Last week, we asked you to post questions on the Broadjam Blog for a chance to have them answered by Dave Codr, a music industry pioneer and an indie promoter. Bloggers posted many great questions, and Dave has given his insight into several of them.

Dave responds to these questions:

General tips on how to promote


A note from Dave:

“Thanks everyone for sending in your questions! Broadjam has arranged for me to answer questions from artists like you once a month. If you’re reading this and you have a question of your own, send it in for our next round.

If you’re thirsty for more industry knowledge, I invite you to visit the music industry insider section of our website. We have assembled a number of articles there specifically written for independent artists and musicians. No login or registration required. http://www.musicphonebook.com/theinsider“

Dave needs your questions! He’ll be answering more of your inquiries next month, so please leave a question below.

Posted by Matthew Levine on 4/24/2007

I am an artist who can’t tour. I have a website promoting my latest album at AnthemfortheWorld.com and I’ve tried almost everything to promote it, but I have found that the money I’ve made divided by the hours I’ve spent promoting the site amounts to about minimum wage. I talked to three other indie artists who do play gigs and tour a little and they had the same results. Is there any way an indie artist can get better bang for their time regrading promotion, especially for an artist who doesn’t tour?


Dave’s Answer:

Matthew,

A little background on the difference between national and indie artists. National artists typically receive 18-24% of their income from CD sales/publishing. The rest of their income comes from touring and merchandise. For independent artists, the formula is essentially reversed. Independent artists make the bulk of their money from CD sales with a smaller percentage coming from live performances.

An advantage that you have as an independent artist is the fact that you get all your CD sale revenue as well as your gate receipts. If you develop a strong fan base and are able to take that fan base with you to whatever club you decide to play at, you can also make a good chunk of money from your live shows. Sadly, most independent musicians do virtually nothing to capture their fan’s information.

You mentioned when you counted up your time invested, it was less than what you’d be paid for a minimum wage job. Good thinking. Most musicians never bother to equate the value of their time with the amount of work they put it. Recognizing that puts you in the top 10 percentile.

Here’s how it works: As much as this sucks, clubs really dont care about your music. Their concern is how much money they make from your fans eating and drinking at your shows. You could be a terrible band, but have a strong draw and the club will still love you because you help them make money. They have to pay bills just like you. If you want to get paid more for your shows, you need to demonstrate your value to the venue. Your value being the number of fans you can pull in on demand. If you are able to take your crowd and go to a different club, the club is going to be much more interested in offering you more money to keep your fans at their club.

Posted by The Time Cycles on 4/24/2007

Have you came across any effective strategies for promoting an ‘online’ band offline, and is it really worth getting a promotion company involved if your music is good enough?


Dave’s answer:

Time Cycles,

First of all, I’m not sure what you mean by “online band.”

One secret to success is building relationships with anyone you want to work with. This includes fans, talent buyers, reporters, etc. Most bands don’t realize that when they call or e-mail someone, they are one of hundreds of other bands doing the exact same thing. Taking the time to find out what interests people you want to work with or to come to your shows illustrates that you value them. Rather than sending an e-mail or leaving a voice message for someone you want to work with, take the time to go and meet them personally. Virtually no independent bands do this anymore. You taking the time for a physical face to face shows these people that you value them enough to take time out of your day to meet them on their turf.

“If your music is good enough” is obviously a very subjective term. The right promotion company can do wonders. The wrong company can set you back substantially if they alienate people that you want to work with. I would be suspicious of any company that wanted to help promote me if I had never played any live shows. No matter who you’re dealing with, always ask yourself, what’s in it for them? If you can’t think of anything other than the money they want you to pay, i’d be a little suspicious. A successful, or in-demand artist will have people approaching them, asking to work with them. Anytime you approach someone on your own, you start from a weaker negotiating position.

Really, it all depends on how much money you have vs. how much money you think they are going to help you bring in. Its always a good idea to do your homework before you hire anyone or make a big purchase. Ask the company for referrals from other artists they have worked with, talk to those people and see what the experience was like for them. Would they do it again? Without having all the specific details, I can’t really give you a definitive answer. But I have learned to listen to my gut.

Dave needs your questions! He’ll be answering more of your inquiries next month, so please leave a question below.

