1. 1. INTRODUCTION
2. 2. HOW TO MANAGE YOUR BAND
3. 3. GET STARTED
4. 4. HOW TO REHEARSE
5. 5. FINANCIAL ISSUES
6. 6. ABOUT GIGS
7. 7. THE SECRET WORLD OF CLUBS
8. 8. YOUR FIRST GIG
9. 9. ABOUT TOURING.
10. 10. MARKETING..
• About Media
• Local Newspapers.
• Press Kit
• Interview
• Flyers
• Bulletin Boards.
• Posters
• Leaflets
• Internet

10. BAND MARKETING

Word-of-mouth is a great way to get people to your shows. Not only is it effective, it will establish your reputation as a "street-level" or "grassroots" band that hasn't yet registered on the public's radar screen. But eventually you'll want to expand your audience, even if it's just from 10 people to 50, or from the tiny suburban coffeehouse to the hip downtown nightclub. One excellent way to do this is by landing articles—or even brief mentions—about your band in the local media. The process can be intimidating: Busy music writers have eight zillion CDs stacked on their desks, and the last thing they need is another local band pestering them.

You can be the best band in the world, but if people don't know about you, they won't come to your shows. The more people hear about you, the more people will assume you're worth watching—or hiring. To expand, and spread the word, the local media is an invaluable tool.

"Media coverage" is a broad term—for your purposes, it can mean a glowing review in the local newspaper trumpeting the band's talents and achievements. It can also mean a tiny-type listing in the local alt-weekly stating the time, date, ticket price, and location of your upcoming gig. Any mention of your band is valuable. At the very least, it might encourage music fans to come hear your show. But it has the potential to create the kind of buzz that leads to a sold-out show.

About Media

 

There are two kinds of media: paid and free. Your band can easily take out a paid advertisement in the local newspaper or arrange for a pop-up ad on a web page. But paid advertisements aren't generally persuasive to fans—savvy readers know paid ads have more to do with how much money the musicians have than how good they are. Publicity, the free kind, usually has much more credibility than paid ads.

When planning a show, it's important to do some advance research—several weeks in advance, if possible—and determine how many people you'd ultimately like to attend. If it's 50, and your family and friends total just 25, you'll have to do some publicity legwork.

Ask other local bands to quantify the benefits of certain types of press. Perhaps a short "critic's choice" article in the newspaper's weekend preview magazine can generate about 15 ticket buyers to a small club. Perhaps a calendar listing means five.

Do the math and figure out what you need, and what you realistically can get at this stage. Target those publications that will lead to the attendance you seek.

If the press doesn't bite the first time you contact them, don't be discouraged. For the next gig, maybe the writer or editor will remember your name and be more generous.

Local radio stations, especially the big ones, are publicity machines. You may not have a chance at the nearby, corporate-owned station, which plays exclusively well-known pop artists, but there's probably at least one community or college station in your town. Call the program director and offer free listener tickets to the upcoming gig; you may get crucial DJ mentions on the air. Or offer to play in the station's studio—or hallways—the day of your show. Such radio networking can also help you build contacts for future publicity; you never know which student station manager will land a job at the commercial station.

Once you've received a taste of publicity, you can use it for many different things. Save the article for your press kit. Then mail the new material to more publications, perhaps in different cities or states. Such clippings can also be a huge help later, if you decide to plan a tour.

Buzz and positive publicity (or even negative publicity, if you spin it right) will attract even more fans—and maybe even the attention of important people in the concert industry. Nightclub owners constantly scan publications for hot new ticket-selling acts, as do record-label representatives, record-store managers, and even other media writers and editors.

"Oh yeah, I think I saw that name" is a great thing for people to say about you. This feeling creates demand for your product, which is to say, live concerts, and helps solidify your status as a working band. It's an investment in your future and, at the very least, a way to ensure you'll get more shows in the short term.

Local Newspapers

 

Almost every daily newspaper has some music coverage. If you live in a small town, that may simply mean a nationally syndicated update on Hugh Grant's upcoming wedding (or divorce). But many papers have at least one writer who covers the "music beat," and they're often looking to cover a local story. That's you. Pay attention to the long, wide, daily pages of newsprint and all the nooks and crannies that fit music coverage. The tiny-print calendar listings are great for announcing concerts, and if you're creative (playing a charity event for the crumbling local library, say), you might even land on the front page, or in a prominent writer's column.

