Top 5 Email Marketing Tips for Musicians

27-Feb-2017 By Ryan Stable

Email Marketing for Bands – Social media, such as Facebook and Twitter, has been the primary marketing tool of musicians to grow their network and promote their name. These platforms are taking off but as an up-and-coming independent artist, you also have to take advantage of other marketing strategies that could do great for the success of your career. One of which, is the commonly neglected, e-mail marketing.

Why is Email Marketing for Bands Important?

Facebook and other social media networks can give you access to millions or billions of fans but only e-mail marketing can provide you with the control over your connections. Therefore, build your e-mail list and begin promoting your music.

Grow Your Email List and Promote Your Music

Design Your Website with an E-mail Sign Up Box

Email marketing for bands start with your website. Your music website should not only have your artist’s details but it should contain information that will help you convert visitors into fans. Therefore, design your website with a sign up box to collect your visitor’s e-mail addresses.

Place it in a prominent area on your page or design it as a pop out so your visitors will immediately see it once they visit your site.

Generate an Effective Call-to-Action

Your e-mail sign box should be accompanied with an effective call-to-action. This short introductory phrase should invite and persuade people to submit their e-mail addresses to your list.

It is also ideal that you introduce the benefits of their subscription like getting regular music updates, concert dates, news, and other exclusive surprises.

Send Gifts to Subscribers

Aside from generating call-to-actions that convert, surprise your visitors with free and exclusive gifts in exchange of their e-mails. You can send them personalized items like posters, Bluetooth speakers, or wristband; or electronic files like a short video of your behind-the-scene rehearsals, a downloadable file of your music, and so on.

Through this, you are giving your fans a fresh and insider look of your life and activities as a musician.

Advertise at your Merch Booth

Do not only use your merch booth to sell your items but utilize it to gather more e-mail subscribers from fans and people who attended the event. Place a signage in a noticeable area of your booth and invite them to sign up.

Or announce it on-stage after your performance. It’s also a good idea to assign someone from your team to go around and collect e-mail addresses from the crowd.

Write a Compelling Blog post

An engaging and informative content can help you grow your e-mail list. The more compelling your story is, the more your readers become interested to reading your succeeding posts. Therefore, add an e-mail sign up box in your blog post area to turn your readers into loyal fans.

And once you have gained more e-mail sign ups, make your promise to send them informative, entertaining, and fresh news about your music. And never try to spam them with promotions and non-sense agenda. Or else, they will hit the unsubscribe button.

Top 5 Email Marketing Tips for Musicians is a guest post by April Alen.

April Alen is a content and social media Manager of the popular SpeakStick brand. SpeakStick creates innovative waterproof bluetooth speakers to aid the burning desire of music lovers and enthusiasts to listen to music whenever wherever. With this goal in mind, we invite you to be a part of our community of music lovers and to Set Your Music Free.

How to promote your music and get clients as a songwriter

24-Feb-2017 By Ryan Stable

How to Promote Your Music – It’s really frustrating, right? You are a songwriter and you write really good songs. People who have listened to your songs such as your friends and family tell you that you have the talent for writing awesome songs and lyrics. But the problem is that you have not been able to get clients to hire you to write songs for them. And this is giving you sleepless nights and leaving you frustrated.

The simple truth is that if you do not know how to promote your music and let people know about the services you offer, then no one will hire you. It’s that simple…

In this article I will be showing you some easy ways on How to Promote Your Music and get clients as a songwriter.

You need to niche down and dominate it in order to get clients as a songwriter

Before we get started on the tips to market yourself, there is something very important you need to know about. That is you need to pick a niche and then dominate it. By this I simply mean, picking one genre of music and becoming a master there. You do not want to be known as that “music songwriter”, instead you want to be known as that jazz or country or rock music songwriter.

By picking a niche and dominating it, you become the go to guy when clients need lyrics in that genre of music. This gives you an edge and helps you stand out amidst the many songwriters out there struggling to get by and will allow you to get clients as a songwriter.

You need to go digital to get clients as a songwriter

Thanks to technology and the internet, with a website and written content you can reach millions of people everyday. So you need to take advantage of this opportunity. Start by getting a blog and provide value for your fans and audience.

The keyword here is “value”. You want to provide so much value for prospective clients that they see you as an expert and the go-to guy when they need your services. Also by having a website and a blog, you can upload samples of your writings and lyrics that people can download and assess your work.

