This is the fifth post in this series, covering promotion. Previous posts have covered developing your overall goals, figuring out what your product(s) could be, determining how to price those product(s), and deciding where to place yourself and the product(s) you’re selling.
Promotion is often the most prominent of the 4P’s, as much of the “What should we sell?” and “How much should we sell it for?” takes place behind the scenes. However, the basis of promoting your products in the places you’ve chosen are founded in the decisions you made earlier in this series, so they’re no less important to you.
Here’s where our first ideas really come in handy, “the big picture”.
- What is my ultimate goal?
- What do I want to achieve on the way to my ultimate goal?
- Why am I in the music business; what’s my motivation?
- If I’m going to make money off of this venture, what are the ways I see myself doing so?
- How in the hell am I going to measure success?
Big Idea(s) –> Strategy –> Tactics –> Execution
Your product, price, and place(s) must all tie in with the answers to theses questions. The promotion questions really start to guide your execution. It all fits together.
How Should I Promote Myself?
In place, we covered these three questions:
- Where does your audience exist?
- Where does your audience go for information?
- How does your audience prefer to connect with each other (and with you)?
Your answers are a great start for your promotions strategy. You know what you want to sell, whether it’s your music, your schwag, your services, your shows, or even your brand (guest appearances, anyone?). You know where your audience exists, which gives you a clear path for how to reach them. Promotion follows logically from there.
- What is my ultimate goal?
- What do I want to achieve on the way to my ultimate goal?
- Why am I in the music business; what’s my motivation?
- If I’m going to make money off of this venture, what are the ways I see myself doing so?
- How in the hell am I going to measure success?
These are all questions that your promotion strategy can help you answer, though I’m sad to say that there’s no “magic formula” I can give you to help you determine the “right” answers to these questions. Some of it is gut instinct, some of it is personal preference, and a lot of it is making sure that your promotions are intimately tied with the product you’re selling, the price you’re selling it at and the place that sells it.
Promotion… What?
Consider this…
If you run a promotional campaign for your new record, where will this campaign run? Will you print posters to put in your local record shop, or buy banner ads online? If you buy banner ads, what sites will you buy them on? Should you have a Facebook Fan Page to help promote the album? Should you create a Facebook Event to allow your fans to register for, and share your even with their friends? How does Twitter fit into everything? What about your blog? Should you even have a blog?
OK, breathe…
Start with these questions:
- In the places where I’m selling my products, how do people communicate?
- Are there opportunities to get in front of my fans virtually? If so, where and how?
- What has “worked” for people similar to me in the past? Even better, what “hasn’t worked”?
Now, here’s where more than a few common mistakes are made. For example, as a counterpart to Pistachio’s “Musician’s Guide to Rocking Twitter“, I created “A Guide to Completely Failing at Twitter (As A Musician)“. We’ll get to more later, but as you move through your answers, you may want to power up Google or Twitter Search and type in a few of the keywords in your answers.
As for our hip hop band, their answers are below.
Q: In the places where I’m selling my products, how do people communicate?
A: My local record store is a really tight-knit community. In-store performances and discounts to shows work well. My fans are also on message boards talking to each other, on Twitter and on our website.
Q: Are there opportunities to get in front of my fans virtually? If so, where and how?
A: Yes, on Twitter, our website and major hip hop message boards. We notice that most people go to Facebook more than MySpace now, but our fans aren’t really into either.
Q: What has “worked” for people similar to me in the past? Even better, what “hasn’t worked”?
A: MF Doom and Burial have built quite the name for themselves being slightly mysterious, and both Radiohead and Nine Inch Nails have made quite a bit of money offering their music up for what their fans feel like paying. More recently, Imogen Heap created great buzz before her album launch by involving her fans in the process of making the album.
Here are a few resources, giving you some ideas of how to plan and execute your promotions.
- Integrated Marketing Communications Plan (it sounds complicated, but click anyway as it’s good info to know)
- Guerilla Music Marketing Suggestions
- Creating a Music Marketing Plan (bit old, but there’s good info in here)
- 1,000 True Fans (saved the best for last!)