Although rock critics are usually on the prowl for something new and different, for various reasons they may not be responsive to your pitches. Do a little research to determine who else writes about music—maybe an editor's specialty is bluegrass, or a feature writer branches out into country, or a local freelancer is just looking for good ideas to pitch.

On a basic level, to obtain publicity, all you have to do is call a local publication and ask for it. Often, this is an easy way to wind up in a calendar listing. It's much harder to place a big story or review about your band. To do this, you'll need to sell yourself.

Ultimately, your music is your most effective sales tool. If your band is the second coming of The Rolling Stones, the selling-yourself-to-writers process won't be hard at all. If you have that kind of confidence, and fans are packing your shows and giving great feedback, let the music speak for itself.

No matter how good you are, though, always send material to journalists early—three or more weeks in advance of the event. Writers can't stand desperate last-minute sales pitches—and will probably remember you, for the wrong reasons, afterwards. As the old saying goes, lack of preparation on your part is no reason for an emergency on my part.

Press Kit

 

The press kit is the leading punch of your promotional efforts. You'll want to send one to every music writer or editor at every publication you're trying to crack. We recommend calling the publications in advance to double-check the recipient's spellings, job title, and address.

A press kit should contain the following three basic elements:

• A biography ("bio," for short), which gives a brief history of the band. It should include members' names (spelled correctly!); year and place the band formed; a pithy quote or two from band members; and relevant or unusual trivia such as an explanation of the band's name.

 

• A press release or letter announcing the band's upcoming gig, including time, date, and place—and, of course, a contact e-mail address or phone number.

• An 8x10 photo, black and white or color, clearly depicting all band members with their names underneath. Don't forget to print contact information on the photo paper!

 

Timing is important. Send the package at least three weeks, preferably four or more, in advance of the gig. Sometimes you won't nail down a show date until it's too late for press. If that happens, feel free to send the package, but don't be surprised if you get a cool reception—editors may have already determined what's going in the paper at that point.

Sometimes, in your press kit, you'll want to include a demo. Later in your career, you might wind up recording a professional demo in a studio as an audition for a record deal. But for now, all you need is to communicate to a writer what you'll sound like at the show.

An electronic press kit, or EPK, is a high-tech version of the press kit. Rather than sending the traditional photo, press release, and bio to a media outlet, you'll provide a website containing a bio, digital photos, MP3s, and your video. These press kits can also be a high-tech, professional way of capturing a record-label scout's attention.

Be persistent—without being a pest. It's a fine line. Wait at least a week after sending the press package. Then call the writer's direct number. Rehearse what you plan to say—your name, the band's name, the name and date of the upcoming concert, and a contact number—in case you get voicemail. If the writer or editor answers, be polite and respectful and try to end the conversation before wearing out your welcome.

Sometimes it's effective to learn a little background about the writer or editor you're calling. If the writer does a regular column, you can learn biographical tidbits just by reading. If he or she skis, for example, you can mention the "great snow pack we've been having." But again, don't go overboard. You don't want to waste the writer's time with rambling anecdotes about your own life.

After reviewing concerts all night, music writers tend to straggle back to their desks around midmorning. Then they need about an hour to drink coffee, talk to their editors, and catch up with phone calls and e-mails. Mondays are particularly stressful. Tuesdays (before deadline crush sets in) and Fridays, around 11 A.M., are often phone-friendly times.

If a writer or editor answers the phone when you call, introduce yourself quickly, and immediately ask, "Do you have time to talk?" If they say yes, be brief. If no—a distinct possibility, no matter how rude it may seem—politely ask for a better time to reach them. The "down period" is good information to have. And a journalist is far more likely to remember you the second time.

The easiest way to get on a writer's bad side is by stalking. Leaving a voicemail or e-mail once a week (or, preferably, every other week) is polite and reasonable. Anything beyond that is irritating. Calling several times a day, and hanging up on the voicemail, is risky indeed in the caller ID age.

Finally, e-mail is convenient and cheap. It's also easily deleted. And pitches from bands can look suspiciously like spam. (You know, the annoying form-letter advertisements that clog up your inbox.) We suggest sticking to more personal snail mail, then following up with e-mail only after you've made personal contact with the writer. Even then, keep it short.

