10 Top Tips For Contacting Music Websites

This article is from Hyperbot.com, and it was written by Andy Parker, editor of Electric Banana where he maintains a New Music section for indie submissions..

"Music websites and magazines receive ridiculous amounts of emails from bands looking to get journalists to write about their band! Therefore, if you are unable to afford big money bribes, then you need to follow these simple guidelines for contacting music websites to improve your chances of being featured.

1) Local and national music blogs and websites

Research and build a list of contacts in the region where you live. Regional websites are more eager to help good local bands and are generally not bombarded like their poor nationwide counterparts. Local newspapers also usually have a music section run by local journalists who write articles about local bands - and are definitely therefore worth contacting. Find your local newspaper’s website and search for a music section.

National music websites are more tricky due to the sheer volume of requests that they receive. There is no harm in trying, so approach this in the same way as local media.

2) Research the website

Look at the various sections of the music website. If you are a new band, then look for sections that focus on new music. Although you may have a new single or album coming out, ‘New Music’ sections are the first step….reviews will then follow once you are on their radar.

Don’t be scared to ring up websites and ask for information on how to send music over to them! Journalists are used to giving out contact info - so ask who deals with their unsigned reviews. If you speak directly with the department you require, then hearing your warm and friendly voice - rather than a cold email - is more likely to get your music heard. A good relationship with the media can be built by this method, but only ring to introduce yourself and enquire about contact details (name and email) - as harassing them will do you no favours.

Once you have the email, you then need to work on your email that you will be sending out!

3) Include mentions of the website you are contacting

Music websites receive many emails that look like a generic email sent to many other websites and publications. Emails like this are unlikely to do you any favours. The research you will have carried out will allow you to mention the section of the website in which you feel that your band should be considered for. Also try and find the name and email address of someone who runs the section you want to be featured on and send them an email - using their first name!

4) Introduce yourself

The opening of the email should introduce yourself and the band…age, location, and include the bands/influences that you could be compared to, with details about your next mind-blowing release.

5) Links

Include links to a website where the music can be heard! If possible, then high quality music single YouTube videos (featuring the band) are the best method due to them visually providing the viewer with a better idea about the band. Of course, live videos should be avoided - as it’s the studio versions of songs that you want to be reviewed. If you lack the funds to create a stunning Gaga-esque video, then contact colleges and universities - as students might be looking for a fun project to do.

Of course, links to official websites, Soundcloud, Facebook, and (dare I say) MySpace should be listed. If they provide a good way to show your brilliance, then include them.

6) Reviews

Have you been praised by music websites and blogs? Well, include bitesize snippets of respected praise. Are you new and yet to receive any praise? BBC Introducing is supportive of new acts, so get in contact with your local team! If they praise you on their show, then include a small quote from the presenter will grab the reader‘s attention. Based on personal experience, a BBC Introducing “thumbs-up” makes clicking on those band links far more likely.

7) Short and snappy

You are NOT Charles Dickens. Try and keep your emails short and containing all the info required. However, tell music journalists that you would be more than happy to provide them with any more info if they need it.

8) Attach a photo

Attach a couple of high quality photos for websites to use if required. Seriously, there are some very lazy journalists out there!

9) Spreadsheet

Keep a record of all the emails you have sent! Include the name, email address, and the date the email was sent. You will be able to see exactly you have contacted and when you should send a follow-up email.

10) Follow-up emails

Not heard anything for two weeks? Send a friendly reminder that have contacted them and yet received an email back. Don’t send emails demonstrating your expert use of Anglo-Saxon - as sites may have just forgotten and just need a friendly reminder about you. However, if there is no response after the second email, then it’s best just to adopt the “can’t win them all” attitude and target other websites and publications. There are many reasons for a failure to respond, so don’t take it to heart! Pick yourself up, dust yourself down, and move on."

Read the original article here.

Using the New Facebook Timeline Features to Market Your Music

If you are using Facebook to promote your music, here are some facts you should know. The article is from CDBaby's blog The DIY Musician:

Your Artist/Band Facebook page will soon be a Facebook Timeline.

