Promo Blog: 2004/07

Do you have some music marketing and promotion business news that you think musicians should know about? If so, submit your music promotion news.

Your CD Cover to Advertise Your Music, Another Opinion

One of the Brobdingnagian Bards' early CDs, Songs of the Muse is going into it's second pressing. When I saw Christopher Knab's article "Your CD Cover is Your Best Ad For Your Music", I decided this was the perfect inspiration I needed to update the CD graphics.

I've been a fan of Christopher Knab for about as long as I've been a fan of Bob Baker. He is without a doubt one of the top Top 10 music marketers in my book.

Well, whenever I create graphics, I find too often that I forget a bunch of stuff. So this article serves as a great checklist. But when I read Seth Godin's Best-Selling book, Free Prize Inside, I realized that it was NOT a complete list!

In fact, the music industry in general has greatly missed out on an amazing opportunity to better sell CDs.

The idea I got came from the backs of books. Go grab a best-seller and turn it over. On the back, you will find the secret...

What did you find? You might've seen testimonials, a brief description of the book, or maybe even an exerpt.

You see, one of the problems I found with Songs of the Muse is that since we call our music "Celtic music." It wasn't till much later that I realized that in the Celtic music tradition, "songs" have lyrics and "tunes" are instrumentals. This album is all instrumental. So it was poorly named for the "Celtic music" world.

But if we use the back cover correctly, it doesn't matter!

The new back cover now lists songs titles along with a brief description of the ideal person who will enjoy this CD. It includes testimonials. And anyone who reads it will have all doubt removed as to if this is a vocal or instrumental CD.

Use Christopher Knab's checklist for a better CD graphics. Then think outside the box. What can you add to the cover that will make this CD sell better than ever?

--posted by Marc Gunn at Thursday, July 15, 2004
Free republishing rights are available to all articles written by Marc Gunn. You can find a complete list of such music marketing articles here. You must contact individual authors to get their permission to republish their articles.

Presidential Campaigning Offers Emotional Insight to Growing Your Fanbase

Putting politics aside for a moment (Vote John Kerry for President), presidential campaign strategies offer an interesting lesson for unsigned bands.

I was listening to NPR this morning on the way to work. They said George Bush was heading back to Pennsylvania to campaign. This is his tenth time or so going to PA. He's doing it, because he lost PA to Al Gore in 2000 by 5%. Now, current polling in Pennsylvania shows that Bush is tied with Kerry.

Hmm. I guess it doesn't take a rocket scientest to make that comparison.

Building a rabid fan base is a lot like running for the presidency. It takes repetition to sway the opinions of music fans and to inspire them to rabidly promote your music.

But it's all about repetition:
· Tour to a city.
· Support your current fan base.
· Inspire your fans to tell their friends.
· Tour back to the city.

Doesn't sound too hard really, huh?
So what makes presidential candidates do so well?

In Bush's case, his presence combined with rousing speeches in Pennsylvania inspires his supporters. They, then, work that much harder to rally other people to support Bush. It's amazing what a little emotion can do.

Unsigned bands have just as much ammunition when earning new fans. Why? Because just like presidential campaigning, bands that want to grow fast, must tour and touch fans on an emotional level.

While Bush has pre-written speeches to inspire, music is your emotional catalyst.

When you play a song to your audience, you touch them on an emotional level. This inspires your fans. They buy your CD. They tell their friends, and your fan base grows.

It's just like running for presidency, well, without the millions of dollar campaign fund-raising. Hmm? That poses another thought... But that's a topic for separate article.

Meantime, if you want to take a look at great political promotion tool, John Kerry's website offers a free download of his "Organizing Toolkit", which offers suggestions for a hosting house party to promote Kerry. What a great idea to stea... borrow for your fans!

Oh! And if you're looking for other ways to build your fans base, check out Joe Taylor's book, Grow Your Band's Audience. It offer some wonderful ideas and some grreat interviews as well.

--posted by Marc Gunn at Friday, July 09, 2004
Free republishing rights are available to all articles written by Marc Gunn. You can find a complete list of such music marketing articles here. You must contact individual authors to get their permission to republish their articles.

Sometimes a Song's Purpose and Story Matters

Sometimes a song's purpose and story matters and is the critical factor to its success. The story could focus on...

· the spark that inspired the song, or
· the reason the writers wrote the song, or
· the details about how it was created, or
· the reason an artist chose to record the song, or
· a group or cause that adopted the song or formed
   because of the song.