Interview

 

Congratulations! You've "sold" a writer on your music and the publication plans to print a big preview story. They'll run your band's photograph and include lots of quotes from the musicians.

But wait…quotes? Can't they just use the ones in the press release? Nope. Writers need new, fresh quotes, to distinguish their stories from any other story run in any other publication. Which means it's time for an interview.

Interviews are very, very good for your band. They're also fun—who wouldn't like spending a half-hour talking about himself? But you have to do some preparation, or the interview process can be very, very bad. And no fun at all.

You'll want to provide colorful, long-but-not-too-long answers, which means anticipating the questions. A writer will probably ask about your influences, or other artists who've inspired your music. Other common questions include the following:

• Where do you get ideas for your songs?
• What are your long-term goals?
• How did you meet the other band members?
• Why did you choose to play this type of music?
• Do you prefer playing live or making music in the studio?

 

No matter what, always have something to say—politely—even if the question is awkward, poorly worded, or even under-researched. And avoid answering simply "yes" or "no," even if it's in response to yes/no questions.

Finally, as a new artist, your message may be as simple as "we want people to come to our show!" But if your singer is charismatic and sexy and gets a lot of attention onstage, you also may want to highlight your underrated bassist and drummer. During interviews, you can direct writers to your message in subtle ways. When they ask about how your singer overcame stage fright, you can say, "It was difficult for him, but our rhythm section is so solid and professional that they give the whole band confidence."

Flyers

 

Professional advertising and stories in the local paper are well and good, but rock fans have been trained over the past 40 years to pay attention to lampposts, telephone poles, kiosks, and coffeeshop bulletin boards for their concert information. With posters, handbills, and flyers, you can publicize a show inexpensively—and use some artistry and imagination in the process.

Your image can be postcard-size, perfect for distribution at clubs and under windshield wipers; letter-size, for stapling onto bulletin boards and kiosks; or poster-size, for papering at the place you're playing or a prominent wall in your city. "Postering" can be a credible way of circumventing other media, spreading the word to regions and audiences newspapers don't traditionally reach.

So, a flyer is usually an 8.5-by-11-inch piece of paper containing your band's name, photo, website address, and information about an upcoming gig or CD release. Like everything else involving your band, you'll want it to fit into your musical scheme and reinforce your image. A genteel Irish folk band, for example, probably shouldn't borrow from Iron Maiden's classic googly-eyed-skeleton artwork.

Unless you own a copy machine that prints in bulk, you'll probably spend a lot of time in the copy shop. It sounds easy enough, but you'll have to make many important decisions: What colour paper should you use? (Colour is almost always more expensive than black and white.) What type of stock? (Thickest is most pricey.) What colors reproduce the best? How can you lay out the artwork in the straightest, most professional way?

Copy-shop employees will be glad to help answer these questions. But if not, we'll note that white is the most professional color if you're snail-mailing flyers or sending out small handbills as postcards. An obnoxiously bright color like Day-Glo pink or orange is effective if you're posting a flyer on a bulletin board and want to distinguish your concert from the garage sales.

If there's a good chance your poster will hang on a kiosk or bulletin board for weeks or months at a time, go with heavy paper stock. Small handbills, which you might hand out to fans after concerts, should be thin and cheap, because they're likely to be quickly thrown away.

You can also spread the word using business cards. If you order them from a professional printing company, cards will cost in the range of £5 for 250, or you can get a bulk rate of roughly £15 for 1,000. You might be able to shrink your handbill design and print it up in a business-card format. Or you might opt for something more simple—just the band name, one phone number, one e-mail address, and perhaps your type of music.

Stickers are also effective in the rock world. You won't have to worry about using tape and staples, and the designs and logos are yet another way to express your originality. They are, however, very difficult to scrape off.

A good slogan is an indispensable tool in rock music. The Sex Pistols, The Clash, and other famous punks were notorious for their slogans, affixing flyers all over London reading, "White Riot!" and "Hate and War." One of the Pistols' revolutionary, military-lampooning gems was "Be a man. Be someone. Kill someone. Be a man. Kill yourself."