Early adopters are split down the middle on whether this latest update is an upgrade or a setback; but no matter if you like it or not, all Facebook Pages (including band, brand, author, and company Pages) will automatically update to Facebook Timeline on March 30th.

Ok. Take a deep breath. If Timeline is mandatory, we might as well get used to it.

For Facebook newbies, the video above will walk you through all the new features.

For Facebook veterans, here is a quick list of all of the new features and how to use them.

Where do I begin?

Read the article here

Five Critical Things to Add to Your Monthly Newsletter

Music Think Tank has an article by Ariel Hyatt with some important things to remember when you plan your newsletter:

So – as you know I am a newsletter evangelist!

I believe it is the NUMBER ONE thing that will help you create a career in the music industry; communicating with your fan base regularly and consistently.

If you do not already have a schedule mapped out for sending your newsletters – get your calendar out NOW and pencil in 12 dates – 1X per month (I suggest you send your newsletter 2X per month but start with once a month and grow from there).

Studies show that the best days to send newsletters (for the highest open rates) are Wednesdays and Thursday so make sure to send them out mid week.

(Courtesy of Mail Chimp)


Here are 5 critical things to keep in mind as you are crafting your newsletters:

1. Keep Your Subject Line to 55 Characters
Most e-mail programs cut off the subject line after 55 and 60 characters, so keep your subject line short and sweet, and to the point; five to six words max.

2. Get Personal
Saying something personal brings you closer to your fan base. So share a photo of something you love (your pet, your kids, your friends), or something fun and non-music related you did recently like a vacation.

3. You Don’t Have To Have A Show To Send A Newsletter
How about just inviting everyone on your newsletter out for drinks evening, or to join you for a show, or share something fun that you’ve done recently; again, or maybe you just purchased a new album and you love it, and you want to talk about it.

4. Mailing Address & Unsubscribe Link
Know that by law you need to put your mailing address and an unsubscribe link at the bottom of each of your newsletters. If you are uncomfortable adding your home address, then open up a P.O. Box and use that.

5. First Names Get Attention
Use the first name of each person you send your newsletter out to. The best way to get anyone’s attention is to include their first name in the subject line of an e-mail, something like this:

Hey Kevin! Summer News From the Darrin James Band.

It’s catchy, and it gets people’s attention immediately to the subject of your e-mail. Any of the mailing list / newsletter management service that I love, including Bandletter, Fanbridge and Reverbnation can help you customize your e-mails so that your first names of your e-mail list appear in the subject line. Testing shows that the response rates will go up 50%-70% or more if you include first names..

Read the original article here.

Selling more music with Facebook

Facebook is the biggest social community on the web, and as an independent artist, you should have a fan page and learn how to use that page to spread your music and collect fans. If you are a relatively new artist (or new on the web), your most important goal should not be to sell your albums or tracks, but to get your music heard and collect real fans. Then you can slowly start to sell your music and begin earning some money.

CD Baby has created a cool guide with the title "Selling more music with Facebook", and you can download your free copy of the pdf here.

10 Tips To Advance Your Music Business Career

A stream of great articles about music promotion is coming from hyperbot.com, and here is what they call "Best of Hyperbot 2011", ten useful tips we should follow if we want to advance our music business career. The article is written by Hisham Dahud, and here are the first five tips:
No matter where you are in your career, it’s important to look back at the basics. It allows you to think like a beginner again; back to when you could visualize the most possibilities. The following ten tips, taken from a NARIP event in San Francisco, will help move forward your career in the music business - however far along you may be.

1. Have a Plan
Write it down - on a piece of paper. Studies have shown that physically writing things down not only helps in retaining the information better, but handwritten goals can bring clarity and focus. If you’ve already typed out your goals somewhere, rewrite them again on a piece of paper. You may come across new insights that can bring even more clarity and focus to your plan. Furthermore, you should be able to clearly articulate your goals so well that there isn’t the least bit of uncertainty or confusion when you’re out making progress towards your plan.