If a song's story is powerful enough, it can become virtually critic proof. Some songs have critic proof stories because if a critic writes or says anything bad about the song, he'll look like an idiot. Most people would rather not.

Some songs have flaws, the writers made choices that professional writers would suggest changing.

For example there's a line in "Let there be peace on earth" that goes "family all are we" which isn't conversational, but that didn't stop people from recording and singing it.

Another example, in late 1999 I cowrote a song with Tommy Byrd called "You Rolled On"

Here's the story:

Tommy and I wrote "You Rolled On" in 1999 after being inspired and amazed by how Lance Armstrong recovered from testicular cancer then won his first Tour de France. He went on to win 5 total and is now going for his 6th. "You Rolled On" helped raise funds for the Lance Armstrong Foundation and is dedicated to people fighting cancer and cancer survivors across the world. www.laf.org

Now we want to make people aware of the Lance Armstrong Foundation's Project to raise $5,000,000 by providing people with the yellow LIVESTRONG! Bracelets.
Show your hope! order your LIVESTRONG wrist band today

In fact I'm giving a
free LiveStrong bracelet
to the first 25 people who do the following:

1) Read "You Rolled On"s story on
  http://www.myspace.com/ande
  then

2) Listen to "You Rolled On"
  then

3) Write a comment (not a critique) about it,
  in the "You Rolled On"s comment section on myspace.com/ande
  then

4) send a MySpace message to me with your name and mail address
  provided the envelope goes somewhere within the United States.
  Sorry if you live outside the U.S.

Ande Rasmussen is the Editor and Publisher of Inspirations for Songwriters as well as a lyricist from Martindale Texas. He cowrites with artists, producers and talented songwriters, (melody writers and lyricists) All his songs may be available for artists to perform or record. Please email if you're interested. Ande cowrote "Home Made of Stone" with Nashville Star Runner up john Arthur martinez and Steve Seskin, it debuted on the Billboard Country Charts in February 2004.

--posted by Marc Gunn at Wednesday, July 07, 2004
Free republishing rights are available to all articles written by Marc Gunn. You can find a complete list of such music marketing articles here. You must contact individual authors to get their permission to republish their articles.

Who Needs Flyers? How to Generate a Flood of Local Web Site Traffic for your Unsigned Band

Seems every time I read an article about music promotion, they seem generally the same thing. "Play in your local market with a fifty mile radius of your hometown."

That's actually pretty smart advice. If you can build a buzz in your region, that local buzz will eventually spread outside of your market into others.

But there's a problem. It is no easy task for any unsigned band to build that buzz. Take my hometown, Austin. Whew! I can't tell you how many bands there are here. The market is flooded. Getting through the clutter is pain in the arse.

Guess what? I learned an untapped secret
to break through the band clutter, earn you web traffic all from your local region. And you will generate good-will in your community.

Here's the secret.
Write reviews of local businesses.

I wrote a short review of a small Irish pub just outside of Austin called the Irish Dragoon Pub. They had no website. So I gave them one and added a few kind words.

This past St. Patrick's Day the owner of the Dragoon embarrassed me. He took the microphone before we started playing. Not only did he talk us up to the audience, but he thanked us for the kind review that "put the Irish Dragoon on the map".

You can do the same for ANY business wherever you're playing. And it's easy. Here's what you do.

  1. Pick a local business you want to support.

  2. Write a short review about that business. Don't just say it's cool. Tell your readers what you've bought there before to make it more personal.

  3. Put that business name in the title of the webpage. For instance, "Irish Dragoon Pub in Killeen, TX".

  4. Add a small banner with your next gig listed.

  5. Submit that webpage to the search engines.

That's it. More than likely, you'll come up easily as one of the top 10 sites listed.

To improve your search ranking, add additional links to that webpage on your website and others. And don't forget to let the business know that you appreciate them. Send them a link to that review as well.

SPECIAL NOTE: While this is a great way to bring in a bunch of random traffic. It's not targeted. Meaning those who DO come to your site, more than likely will have little interest in your music, UNLESS the business you write about attracts your type of fans. So do a little bit o'research and good luck!

--posted by Marc Gunn at Tuesday, July 06, 2004
Free republishing rights are available to all articles written by Marc Gunn. You can find a complete list of such music marketing articles here. You must contact individual authors to get their permission to republish their articles.

How Does Google Read Your Website?

Google Poodle is a great tool I found that allows you to see the main pages of your site as visitors to Google see them.

This is especially useful to help make your website stand out in the search engines. See how the Bards Crier is viewed