A slogan isn't a requirement, of course. You can make a perfectly fine poster with just the band's name, time and location of gig, and website address. But if you're stapling a poster to a telephone pole, construction site, or other widely papered location, you'll want to stand out.

Bulletin Boards

 

Be respectful of the bulletin-board owner (and other users). Don't plaster your material blithely over the flyer begging for the whereabouts of a lost 15-year-old Labrador Retriever. And while you may be tempted to preempt a rival band's flyer in the same location, try to resist. This kind of activity can start a long-term war that will ultimately upset the bulletin board owner. Be courteous. Look for an open spot and don't jam in so many staples or string up so much tape that it's impossible to remove later.

Also, ask for permission first, even if it seems obvious that everybody gets to post whatever they want. In a location without a bulletin board, use one small, not-too-sticky piece of tape so as to not leave gunk on the window or wall.

Bands in college towns face heavier competition than bands in rural or out-of-the-way areas. But they're also blessed with far more promotional opportunities, from (usually) receptive campus radio stations to prominent banner-placing opportunities.

Whether or not you're a student, go on a few exploratory missions around campus. Where are the bulletin boards? What publications exist with prominent classified ads? Is it a grassroots "tradition" that people chalk or spray-paint the sidewalks in certain areas?

Also, study the other band flyers that seem effective on campus. Were they laser-printed? Designed by hand? What works and what doesn't? What information appears most prominently? How do the artistic designs of posters, flyers, and handbills differ? Learn from these artistic and informational decisions and copy the best ideas.

Posters

 

Some bands simply design a small handbill and, when it comes time to hang up a poster, enlarge it several times. This works, but on super-size posters you may want to take advantage of the extra space and add more art and perhaps written information.

When using a poster as a canvas, you have more space for imagination and creativity. Consider turning the poster into a mini-billboard—and for inspiration, check out corporate highway billboards to see what works and what doesn't. (Hint: Short, terse, and funny or colorful messages are incredibly effective for pedestrians rushing past the posters.)

No matter what else you decide to put on your poster, the following information is essential, but feel free to arrange it in an unusual way: band name or logo; time, date, and location of gig, CD-release party, or other event; contact information; band photo; and website address.

In some parts of certain cities, tacking your posters on lampposts or the wooden areas surrounding construction sites is an even more effective way of spreading the word than local newspapers. In urban areas where people are far more likely to ride the bus than commute on a highway, lamppost-type messages can be effective. But in some areas, litter-law enforcement may be so intense that you never see posters at all.

Guerrilla marketing refers to untraditional means of gaining exposure for a business. Whereas a traditional music marketer buys advertising on a local radio station, a guerrilla marketer might set up his own soapbox in the middle of a crowded street and loudly act out the reasons why his product is worth buying. This approach can be valuable for developing rock bands.

Posting a concert announcement on a lamppost isn't the ultimate act of rock 'n' roll rebellion, of course, but it's a small form of guerrilla marketing. Although the term has become part of corporate strategy over the past 20 years—meaning, loosely, "spreading your message with your own hard work rather than spending tons of money"—it's still effective for grassroots bands. Depending how extreme you want to get, guerrilla marketing can involve everything from spray-painting graffiti at a subway stop to shouting the band's name via bullhorn on a crowded street.

Before indulging in guerrilla marketing, it's best to have a working knowledge of local laws. In some cities stickering and postering private property is illegal; if you do it, you could receive a fine or even jail time. (The penalties tend to be even stricter for more permanent street displays such as graffiti.) Rock marketing has a long history of rebelling against these laws with defiantly underground poster and handbill displays. However, in no way do we condone illegal behavior.

Leaflets

 

Unattached handbills, posters, and flyers can be used as leaflets. Some merchants will let you drop off a stack of them at the front counter, near the cash register, or at the front door, near the alt-weeklies and classified-ad rags. But as this can lead to an unruly mess, many merchants prefer people to post flyers to central bulletin boards. (If a merchant is generous about leaving stacks of flyers around, be sure to keep the area neat and return frequently for cleanup.)

A more effective way of dispersing leaflets involves standing in the street outside a club or theatre. When a band finishes playing, approach everybody in sight to hand out flyers. This is especially effective if you're playing the same venue later—and if you are, you'll win points with the owners if you stick around to clean up the flyers fans inevitably toss on the ground. Also, it helps to get permission from the club booker in advance.