2. Recognize That Everything Is Sales
As music professionals, we’re all in the business of sales. For some, this can be a hard fact to swallow. After all, music is an art form - a transcendental language that breaks down language barriers across the world. However, it’s also a form of entertainment. In order to sustain ourselves as artists - as entertainers - we must be compensated for our time and effort. At the very least, the art needs to sustain itself. You must learn, understand, appreciate, execute, and learn to love sales. This applies whether you’re on stage, at a conference, or online - consider yourself always on the sales floor.

3. Network
You’ve heard it time and time again: “It’s not about what you know, but who you know.” This is certainly true, but only to a degree. Just as important as whom you know in this business is what you can do for them. You shouldn't be handing out business cards to every potential ally you encounter. You should first ensure that you have something of value to offer them. In a proper networking situation, a mutually beneficial exchange of resources occurs where both parties benefit from one another. If at first you seek to help others, and do so genuinely, you will gain leverage in earning what it is you’re after. Yes, while everything is sales as I mentioned above, it's important to remember the art of “sellling without selling” - to give in order to get.

4. Collaborate / Create Partnerships
In an ideal world, we’d all have large amounts of capital that we can allocate to pay top-quality help. This obviously is not the case, but sometimes money isn’t what is needed to gain the services we seek. If you can’t exchange dollars, exchange services. Either way, you’re building relationships and displaying a genuine desire to help the other person out.

5. Collect and Surround Yourself with Winners
Surround yourself with firelighters – people who recognize your passion (your flame) and encourage you to move forward, and try to avoid the firefighters – people who diminish your spirits by trying to bring you down - intentionally or unintentionally. You’re known by the company you keep, so affiliate and associate yourself wisely. Do some research on successful people and try to model their success. Also, if you haven’t had a mentor yet, consider seeking one out. Personalized and experienced professional guidance can work wonders for your career.

Read all the ten tips here

5 SoundCloud Music Promotion Tips

SoundCloud is absolutely one of the best sites for serious music artists. If you don't know this site - and don't have an account - check it out and set up your free or paid account and start sharing your music in a great community. The ability to leave comments that pop up as the track is playing, is unique on the web. - SoundCloud is also a great location for music promotion. The Music Think Tank has five easy SoundCloud Music Promotion tips:

Taking advantage of SoundCloud’s growing community of music lovers should be a strategic practice of all musicians, big and small. Sharing tracks, creating sets, and interacting with other users are all essential parts of good SoundCloud promotion. Add to that commenting, following and group joining, and SoundCloud becomes the online pulse of social music.

Looking at the current success of Skrillex and his presence on SoundCloud, you can’t help but get excited about the potential for music discovery that SoundCloud offers. To help gain the most out of SoundCloud and reach the widest audience possible, I’ve put together some tips and ideas that any musician can easily implement. I call them my 5 Super-Social Easily-Implemented Just-Do-It-Already SoundCloud-Tips.

Tip 1: Share

Sharing your SoundCloud tracks is very important. In today’s age of social networking this should not come as a surprise. In fact, this should be second nature by now. When you release a new track or a new set, always remember to share it on Facebook, send out some tweets, embed a HTML5 player on your site, post the music on Tumblr, share the track with SoundCloud users who are not following you already, and send some old-fashioned emails. SoundCloud even lets you connects various networks in their Settings area to assist in this process. Make sure you use it.

Tip 2: Be Free

Everyone likes free stuff, including free SoundCloud downloads. Don’t be afraid to release tracks for free every so often. Many people have grown up not even paying for music anymore. And although that can be detrimental to the starving artist, letting a track go for free can have it benefits. Free downloads have a certain type of virality. When the right fans get their hands on them they can spread across the world at a much faster rate than paid tracks. Use free downloads to produce a larger fan base. With a larger fan base, you have a greater chance of selling more music.

