Music Marketing in Multiple Social Networks

Music Marketing -- how does one begin this noble enterprise?

Once you've got your stupid music converted to mp3, your next move is to join as many music fan and composer websites as you can find. Check out how bands you admire are promoting themselves online. Go to their website or MySpace page and see what they link to, what widgets they're using.

Widgets that sell tunes online are usually worthless. They often have "Not working right now. Check back later." messages on them, making you look stupid.

Create cool profiles, with weird photos along with a few (I repeat FEW) glam shots for the love starved fans. Upload as many mp3s and music videos of your band, as many as they allow. Interact with other bands and fans on these music oriented sites. Explore the sites and discover new music, then post nice comments thanking the bands for sharing their marvelous tunes.

Huh?

What's the point?

What if nobody comments on your tunes, replies to your comments on other band's tunes, or friends your band?

What if all your online mp3s are ignored and under-appreciated?

Here's why...

You post tons of music, videos, and photos to the web for one basic reason: You Are Proud and You Love Everybody...and You Love SERPs.

You're proud of your music. You worked hard on it. You did numerous mixes until you got it perfect. You even deleted uploaded mp3s on various websites and replaced them with better mixes as you found flaws in the originals. You think maybe some other music fans might like your music. You want to share. Even if you charge 99 cents per download, as I have not ever done yet, still: you're making your music known and available.

Rule #1 of Music Marketing:

There's too much music. Fans can't make sense of the abundance of new music and bands out there.

Rule #2 of Music Marketing:

Go from Unknown and Unwanted...to Popular and Craved by Collector Mentalities...by spreading your music all over the internet.

Your enemies, and every band and singer has enemies, will hate you for doing this. They'll say you're "spamming" the web with your "shit". But spam is unsolicited commercial email, so it's not spam. It's not flooding either, because you don't overload any one site, you spread it out all over the internet.

Google likes it. Google spiders crave fresh keyworded content. The more you put your work on the web, the easier it will be for fans to find you. Prove it. Follow the instructions in this post, then start Googling your band name. It won't take very long for the fresh content to show up on the SERPs (search engine results pages).

As we approach the end of this lesson, let me just share with you some of the locations (that I remember) where Str8 Sounds and my other projects are found on the web. Perhaps you'll discover a cool site to put your music on, and also find some new bands to love!

Each of these sites has different functionalities, purposes, user communities, rules, and offerings.

For example, I use Last.fm to upload entire distinct albums with cover art. I use SoundCloud as a dropbox for other musicians to upload their entries in my underground music compilation. I use MySpace Music as the central hub for Str8 Sounds, with all the most important information and links there.

Some of the sites listed below contain exclusive material that is not uploaded to any other site.

Str8 Sounds
on the Web

The Str8 Sounds on MySpace Music


Str8 Sounds on YouTube


Str8 Sounds (band) on Last.fm


Str8 Sounds (user) on Last.fm


Str8 Sounds on Rhizome at the New Museum


Str8 Sounds on NME New Musical Express


Str8 Sounds on SoundCloud


Str8 Sounds on WFMU Free Music Archive


Str8 Sounds on Pure Volume


Str8 Sounds on SoundClick


Str8 Sounds on GarageBand


Str8 Sounds on Vimeo


Str8 Sounds on Mevio


Str8 Sounds on Box