Most importantly, you can begin to build a fan base by collecting email addresses on your website and giving then tips and advice that they can use to stay in touch with you and your brand. By building your fan base you have an army that will spread the word about you to their friends and increase your reach.

You need to embrace social media to get clients as a songwriter

Social media is probably the hottest thing right now. If you are looking for the fastest way to spread your name and become known then you need to jump on the social media bandwagon.

By having social media profiles on the major platforms (Facebook, Twitter and Instagram), you can easily get heard by a lot of people. Just imagine that recently Facebook announced that they have about 1 billion active users on their platform. That’s really huge if you ask me and you do not need that amount of people to become successful. All you need is a way to reach some of those people, preferably within your local community and build up your fan base.

By posting your lyrics and songs you have completed online, you get to have people connecting with you and your brand. Maintaining a social network presence is one of the most time effective strategies that you can employ to get yourself known and attract paying clients to your business.

Get out there and network to get clients as a songwriter

This is one idea that a lot of people find very difficult. Most people (myself included) would prefer to sit in my house and do all the interactions by mail or by phone. But unfortunately, this does not work very well.

As a songwriter trying to get clients, you need to be ready to meet people and do a lot of networking. Now I am not advising that you travel around the country just to network. You can and should start small by meeting people around your community.

One phrase that I like so much is “It’s all about who you know”. While this might sound like a cliché, it is absolutely true. You need to keep your ear to the ground and go out and network with people in the same industry as you.

One thing you need to know about networking is that you want to avoid coming across as a needy or offensive. Think about what you can offer to the other person even before you pitch your services. This way the relationship is more of a win win situation than a needy one.

Pick someone and develop them to get clients as a songwriter

This point is all about working with an upcoming artist and providing lyrics for them. The advantage of this is that you get to flex your creative writing skills while using the artist as a stage to project your lyrics.

The truth is that when starting out, you are going to find it a little difficult to get noticed by the big boys in your industry. The best way to get on their radar is to have an upcoming artist who you can easily work with sing your lyrics. This way you are not just pitching them lyrics, you are also showing them a complete work and how your lyrics sound with instrumentals. This helps you become recognized as an expert and someone that they actually want to work with.

Conclusion

Promoting yourself is crucial to your success and will help you get clients as a songwriter. It is probably more important than stage performance or understanding song theory. The truth is that if nobody knows you, then nobody hires you. So unless you are a songwriter simply for fun, then you need to take the points discussed in this article very serious.

How to promote your music and get clients as a songwriter is a guest post by Uche Ibe.

Uche Ibe is a passionate singer and blogger as www.welovesinging.com. He enjoys teaching people how to sing and helping them become better singers. You can connect with him by visiting his blog or sending him an email.

10 reasons you can’t hit the right pitch

23-Feb-2017 By Ryan Stable

As a singer, you absolutely need to hit the right pitch. If you have a hard time with pitch, learning to get it right will lead to a noticeable improvement in your singing voice. Luckily, problems with pitch often come down to a few simple issues that are quite easy to fix. Here are ten potential reasons why you can’t hit the right pitch.

Poor Posture

Bad posture is easy to fix, but it takes time to get used to standing up straight to the point where if feels natural and you do it without thinking about it. At first you will have to keep reminding yourself to do it. But even just standing up straight for a moment, you will immediately feel the difference. Breathing becomes easier and your confidence improves, too, which leads to the next point.

Poor Confidence

A lack of confidence has a strong impact on your singing voice. It weakens your voice and makes it virtually impossible to sing in tune. Adopting a good posture helps confidence quite a bit, but you also need to believe in yourself and your ability.

Tension

Carrying a tune becomes impossible if your mouth, tongue or throat are tense. Try to loosen your singing muscles by massaging your cheeks and stretching your jaw. Ten to fifteen solid yawns will often do the trick, since they not only stretch the jaw, but also the vocal cords.

Incorrect Tongue Position

If your tongue is in the back of your throat, it prevents your vocal cords from vibrating properly. You want to keep it forward in your mouth, with the tip touching your bottom teeth. I have a number of exercises on my site to help you position your tongue properly.

Exhaling Too Quickly

If you exhale to quickly, your pitch rises. You need to control your breathing to stay in tune. This is a very comon reason why you can’t hit the right pitch.

Using The Wrong Voice

Singing makes use of a head voice and a chest voice. If you can’t hit the right pitch, you have to use them both correctly. For example, when singing vowels, you want to use your head voice to keep the tone from going flat.