Read the three other tips here

Twitter Music Promotion and Marketing Guide

Bob Baker is one of the most experienced music marketing experts on the web, and he is sharing some useful tips for using Twitter to reach out with your music:

A YouTube video that offers a quick and easy explanation of what Twitter is and why people use it:



Getting Started With Twitter

How to Use Twitter for Music Promotion by Heather McDonald, About.com

From Twits to Tweeple, Why I Embraced Twitter and You Should Too by Jennifer Laycock, Search Engine Guide

Newbies Guide to Twitter by Chris Brogan

Getting Started With Twitter by Dave Fleet

A Geek's Guide to Promoting Yourself and Your Business with Twitter by Geekpreneur (48-page PDF ebook)

Twitter? It's What You Make It by David Pogue, The New York Times

Read the article here

Berklee's Exlusive Music Business Videos - take a look and learn!

Berklee Music has some of the best teachers and thinkers when it comes to understanding and navigating in the new music business. Here is a collection of videos on their site. If you enjoy them, you might concider attending one of their business courses, or perhaps watch more of their videos.

Watch the videos here

4 Ways to Treat Your Music Fans like VIPs

Brian Botkiller has written this guest post for CDBaby's blog, about treating your music fans:

Voice-mail, Vlogs, VIP treatment, and more!
Probably the hardest thing as a musician is figuring out how to promote your music to the masses. We all know that we can make great music, but how can we get people to hear it? This article isn’t about promoting on twitter and Facebook – at least not in the usual ways. This is about coming up with unique ways to promote your music and find new fans.

First off, don’t’ talk about yourself all the time. Talking only about yourself on social networks won’t keep people’s interest. Pay attention to what they say. Respond, retweet, like, interact! Then, when you promote yourself, you may find that they’re more interested in what you’re talking about.

This is where the rubber meets the road. Host contests over social networks, offering up cool stuff beyond just free downloads to people who share the news about your band. Free mp3s are fine,… but what about signed CDs and custom merchandise? Remember, your music is only a very small part of your band’s brand recognition. It’s your main product, but not your only product.

Fans love it when they’re treated like VIPs.
So how can you give fans that VIP treatment?

1. In the case of my band, Vertigo Venus, we opened up a Google Voice hotline (which you can call or text anytime at 505-750-VENS).

It was simple; open a Google account, signup for Google Voice, and link your voice account to a cell phone – it’ll have to be one of your bandmate’s, of course. And then, one big thing; set the voice account to “do not disturb” in your preferences. This will assure that your phone doesn’t ring off the hook or get millions of text messages, but you’ll still be able to get texts and voice messages in your voice inbox. You can offer up cool stuff to fans who leave the most inventive messages, texts, and things like that. And then, you can ask them if it’s ok to add them to your mailing list! Best of all, Google Voice is FREE.

2. Another VIP treatment we’ve come up with is writing songs for your fans – this is something I haven’t seen done before. You can pick your favorite fans and write short songs about them for free (remember the ones that come to your shows all the time – reward them!), or you can ask fans to donate money to you to record the song. Maybe one of them needs a song for their girlfriend? Tell them to go to you for that! You can make a lot of headway in this fashion, and give fans the VIP treatment.

3. Try out a subscription based model for your music. In our case, We call it “Vv365″ – and for a small subscription fee, paid per year (with discounts for buying more than one year), a fan gets all of our music in digital download format, both previous, and new releases, as well as one-offs, studio cuts, and other special offerings. They get music before everyone else this way, and they get the red carpet treatment for new music. You can set this up in Paypal pretty easily, and find a great way to work with fans in ways most others are not.

4. Other ideas include making custom art for fans, setting up promotions with local clubs (see if you can tie in with their email newsletter if you offer to do some footwork and flyer for their business), and making a webcomic about your band’s escapades. Have fun with promoting, and think about the kind of things that you have fun interacting with!

This isn’t everything you can do (the possibilities are endless), but all of these ideas are things you can offer up to fans to help promote your music and your band. Use these ideas on your Youtube (vlogs!), Facebook, your blogs, Tweets, and your newsletter. Remember, connect with your fans! Talking to them means that you’re a real group of people. Tell them about what you’re doing as a band, keep them interested. They’ll thank you for it, and you’ll see your fanbase grow – and in the long run, that’s your goal!

The whole article is here

The Indie - get worldwide airplay for your music!

The Indie is a web site for independent music artists, and their speciality is to help you get worldwide airplay. They say on their web site:

Get Worldwide Airplay, Now!

