Do it Yourself Band Promotions For Musicians
So maybe you have considering hiring an agent to help you promote your music, or maybe you simply cannot afford this type of service. Perhaps you have used various paid methods of promoting your band, and failed to produce the results you wanted for the money? Either way, there are some key ways you can promote your band in a low cost, or even free manner, that will surely help you to gain a great deal of exposure.
First thing you need to do is lay the groundwork for proper promotions. Have press kits ready, postcards, business cards, t-shirts, hats, and mini CDs or samples of your music. You need to be able to give out these items to newspaper reps, friends, fans, agents, and anyone at all who crosses your path, especially while playing shows and so forth. You can get many of these items to promote your band at a very low cost through services like vistaprint. Pocketreels.com is good for mini CDs to give away. This is the groundwork. You need to be somewhat prepared to give people something to hold. Imagine if someone substantial hears you music, asks you for a demo at a show, and you have nothing to give? A disaster possibly. You don’t need to spend a lot of money, but have a few things to give out at all time. Plus the more you give out to people with your bands name on it, plus the more free CDs you can give out, the better. If you have recognition and want to charge, then so be it.
Okay, next, play as much as possible! Yes, that’s right, play even when there is no pay involved. After all, you are doing this for the fun of it anyway, right? So play charity events, fundraisers, school events, open mic nights, or even karaoke nights! If you are really serious about making it, play as much as possible and get your music in front of people. Then give out your CDs and so forth (See groundwork section, above).
Finally, make sure you have online exposure. That means if you have a website make sure it is properly optimized for traffic and rankings. You either need a website, or a MySpace, that has pictures, samples of music, listings of events for fans, and ideally an email list for fans to subscribe to so you can keep them up to date. You must have one or the other. If you need a website, you can easily build one online for a few bucks a month. You must, must, have a MySpace and/or website. I would venture to say the MySpace is important for rock bands, but cover bands should have both. If you want the professional image, you should have a website, plus a MySpace. If you are just looking for rock band exposure, and hope to make it big, but don’t book weddings and so forth, then a MySpace will do.
Good luck!