Song In The Wrong Key

We often think we should be able to sing every song out there, but that simply isn’t the case. If a song is not in your key, you won’t be able to hit the notes. You might be able to bring it up or down a key, but if not, it’s just not your song.

Yelling Instead Of Singing

Singing too loudly is a common problem. A lot of beginners think they have to yell to project their voice, which might be why they can’t hit the right pitch. A higher volume does not equal a more powerful voice.

Difficulty Matching Notes

This is a bit more difficult to overcome than the other issues, but certainly not impossible. All it takes is practice. Have someone play notes for your then match them with your voice. Keep practicing until you can get them right every time. If you do not have someone to play notes for you, there are online keyboards available, like this one.

Focus On The Wrong Frequencies

Often beginning singers will mistakenly focus on the overtone or undertone, instead of the main tone. Naturally, this a reason you can’t hit the right pitch. If you can, try changing the volume of the overtones and undertones, so you can hear the main tone more clearly.

If you can’t hit the right pitch, it is highly likely you are committing several of the errors on this page. Pick one issue and work on it until it is fixed, then move on to the next one. You should see some improvement almost immediately, but it will take a bit of work to get to the point where you are nailing the pitch each and every time. I know you can do it!

10 reasons you can’t hit the right pitch is a guest post by Camila Rabin, a music teacher who recently started the blog musicaroo.com.

How Independent Musicians Can Build a Street Team

13-Feb-2017 By Ryan Stable

Having a street team is a great way to promote. You have less stress and things to worry about, and most fans are more than willing to help out. Just make sure you are ready and prepared before starting a street team. Is your music good enough yet? Do you have the money to purchase promoting material? Do you have anything to promote? All of those are crucial to have before starting a street team. Always make sure that people know you have a street team and that you’re always recruiting people for it.

Online Street Team:

When starting a street team, it is best to start online. The fans who signed up for your email list are best to start off with because they are already invested in you and are keeping up on you. It will be easier to contact those people and you can invite them individually.

A social media street team should be done next. There are ways you can make forms for them to fill out on your social media and make multiple ways for them to join. It’s also easy for fans to keep up to date and for you to post tasks for them to do. It will also help your email list grow. Having members post things at the same time on multiple social medias will help give you more of a buzz and will get others interested.

Getting an online street team gives you a wider range of things to do. You can have fans share videos, tweeting and re-tweeting, and share posts. It’s a great way to get feedback on things that you want to do. They can help you decide and create posters and shirts, as well as coming up with new merchandise to sell.

Offline Street Team:

Having a street team on the streets are still very important. It’s a lot easier to find out what place you’re more popular online so you know where to start the street team. You want to find fans who are willing to go out and post fliers or pass out stickers and talk about you to other people and call up radio stations to request your song. They will make things more personal when promoting and it will help with getting more fans. You have to make sure that you have the money to provide the promotional tools for them to pass out.

Asking fans to promote you isn’t all you need to do. You want to make sure to reward them as well since they are using their free time to help promote you. It can be anything. A shirt, tickets, CD, stickers, etc., will all work and will make people want to do more. You can even turn tasks into contests and give out prizes for whoever did the most. Keep them interested to have them want to help you. Make sure not to do give out the same thing too many times or it will get old and they won’t be doing it as much. Make sure to do meet-and-greets with them so you guys can connect and they’ll feel more excited to help.

Finding people who are most influential will help the most. They will be the ones who will talk to people about you and get them interested, whether it’s online or off. They’re the ones that their friends go to for new music.

You want to make sure that when you get people to join your team that they are willing to do things to help you out. You don’t want them to be rude and give you a bad name. They will be trying to help, but you don’t want them to be pushy are make people upset in any way. It will look bad on you. It’s not always easy to monitor that, but when you start hearing about it, you should try to fix it. Always make sure your team members know what you expect them to do for you and the Do’s and Don’ts of what you want, before they sign up. And always keep them updated with events or anything coming up.

You want to make sure that there’s always a way for your members to contact you or anyone else. Email is always a great way for them to keep in contact, but creating a FaceBook private group for just the members is a great way for them to keep in touch with each other and get help from each other. Having groups set up for specific cities will help the members fell more connected with each other and can even get together to come up with ideas on what to do. Emails are great for members to report what they’re doing. They can send written reports and photos of what they’re doing. It will help you keep track of what’s going on and where. Having a forum will help each other stay in connect and have easy access to anything they have a question about and maybe even before they ask it. It’s easier to find what they’re looking for.