Radio has always made it easy for music lovers to discover new music and new artists. In fact, airplay is the single most important vehicle for exposing music to hundreds of thousands of fans in an instant. Therefore, your first task in getting effective promotion is securing airplay--globally!

We're opening the airwaves...
However, getting airplay isn't easy. It requires identifying viable outlets, and enlisting the a dedicated team of professionals to market and promote your song(s). Alternatively, you can build buzz and momentum by getting your music picked up on alternative outlets for global airplay. How? The Indie has partnered with Media2Radio, a company that is committed to delivering results for artists and labels that want real worldwide radio exposure! This is the opportunity you've been waiting for!

Read more and sign up: here

Effective Music Advertising

Here's an interesting article from music think tank about music advertising on the web. Independent artists are tempted to spend money on ads in order to grab new listeners and fans, but is it effective? You will find the facts below:

When it comes to music and advertising, there’s no such thing as a one-size-fits-all solution. What works for some artists will not work for others, and vice versa. However here’s one thing I can tell you for sure: too many artists are using advertising as a blunt force weapon. Simply dropping a picture of yourself, your band, or your album art into an ad unit and then indiscriminately campaigning nationwide for clicks will rarely generate the advertising ROI you need to justify spending on another campaign.

Based upon my own experiences and upon the numerous campaigns I have reviewed over the last year, I believe artists should 1) commit to running numerous test-trial campaigns prior to allocating the majority of their advertising spend to a single message, and 2) seriously consider which geographic targeting option (local, regional, or nationwide) will generate the immediate ROI artists need to justify a continuous investment in advertising.

For test campaigns, if you want to compare click results between campaigns, plan on spending at least $100 to generate 30 to 40 clicks per test campaign. Campaign costs and results will vary widely between advertising platforms. Test a matrix of targeting options, artwork, songs, messages and propositions to determine which combination outperforms all the others.

Read all of the article here

RADIO AIRPLAY 101 - The Overall Picture of Music Marketing

Bryan Farrish is an expert in music radio promotion, which means that he is sharing his thoughts (and service) to independent music artists like you and me. On his home page, he is sharing this article about the importance of radio airplay:

"There are two options for your independent music in the music business: You can either try to be your own record label (and/or PR firm, music company, entertainment agent, etc.), or you can partner with others who will do the work for you if you pay them. Either way, you need to know who does what.

A Record label, PR firm, music manager, music publishing company, entertainment agency, music distribution firm, entertainment lawyer, music magazine, and most any other entity in the music industry are all part of a "mass media" wheel that generates airplay, publicity, gigs and record (CD) sales. All this is part of a record deal (from a record label), or, it can be used to get a record deal. Alternatively, you could decide just to keep as much of it in-house as possible, thus creating your own operation. This is a realistic option if you will be in the business for five or more years, and you are willing to work at least 30 hours a week at it.

A real record company handles four basic areas of music marketing: Radio, PR (public relations), gigs, and music retail. The radio portion is what this entire site is about; radio is the most complicated part of the music industry, and the most expensive part of the budget of a major record label. If you hire an independent radio promoter, they can also help a little with PR, gigs and retail, provided the airplay campaign is large enough.

The PR (publicity) portion of the entertainment industry is obtained by hiring a PR firm (or PR person). A large record label has these people on staff, but will still hire out for more push. A smaller independent record label sometimes will just try to do its own publicity, maybe by just focusing on some local music magazines. Big mass media music magazines, however, will be beyond what an independent music label can get.

The gig portion of your music marketing is obtained by partnering with an entertainment agency who book gigs for you (good gigs can get you some PR too.) Small music labels will just try to book their own gigs. Note that an entertainment agency for gigs is not the same as an entertainment agent that an actor would have.

For the retail part of the music industry, a record company would hire a retail promoter, whereas a small independent record label would just call stores on their own. Note that this is NOT the same thing as music distribution, which is simply a middleman between the record company and the music retail stores... they just take retail orders once the retail promotion person causes the sales to happen. If you have no retail promotions person, you will have no sales, regardless of the radio that you do.