Posted by sundae on 4/24/2007

I run a weekly party in downtown Philly that caters to electronic music. We have had huge success with the party now entering its 3rd year and the addition of our website last April has taken off too. We currently give away the mixes of the dj sets each week via the website, which also gets a lot of hits. I am wondering if there is a way to “gureilla” market an already somewhat successful site. I am more interested in getting the information to the people that “don’t know, they don’t know” about us.


Dave’s answer:

Sundae,

First of all, I’m assuming that you’re already collecting information for people who visit your website and go to the shows. Many bands and promoters fail to capture this information which is a huge mistake. You’re fans/attendees/web visitors are all the reason you do what you do. Collecting their information makes it easy for you to keep them up to date, notify them of new events and promotions etc.

Many clubs in New York use a technique that may work for you. The idea is to get your current attendees to promote your event to their friends. Typically, this promotion involves people signing up as a club liaison or whatever name you want to give the position. Instead of paying these people, you give them either a percentage of the door cover price, bar tab, or anything else at your disposal to entice them. Each week they should turn a list into you of people they have invited to the event. Typically these people get a discounted cover price or some other form of VIP treatment. Many clubs run it as a competition where the person who gets the most new attendees gets some sort of prize/bonus etc. You can announce this new promotion at the mic at your shows, include a sign up on your website, and may want to consider alternate web postings such as craigslist.org, myspace etc.

Another idea, I’m hoping you’ve already incorporated, is setting up a myspace account. You could use the mixes in the myspace mp3 player to give them a taste of what they will receive coming to the club. Be sure to include a link to your actual website as the coding on the myspace default sometimes doesn’t work. This would be an opportune place to include pictures form your events as well.

Also thinking Mysapce, if you do go the guest list promotion route, make sure all the people spreading the word for you have a link to both your Myspace page and your actual website.

Dave needs your questions! He’ll be answering more of your inquiries next month, so please leave a question below.

Posted by jcamero on 4/24/2007

Hi Dave

First of all, congratulations on your many accomplishments in the music business, and especially your work in the world of indie music, great job!

I have a Broadjam hosted website where I sell songs in the modern/alternative rock genre, mostly humorous “power rock” songs about women for a fully vocalized album, and some instrumental rock for a separate album.

I’ve been online now for about a year and a half and I’m getting about about 5000 to 6000 hits a month and rising, without any promotion.

I’m also getting a lot of repeat traffic, and I feel confident that my music is ready for a much larger audience.

My goal is for this number to grow to 50,000 to 100,000 hits a month before all my hair turns gray (or falls out).

Outside of extensive Iive performances and touring, which is not an option at this moment, do you have any helpful suggestions for me and other artists like myself for driving more traffic to our sites, ones that won’t submerge our band accounts into the red???

Also, the vocalized album, “Welcome To The Game”, won’t be completed until the end of this year. Can you give me a ballpark on the number of songs you
need to release an album of this genre? Any advice would be greatly appreciated Dave.

Thanks

Cameron Smith

jcameronsmith.com


Dave’s answer:

Cameron,

First of all, I’m impressed with the number of hits you’re receiving on your website. Setting goals is a great way to improve on your status, but I’d be cautious about how high you set the bar. Reaching the 50,000 per month range is a huge number and is probably a little unreachable. As I’ve stated in other posts, capturing your web traffic’s information is a crucial component to building a fan base, and sadly something most artists neglect completely. If your not doing that already, make sure to set up a way for your current web traffic to become members of your fan club / list.

Creating interactivity on your website is a sure fire way to not only increase your traffic, but increase your repeat visitors. Bulletin boards, chat, the ability to post pictures, etc are all tools that allow your fans to feel as if they’re part of your website. There is obviously a programming cost involved, however you should be able to find someone to do this for your relatively inexpensively.

As for your CD, a few suggestions:
• Include your website on the front of your actual CD, not just on the case. CDs are often separated form their jewel boxes, so it’s important to put not only your website, but the band name and contact information, even if it’s just an e-mail, on the face of the CD.
• Make sure the first song on the CD is your best song. Often times, club talent buyers, reporters and other music pros you will want to work with are only going to listen to the first song on your CD. If they don’t like what they hear, they won’t listen to anything else. Essentially, your CD is your resume to these music pros. Make sure you lead off with your best song.
• Number of songs is up for debate. However, I would suggest a minimum of 8 songs. There is very little difference between the decision making process for fans to buy a 4 song EP or a full length CD. It’s more about the decision to buy a CD than the actual cost of the CD.

