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Promoting Your Band - Tips For Musicians
Author: Jason Cole  | Posted: 19-06-2006 | Comments: 0 | Views: 262 | Rating: (50)  (?) 
Your band is starting to take shape, finally. You've recorded a demo and have had a little airplay on your local college radio station. You're starting to regularly play shows, and although the band's not headlining yet, you feel like your playing is solid. Shopping that demo around isn't doing much for, because none of the labels have ever heard of you. And while you have a close-knit group of people who come out to your shows, most of them are personal friends, or friends of friends. So what's next? How do you start chipping away at gaining exposure? Here are a couple of tips for promoting your band.
1. Use online communities -
Websites like DFJams.com, SectionZ.com, and Myspace.com are great tools that I think all musicians should be taking advantage of. These musician's sites allow bands and artists to sign up and basically receive their own free web space. You can post MP3 files, videos, show dates, and sometimes even post blog entries. This allows you to keep your fans up to date on what's going on with your band, introduce new songs, and basically engage people that you normally wouldn't be able to. If the musician's community you utilize has a message board or forum, definitely get on and participate. One of the greatest things that the internet has to offer musicians is the wealth of knowledge other users have, go ahead and tap it!
2. Maintain a website -
In addition to musician's communities, go ahead and start a website for your band. Start by purchasing a domain name, do a google search for www.yourbandname.com. And if it is not taken, go to itsyourdomain.com and buy it. You can find affordable hosting for your website at networksolutions.com. But if you are not very internet savvy, hire a web designer to do this all for you. You can use your website as a base of operations on the internet. Post sample tracks, music lyrics, photos, and show dates. It's like using a musician's community, except the only limit to what you can do, is what you can imagine.
3. Flyer shows / Pass out business cards -
If your band is serious about gaining ground in the music industry, you'll need to treat it like a business. So, I would definitely recommend having business cards printed up, with your contact info, and your band's website address. When you go to your local record store, drop a stack off. When you go out to clubs to see bands play, leave some there. Pass them out to people on the street. Do whatever it takes! An alternative to a traditional business card is the CD business card. This is a wallet sized CD that has all of your business card info printed on it, and also contains files. You can place song samples, photos, whatever you want. Most places that manufacture audio CDs also offer CD business cards at affordable prices.
Getting your band from the garage to a major label is not easy by any means. It is a combination of hard work, dedication, and pure luck. But that doesn't mean that you should not have a focus and a strategy. Like I said earlier in the article, a successful band is run like a successful business. You know your goal, and to reach this goal you need to use every tool at your dispense. These 3 tips are 3 of the many tools that will help you further your music career.
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