Everyone wants to help their favorite bands or friends/family members in bands, but the bands have to make sure they are ready to have a street team. You have to purchase all the posters and stickers that the members need to pass out and you have to be able to afford to send the products to them. You want to make sure you have a song or music video or anything for them to promote. If there’s nothing to promote, then there’s nothing for them to really do and they’ll forget about it. Make sure to reward them for their help and that they know you appreciate all that they are doing for you. If you get the right people to work on your team, they will do anything to help you out, so you want to make sure you can do anything to show your appreciation. It will be hard to get noticed without their help.

How Independent Musicians Can Build a Street Team is a guest post by Michele Enouch

Michele Enoch is a music business graduate from Musicians Institute who has managed and promoted bands for years. She is now working on her photography and helping performers advance in their career. Her passion has always been music and she is exploring all aspects of the industry. Michele appreciates all kinds of music and seeing music in all kinds of environments. She enjoys crocheting hats and toys, reading and writing mystery and horror stories, taking pictures of everything she can, food from around the world, and adorable animals. She is always on the look out for anything new and exciting

Interview with Sean Rooney: Featured Artist at youbloomDublin 2017

08-Feb-2017 By Ryan Stable

Featured artist at youbloomDublin 2017, Sean Rooney, is the type of soulful singer/songwriter that you can take home to mother. Having performed at a myriad of festivals and venues around the world, youbloom gets to know Sean a little better before his performance at at youbloomDublin 2017 in this exclusive interview.

How long have you been playing music? What inspired you to pick up an instrument?

Sean Rooney: I’ve been playing music about 12 years .. I started playing just from a love of pop punk music in my early teens .. thankfully my tastes have broadened a lot since then..

What instrument did you first lean to play?

Sean Rooney: I first learned to play the guitar .. well.. I’m still learning ! I’m self taught so I’m always learning.

What is your favorite part of your writing process when making new music?

Sean Rooney: My favourite part of the writing process is whenever I manage to capture exactly what I want to say lyrically and melodically.. I do enjoy the challenge of writing lyrics .. it might be trite but I write about my own life and that makes lyric writing a cathartic process for me.

In your song “Everest High” you say that its about dealing with depression from a first person point of view. How have you been able to cope with that and what role has music played to help battle with this?

Sean Rooney: coping with depression isn’t easy. Not only because there is a lot of stigma attached to the subject and It’s different for everyone but I’ve found talking to a psychologist and taking medication very helpful. In terms of music, the cathartic element is very important. There is a release that comes with expressing your emotions through song.

“Everest High” sounds like a very up beat song. Was that intentional when writing this song due to the meaning?

Sean Rooney: Yes .. the upbeat and borderline aggressive sound of the song is basically my way of conveying that I will not let depression beat me. I’m fighting against it with everything I have; also there’s nothing more melancholy than a ballad about depression .. it would just be too much if it sounded sad too.

You have a great cover of Bruce Springsteen. What are some other artists that inspired you to make music? And what would be another cover you would enjoy to make?

Sean Rooney: Thank you! My main inspiration comes from the genres of soul, indie-rock/rock and R&B.. In terms of idols I’d have to say Paul Weller is my favourite artist. The body of incredible work he had created and continues to create is a never ending reservoir of inspiration to me. There aren’t that many covers that I feel I could really add much to or change without ruining! But a couple of songs I would love to play live with a band are “Soul Man” by Sam&Dave and “The Changingman” by Paul Weller

For someone who has never heard your music before, how would you describe your sound?

Sean Rooney: I would describe my music as sort of.. Blue-eyed soul rock .. although not all of my songs would fit neatly into that genre!

What advice would you give new musicians trying to get their music out there?

Sean Rooney: The only advice I feel qualified to give is to not criticise yourself too much.. some self criticism is healthy but there comes a point when it can ruin things and I know that from experience. In terms of physically getting music out there, Facebook videos are a great way to go.

What are you anticipating the most at the YouBloom festival?

Sean Rooney: What I’m anticipating most at Youbloom is just the opportunity to play for a new audience and to meet lots of new punters and musicians alike. I’m always super grateful to get to play live. It is what I love most in the world, so to that end I’d like to say thank you to Youbloom for giving me the opportunity.

Do you have any new material coming out in the near future?

Sean Rooney: Yes! I’ve been writing and recording recently. my first official single will be released soon and then the plan is to release my first EP in around May!

Learn more about Sean Rooney on his Facebook page here. You can catch Sean Rooney performing live at youblomDublin 2017.