Dave needs your questions! He’ll be answering more of your inquiries next month, so please leave a question below.

Posted by Dan Phelps on 4/24/2007

I am a classical musician/composer, I’m thinking I am a little out of place here but thought I would ask a question anyway. I am wondering if there are any tips or advice on promotion. I really want to get representation by a publisher and a record label but basically have no idea where to start! Are you able to answer my question? Thank you


Dave’s answer:

Dan,

I’m gonna start off with a shameless plug for my publication. We list thousands of record label, music publishers and music licensing companies in the Music Phone Book, which is only $39.95 and available through our website www.musicphonebook.com. The key to any working relationship is to build a personal relationship with those individuals, but first you need to know who they are. As I stated in an earlier post, most artists are unaware that when they call a music pro, they are saying virtually the same things as thousands of other bands do. You need to find a way to create separation between yourself and these other artists. The most effective and easiest way to do this is to find out what they like and what their hobbies are. When you call them, make sure to touch on topics that are not related to the reason you’re calling. People like to talk about their own interests. Simply showing that you share their interests can help you stand apart from everyone else.

I have a file sharing/stealing promotion that you can use. As you know, many people these days steal music through P2P systems, such as limewire and aquisition. These programs allow you to share files on your computer with others and allows them to grab files you have in your share folder on your computer. I’m not advising you to steal music, but I am advising that you use the fact that people do steal music to promote yourself.

Let’s say you sound like Yo Yo Ma. Electronically rename one of your songs with the name of a Yo Yo Ma song. What we’re going to do is trick people who like Yo Yo Ma’s music into listening to yours. You’re going to let them steal your music, and they’re going to think they’re stealing Yo Yo Ma’s music. You’ll need to include an audio track at the beginning of the song that says something along the lines of, “Gotcha! This really isn’t Yo Yo Ma. It’s my own music but people frequently compare me to Yo Yo. Since you stole the mp3, you didn’t lose anything. So give my song a listen and if you like it, you can get more information about me on my website at www.mybandname.com.” I’d suggest fading that into the introduction of one of your songs. Place that song in your shared folder. Open your Limewire or P2P program and let it run all the time. I have heard about artists using this technique and reaching fans all around the globe. It’s not going to make or break you, but it lets you use your computer as another tool to promote your music without any time commitment from you.

Something else you may want to check out is stretchtheskies.com. They have a cool services called the music button. The music button is a very easy and affordable way to get your CD sales reported to Soundscan. Soundscan is the definitive CD sale tracking service and is used by virtually every A&R rep, music publisher and music licensing company to track artist CD sale progress.

Do you have any news? Tell us about upcoming shows, CD releases, new websites or anything else you have going on.

David Codr, the creator of the Independent Artist Registry and publisher of the Music Phone Book, has produced and promoted over 1,000 concerts, working with acts as diverse as Dave Matthews and Notorious BIG.

He has also managed a number of regional and nationally touring bands, logged countless hours as a producer and was the talent buyer for several premier live music venues on the West Coast.

Dave was one of the pioneers of “guerilla promotion” for independent artists and bands and most of his techniques are still widely used by industry insiders.

Now, Dave is ready to answer Broadjam members’ questions about the music business.

Leave a question on the Broadjam Blog for a chance to have it answered by Dave. Check back next week to see if he answers your question. We will post his replies to select questions on the Broadjam Blog next Monday (4/30).

Do you have any news? Tell us about upcoming shows, CD releases, new websites or anything else you have going on.

Some artists begin with the music. Others start with the words. When you sit down to write a song, how do you begin?

Maybe you sketch out a tune on the guitar and then flesh it out with a full band and write the lyrics later. Perhaps you have a jam session and see where it takes you. You might even carry a notebook with you at all times and just write down what strikes you.

However you compose, lyrics or music, we want know. Tell us how you write your music in the Broadjam Blog.