The entertainment industry has a few other entities you will have to work with... like the music manager (i.e., personal manager) and the entertainment lawyer. While they are not into music-marketing or mass-media details the way a record label or radio promoter would be, they are needed with things like music publishing and general operation once you are on the road (but probably not before.)

As a final note, below are some miscellaneous terms that some new artists seek info on, but which were already covered above:

Record label company
Music royalty
Music record company
Entertainment business
Artist manager
Music industry contact
Publicity agency
PR company
Entertainment marketing
Music management company
Music distribution company
Radio publicity system
Music industry information
Music industry PR company
Radio publicity campaign
The music industry
Music industry marketing company
Music industry resource
Music industry statistics
Marketing music
Music industry contract
Music industry publication
Music industry directory
Music industry management
Music industry magazine

I suggest that you visit Bryan Farrish's page and read more of his articles here!

The Profitable Artist: A Handbook for All Artists in the Performing, Literary, and Visual Arts

There's a new book out which labels itself as "an essential how-to guide for all artists in all disciplines to acquire the skills they need to be profitable. While all art is unique, the challenges artists face are shared regardless of background, experience, and artistic medium. With decades of experience training and helping artists, the expert staff of the New York Foundation for the Arts have compiled a “best practices” approach to planning and organizing an art career. In this book, NYFA has identified common problems, examined specialized areas of business, finance, marketing, and law, and distilled these topics in such a way that readers can digest them and apply them to their own experience and practice.

Included are interviews, anecdotes, and in-depth case studies. The skills and guidelines in The Profitable Artist will also translate effectively to teaching and mentoring opportunities that artists may encounter as their career progresses. This invaluable guide appeals to all artists in all disciplines of the literary, media, performing, and visual arts, from recent art school graduates to established artists undertaking new arts businesses to artists seeking more from their careers at any stage of their career."

Check out this great book: here

Best Kept Secret for Advancing Your Music Career

Minh D. Chau has an interesting article at the music think tank. He starts off like this:

Let’s paint a scenario. Let’s say you’ve got some great music. You’re an up-and-coming independent. It doesn’t matter who you are - the songwriter, the producer, the artist, the manager, or the indie label owner. You’ve generated some pretty good buzz for that music. And, you happen to have $5000 to spend. What should you spend it on? What would really help advance your career?

A. Spend it on advertising
B. Spend it going on tour
C. Hire a publicist
D. Hire a lawyer
E. Hire a college radio promoter

And the correct answer is…

D. Hire a lawyer

Are you surprised by the answer? You shouldn’t be. Truth is, in the world of entertainment, the attorney is king in many ways. They are the silent force behind every deal and advancement. They are the music industry’s silent gatekeeper and its best kept secret (and probably safe to say, best weapon).

Read the article here.

Free Ebook: The Essential Step-by-Step Guide to Internet Marketing

Here's a great offer from HubSpot: a free ebook with the essential step-by-step guide to Internet Marketing:

Whether you're just getting started with internet marketing or you just want to brush up on the basics, this ebook can serve as your essential guide to setting up and implementing a successful internet marketing strategy, step by step.

From establishing your initial keyword strategy to leveraging social media to promote content online all the way through to analyzing and refining your strategies, this comprehensive internet marketing ebook will guide you through every essential step you should be taking to effectively market your business on the web, whether you’re a software company, a chimney sweep, a tailor, or a marketing agency, to name a few.

This comprehensive guide will cover the following 8 essential steps to internet marketing success:

How to define a keyword strategy
How to optimize your website
How to create blog & other content
How to promote content & participate in social media
How to convert site traffic into leads
How to nurture leads with email marketing
How to be mobile-friendly
How to analyze & refine strategies

Download the FREE ebook here.

Add Your Tracks to The Vimeo Video Music Store

Vimeo - one of the best video sites on the web - has opened up an opportunity for music artists to add their music to the Vimeo Video Music Store. Users of the site can easily - and legally - license your tracks to use in their video creations. It's sometimes hard for a video editor to find suitable music that can easily be licensed, and Vimeo has changed this with their new feature :) Users can obtain a Creative Commons license or buy licenses for non-commercial and commercial use. Vimeo is so far offering more than 45,000 tracks from many genres. Users can search the library of available tracks by genre or browse more than 100 categories like mood, instruments or tempo.

