The purpose of promoting is to reach a larger audience. Mainstream Artists have management, PR, Agents, etc. They have promotion teams to help them along the way. But as an Indie Artist you may not be lucky enough to have the extra help and you may not be as educated on what to do. In Pt 2 I'm going to give a few tips on promoting the PR way. Let's Go! There's a lot of behind the scenes work when you're an Indie Artist. You probably spend a lot of time on Social Media reaching out to fans, tagging people, messaging people and etc. At a certain point this method becomes old and you're not reaching anyone new. You need to reach outside of your social media. Blogs: Do you have a new project coming out? You're probably going to share that project on social media but who else are you reaching? What you need to do is research Blogs in your genre and submit your music to blogs. Blogs have 1000's of fans that are always looking for new music to listen to. All you need to do is make sure the Blog writer is accepting submissions. If so, on the website you will click the submission link and you would be told step by step how and where to send your music. Always send a professional email when submitting music. Include a short bio and photo along with the music file they requested. Usually it's a youtube or soundcloud file. Make sure that your bios on your social media files are all updated and professional because they will ask for those links as well. Please Note. You will not be accepted to every blog, it may take time for them to get back to you, you may be rejected, you may not be contacted, you may have to pay But hey that's the music business. Here are a few blogs I know you will be accepted to.Melody SupplyDaily Hip Hop JamzCoast2Coast Mixtapes Offline PromotionThough Social Media has grown with the rise of sites like Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, YouTube and other sites to share your music. The art of old fashioned footwork has not died out. Showing your face and connecting with your fans in just as affective as if not even more affective than Social Media. Try these methods if you're not already. Business Cards/Flyers: Every time I attend an event I have Business Cards and I have Flyers with all of my information of where my music can be heard, where I can be followed on social media, my email and my business phone number. As an artist you can perform and tell people where to follow all day but what about when they forget or misspell your name? This is where the cards come in handy. Merchandise: Do you have cds, apparel? Do you have anything tangible that can link you back to you? With Merchandise you can make money or decide to give it away for free but either way you're going to be remembered. Rappers have made thousands of dollars and even became legends just by selling CD's and merchandise on the streets and out of the trunk of their cars. This isn't a lost method at all. Do some footwork and see what a difference you can make with your promotion. PR Team: Music PR, or Public Relations for music, is the strategic promotion of a new release, tour or other music related news to the public via the media. People who work in PR liaise between labels and/or musicians and the media to try and get album reviews, profiles of the band, reviews of live shows and so on. Street Team: Building a Your TeamYou don't have to have a big record label to have a street team. If you're an independent artist, assembling your street team can be very worthwhile. There's only so much you or your bandmates can tackle on top of the work you have to do as artists.Getting help with promotional efforts frees you up to focus on what you probably love more than marketing—making music.A street team can help you get the word out about you and your latest release, and they can do it from a place of sincere love and appreciation of what they're promoting. You'll want to find people you can trust and who want to help you.
Online
Starting with an online street team is a smart first step. It's easier to put together a group of people through social media, for example, who are excited to talk about you and recommend you. This will also give you a chance to try out promotional ideas and strategies, and to get feedback from your team on what's popular and works. As you get better at this, you can move on to starting an offline street team.
Offline
When putting together your offline street team, you'll be best served to start in a local area where you are popular. It will make finding people who love your work and want to promote you easier, and you won't be trying to break into a brand new market when you're still building your promotional talents.In exchange for their work, street team members get exclusive merchandise, concert tickets, and other special gifts. Of course, they also get experience. If someone is serious about getting into music promotion, having some street team experience can be a good way to get their feet wet, learning the process and strategies of promotion from the ground up. To be honest there are many different ways to promote your music. There is not just 1 way to do it. You need to be rocking shows and implementing every way possible to promote your music and to keep fans coming back to your shows and listening to your music. You're going to have to spend some money and network like crazy but once you're on stage accepting that Grammy you won't regret a second spent. Let's stop here. I can't give you all the answers but I am here to help :) Follow me @CymphaniMusic on Twitter for daily tips! #CymphaniSpeaks