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All articles on East Coast Overture are ©opyright East Coast Overture and are owned by the site and the original author unless stated otherwise. All photography on ECO is owned by the original photographer. ECO is not responsible for the contents of any off-site pages or any other sites linked from ECO. Linking to the site or any of its pages is permitted and encouraged. This website does not permit direct linking of images, as that is bandwidth theft. East Coast Overture is not affiliated with any artist, recording label, management company, etc. ECO is an independently-produced project, headed by
Jillianne Hamilton.
The Art of Self Promotion: Performers Guide
By Alex Maine
(05/21/09)
We all have to self-promote from time to time and it's not always the easiest thing to do. I hope by reading this you will pick up some simple but very affective pointers.
I don’t plan on going into too much detail but you can always email me with your questions and I will do my best to answer them.
Networking: So what is networking? It’s the skill of communicating with people within the same sector of business as you. For most of you, this will mean managers,
promoters and other performers. So, the question is how do you do it? Well, there are too many ways to do this but a good start would be to attend any public event that is
along the lines of what you're after. Send emails out to local people in the same line of business, use a directory to find them. The message will soon go around. Don't make
it too obvious. You're trying to build contacts so treat them like friends but remember it's business so keep them close but not too close.
Social Networking: Everyday the Internet is getting more powerful so take use of this free power. Look at the trends and register for the most useful social networking
sites. Facebook offer a service for artists to make public profiles (or pages) so people can become fans of your work. This is a superb way of letting people know when you're
performing or you're attending an event. It doesn’t matter if you have 30 fans or 300 fans. Ask people from your personal profile on Facebook to become a fan. Most people have
at least 100 friends on Facebook so that’s 100 fans already. Where to go next? Try Twitter. This site is a social networking
breakthrough. Register yourself an account with the username “YourStageName” and start talking. Over time your followers list will expand. Try to avoid the auto following
tools. It's better to follow 300 of your diehard fans and friends than 3000 people trying to sell you Viagra and “Ten tips to improve your sex life.”. I only follow people
who make good conversation with me or who interest me. There are many more following me than me following them which works for me and it will work for you too!
Blog: Spend a couple bucks and buy yourself a website. Make sure it's relevant eg. yourstagename.com. Then install Wordpress
or another blogging platform and start typing. Talk about your latest auditions or events you're attending/attended etc. Get yourself a nice theme. That first impression
could see you signing a record deal. If you need some advice on designs or hosting for a site, email me and I will put you in contact with
some people who can build you amazing blogs for less than a few hundred dollars and refer you to some great hosters. Remember to connect all your social networking sites to
your blog. You will be all over Google within weeks!
Media: This can be broke down in to several sections.
- Samples: Whether you're a singer, songwriter or musician, make sure you have some samples of your work online and available to give to people on CDs. Once you get
some feedback and you find out if people like it or not, you can start considering setting up an online shop on your site for digital downloads of your tracks.
- Photography: It's all about appearance, if you go to an event make sure you are in the photographs. Don’t bother hiring a photographer unless its totally necessary
for promo shots.
- Local Media: There is no shame in giving your media a kick start. Get a close friend or fake it yourself and send an email to the local newspaper with a report on
something interesting like a leak on where you will be performing or that its rumoured you signed a record contract. It doesn’t have to be accurate. You will find once you
give them a nudge they will come up with their own ideas. Remember the golden rule: all publicity is good publicity.
(Photo courtesy of Jillianne Hamilton.)
Go back to Music = Life.
Go back to Reading Material.
* * * * *
Alex Maine is an event manager from Somerset, England but currently living in Musquodoboit Harbour, NS. He dabbles in community projects, performer management and
photography. He is the former managing director of the National Variety Org for the United Kingdom. Check out his
website/blog or follow him on
Twitter.
