Entering concert dates is one of the most annoying parts of playing live. It’s both time-consuming and annoying to keep up with. Thankfully, it gets easier and easier each year to do this menial task. Entering dates into the services we have outlined below increases the chance of getting both fans and potential fans to your shows. Some of them can put them in the places where your fans go to […]

Independent artists can make more money than ever before. The walls of major label distribution have crumbled, and have been down for a decade. Social networks make promotion to fans easier and cheaper. Add in home recording, crowd-sourced artwork, and other cost cutting maneuvers and DIY musicians can be financially successful. Or so goes the myth. Reality is far murkier. Yes, it is possible to make money as a DIY […]

Are you committing any of these social media sins? 1. Promoting without providing value  This is without a doubt one of the biggest no-no’s that exists on EVERY Social Media platform today. It’s one thing to use your page to dutifully inform your followers that you have new music, videos, or shows coming up, but completely another to ram the self-promotion stick so far down their throats that they get rushed […]

A few weeks ago, YouTube released a creators guide for musicians who use YouTube—detailing best practices and techniques for musicians using the service. The 40 page guide holds much common knowledge but a few gems of wisdom stuck out to me. Below I rounded up a few key points they made, that you shouldn’t miss. Put Popular Searched Items In Your Title – If you have famous guests or keywords users will […]

Artists tend to be creative people. We write music, create dazzling visions of art, and express sentiments in the most unique ways. However, when it comes to promoting our art, something else happens. For one reason or the other, most artists fail to express any creativity in their business endeavors. Here are five easy (non-internet) ways that you could promote your band. I hope that more than anything else, they […]

1. Write, record and play high quality music It seems like an obvious thing to say, but everything starts & ends with the music. If the songs are poor, the recording is bad, and the live show is dull don’t expect to make a living from music. 2. Continue to only deal in high quality Some of the best new bands and artists are let down by terrible videos, bad photography […]

Online music PR takes patience, follow up, and a three-phase plan For any emerging brand (yes musicians, this means you), a music PR campaign is a great way to spark new conversations, build visibility within key markets, and grow your overall influence over a long-term. The problem is, your budget may be tied up in basic costs such as recording, production, touring, rent, food, etc. Working with an established, professional publicity or […]

1. When publicizing anything on Facebook, if your post just contains text – no links, no photos etc, you will immediately reach more people than one contaminated with attachments. 2. If you are going to tag something, tag another internal Facebook page. You may even show up on non-fan feeds saying you are “talking about” the person you tagged. 3. Changing your header or profile picture seems to go far more noticed than […]

Thanks in no small part to the global reach of digital distribution, more and more independent musicians are finding themselves with opportunities to gig well beyond the borders of their home countries. Whether you’re driving north from the east coast of the United States to play a coffee shop in Montreal, bringing your electro-pop act to a string of clubs in Tokyo and Thailand, or presenting a midnight set at […]

Networking is the best way to get ahead in “the biz.” It isn’t all about sending your music to Pitchfork and blogs to hope it gets some airplay in the corners of the internet. It’s about talking to the people who matter most in your town to help each other out and to build a core fan base you can build from in the coming months. Mutual Benefit The whole […]