As a music artist, how do you add your tracks to Vimeo's database? Most of their tracks comes from Audiosocet, which offers a catalog of more than 30.000 songs from independent artist, and from FMA which offers 11.000 songs with a free Creative Commons license. (Creative Commons is a method of marking a musical composition with a license that (usually) gives the user a legal right to use the composition in his work.)

Here's an introduction to the Vimeo Music Store:



You may submit your music to Audiosocket here.

Top Twitter Tips for Musicians

Steve Lawson (artist and promo guru) has a great article about how artists should use Twitter. He starts his article like this:

"I’ve been getting WAY too many ‘follows’ on Twitter of late from musicians who really don’t get it. So here’s my Top Tips For Musicians On Twitter. You may want to start with my Best Practices In Social Media post, or just jump straight in here.

OK, let’s start by comparing twitter with Myspace, as that’s where most musicians get their start in social media:

Like most musicians, my start on Myspace involved using the search function to find other musicians and ‘fans’ and adding them without any interaction. I accumulated thousands of ‘friends’ in no time, and for about a month was getting hundreds-sometimes-thousands of plays a day. But very little of it turned into any real interaction with them, either at gigs, buying/downloading music or just messages to say ‘hi’.

So I backed off, and stopped actively adding anyone to myspace, and recently deleted 8000 myspace friends in an attempt to make it useful.

So how does that relate to Twitter?" ...

Read the rest of the article here: "here

Download 500 Mbyte of great instrument samples here for free!

Loopmasters is a cool site for those of us who create electronic music. They have a huge amount of sample libraries with everything from single samples (drums, percussion, hits) to loops, atmospheres, voice samples and instruments like keyboard, synth, bass, you name it. Check out their current promotion where you are allowed to download five (5) FREE SamplePacks named "DJ MIXTOOLS". Go here to download your 500 Mbyte of great samples: download

WARNING: Every Musician's Digital Performance Royalties Are At Risk

Hyperbot has an important article about a change that some forces in the music industry want:

Recording artists and indie labels: there¹s a movement afoot to change the way that you would receive your digital public performance royalties, and it¹s not a good one, especially for recording artists.

Back in August, FMC blogged about the news that Sirius/XM was considering doing a direct licensing deal, expressing our serious displeasure with the move.

In recent days, the artist community ‹ including AFTRA, AFM, The Recording Academy, A2IM and SoundExchange‹ has been broadcasting the message to their members about the negative consequences of direct licensing deals for digital performance royalties. We applaud our artist colleagues for urging their members signed to indie labels (or self-released artists) to not accept these direct licensing deals.

We here at FMC wanted to join in the chorus and explain to musicians and labels why the current statutory licensing structure is better for all stakeholders.

Read on here

How to Communicate With Fans So You Connect With Them (Instead of Bore Them to Tears)

Communicating with your music fans is very important. Here's an article you should read, from our friends at the Music Think Tank:

"In the same way that there is an art and craft to songwriting, there is also a craft to writing and using language in general and these word-related skills can play a big part in how effectively you communicate with fans - especially online.

In this article I’m going to quickly address something called “point of view” and why it’s so important — namely, when to use the First Person, Second Person, or Third Person perspective when talking about and describing your music.

You probably learned these things in school. But just in case you forgot the details, here’s a refresher on what they are:

First Person is when you write about yourself: “I just wrote a new song” or “We have a big show coming up this weekend.”

Second Person is when you speak directly to the reader: “You will really enjoy this new song” or “You should come to our show this Saturday night.” (The second example actually combines first and second points of view in both “you” and “our” terms.)

Third Person speaks from a more distant, observer viewpoint: “Suzy just wrote a new song” or “The XYZ band has a big show coming up this weekend.”
Great. You’re back on track with what these three things are. Now, how can you use them to more powerfully communicate with fans?"

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