often-overlooked promotion strategies you should be using to market your music (III)

Continuing from last week’s article…

Identify your image

Bands that choose to portray a certain image often attempt to mislead the music-buying public. And these music consumers show their displeasure by staying away from your shows and new CDs in droves. Having an “image” implies something phony – a façade that tries to manipulate the people exposed to it.

Instead of trying to communicate your image, start marketing your “identity.” An identity is an honest expression of what your music and personality are all about. I know this might seem like a nit-picking argument over semantics, since many people use these terms interchangeably. But if you focus on finding your “Identity,” it forces you to send a more honest message regarding your music.

And that kind of honesty breeds confidence and attracts fans like magnets.

Grab attention – with a purpose

Before you fall in love with a crazy new promotion scheme, consider this: People will remember the most fascinating part of your marketing but not necessarily your band or new release. Of course, this all depends on what the most fascinating aspect is. If you display an eye-catching photo or piece of artwork on your web site or fliers, people may remember the visual image but not your band name. If you use a witty headline, they may remember the humor but not your musical identity.

Reality: Music consumers are first and foremost interested in the benefit they get from the artists they support. So if you want to interest them, relate your marketing pitch directly to their needs. And do it in a way that makes your band or new release the most fascinating part of the message.

For instance, the Tone Casualties label ran a print ad that still has me scratching my head. A collage of bizarre artwork takes up half of the ad; the other half is filled with small, hard-to-read text. I think this ad is promoting several of the label’s releases, but I’m not sure. I know that Tone Casualties specializes in unconventional, experimental sounds, but this experimental marketing ploy doesn’t help get the message across.

A half-page ad from Hannibal Records, on the other hand, does a nice job of using humor to get its point made. The headline reads, “Did you hear the one about the Cuban piano player, the Tibetan nun and the Finnish accordionist?” the smaller subhead underneath explains, “It’s no joke: They’ve made three must-have new world music albums for Hannibal.”

Each album then has a one-sentence description and that’s it – short, sweet, interesting and effective. Just like all good music marketing efforts should be!

Doing it yourself – at least at first – is better

According to John Huling, a New Age artist from Arizona, the personal approach is best. “If you see a store selling the type of music you play, immediately give the owner a copy of your album,” says Huling in an issue of Disc Makers’ Fast Forward newsletter. “Return a few days later to see if they liked it. If their response is positive, ask them to stock it.”

Lesson: after you get your release into enough stores, distributors will then be interested in taking on your line of recordings – thereby saving you a lot of time and effort dealing with so many different retailers. But in the meantime, as Huling points out, “the money from a lot of little stores does add up.”

Huling also explains that the experience of releasing CDs on his own Novox record label greatly prepared him for being approached by major record companies. “I was offered a dollar per unit from one major label,” he recalls. “There was no way I’d do that. But if I had not released my own albums and been successful as an independent artist, then those same offers would have sounded good.”

Demo strategies that set your music apart

Whether you want to attract the attention of a publisher, record label, music magazine or radio station, you need to find ways to make your recorded submissions stand out. Here are two ideas few others are using:

1) Several years ago, as I was going through submissions to an annual music conference, I came across a short tape that featured snippets of about 30 seconds and the next song began. I got a quick earful of this group’s music without getting bored or having to fast-forward through the tape.

I believe that, in the right situations, this sampling presentation can be an effective one. It gives you more bang for your buck, especially if you make the recipient aware of the time-saving benefits of this format.

Strategy: include a short letter that states something like: “You’re busy. You haven’t got the time to listen to every note of every song that comes across your desk. That’s why we’ve made it easy for you to enjoy a three-minute sampling of our six best songs. That’s all it takes. Three minutes. And you’re done. If you like what you hear, contact us for our full-length CD…”

If more artists used this approach, they’d probably see a better response to unsolicited mailings.

2) This second demo submission technique could work well along with the first one or by itself. It involves recording a personalized voice message at the beginning of each CD you send. Let’s say you plan to send the six-song sampler mentioned above. Make the first track a 30 second recording of your voice greeting the specific person the CD is meant for. Yes, this tactic will take a little extra time for you to burn individual CDs for each contact.

The CD should be delivered with a note saying: “I recorded a personal message just for you on the first 30 seconds of this CD. I think this is something you’ll want to hear.”

How it works: Once the person’s curiosity is teased and he or she pops in the CD, your recorded message might say: “Hi, Pat. This is Fred from the band Green Slime. I really enjoy your columns in the The Weekly Music Rag, especially the piece you did on (insert any detailed reference, as long as it’s genuine). I know you’re busy and are probably sick of opening mail, so I thought I’d give you a change of pace with this voice cover letter. The rest of this disc contains… (here you can borrow wording used in the sampler CD example above).”

The reason these two tactics work is because they meet the two most important criteria for marketing music:

1. They keep the recipient’s limited time foremost in mind.

2. They are truly different from the norm.