When should you hand out the flyers? Definitely as fans are leaving the concert. If you hand out leaflets on their way in, fans will invariably drop them in the first garbage can they see and focus on more important tasks such as buying beer or staking out a seat. On the way out, however, fans are idle, walking leisurely to their cars, and talking about the show they just saw. They'll be more receptive at that time, for sure.

When deciding where to hand out leaflets, find a like-minded band's gig and park yourself there after the show. If you play funk and rock, for example, hit The Red Hot Chili Peppers show at the local arena. The risk is that fans will perceive you as a cheaper version of the band they just saw; the potential reward is that they love this type of music so much they'll want to hear more.

Don't be insulted if your flyers wind up on the ground. If you hand out 200, and 190 people drop them and 10 decide to attend your show, that's a half-hour (or so) well spent. But again, clean up after yourself so the club will let you hang around with the handbills on a future date.
You can also stick handbills under windshield wipers, although many fans find this a nuisance. Annoying advertising can be effective—take television commercials and pop-up ads on websites, for example—just be aware you risk alienating potential fans.

Internet

 

In addition to revolutionizing everything else in the world, the Internet has vastly improved the way bands network with their fans. The Internet—specifically, bands' websites—has replaced the old-fashioned fan club.

Some bands, such as Pearl Jam, still run fan clubs the old-fashioned way—but they do everything through their websites. Metallica, to name one prominent example, runs a bulletin board so fans around the world can talk to each other. Weezer, Zwan, Wilco, and others post live or rare music files directly onto their sites. At a minimum, a band can provide basic information and spread the word about upcoming gigs or CD releases. Learning to do this is a huge marketing and promotional leap forward.

Your Website

Like a CD cover or a promotional photo, a homepage should be an extension of the band's personality. Beyond that, it should provide solid, straightforward information. And maybe it should try to sell stuff—without coming across like an annoying salesperson.

But let's back up. First you have to find a domain name, or World Wide Web address. A URL, or Uniform Resource Locator, is the high-tech way of saying metallica.com, phish.com, or any other name you type into a browser to call up a page. URLs usually end in an extension such as ".co.uk," but many use ".com," ".org" and ".net" for various reasons not worth going into here.

The first thing to do is determine whether anybody else has your name. (The easiest way is to use your browser to see if any-thing's posted to that site.) If somebody else owns "your" URL, it's time for a few decisions. Maybe your band is called Slate—in that case, you're out of luck, because Slate.com has existed for years as a Microsoft online magazine. If that happens, and if your band isn't attached to its name, consider changing the name to something else.

If the site in question is more obscure, e-mail the owner to see if he or she will relinquish the domain. In rare cases, people will agree to do this for free. More likely, they'll ask for money or another favor. (Free band CDs?) Still others will be completely unreceptive.

Once you settle on a name, go to an Internet registrar, and follow the site's instructions. Prices vary, but it usually will cost about £50 a year to register and maintain your domain. Depending on how you ultimately use your website, this is pretty much a bargain.

You can set up a "store" on your web page. Usually your Internet service provider will be happy to take care of the details—sending you the HTML code and the graphical "buy me" buttons. They'll also help you accept credit cards, as long as you have a business account at a bank. The money from buyers' credit cards will get deposited directly to your account.

Also consider posting a discography, including any CD or tape releases you've offered to the public, even if they're demos, singles, or EPs. Lyrics to songs are always handy. And stamp your band's logo on every page. A web page is a lot like an ad.

In some popular bands, certain members periodically post their own diary entries. This is an excellent way to create your own "news," and sometimes, as when Limp Bizkit singer Fred Durst described his alleged relationship with singer Britney Spears, may generate publicity through print or television media outlets.

"Hits," or the number of people who surf to your page on the web, are always desirable. You want lots of fans to buy your CDs, T-shirts, and concert tickets, and the more people who reach your homepage, the better. To get a lot of hits, you need to make a lot of links.

Links are a great way to connect your web page to other popular websites. It's fun to link to pages you like, and exchanging links with other sites is a great free tool for marketing and networking. Do this often: Link to musical equipment manufacturers, other bands, clubs you've played, and especially places where people can buy your CD.