Music distribution has changed dramatically, with the introduction of new online technologies and new opportunities for artists to interact with fan bases. This section investigates how artists use emails, social networks and legal downloads to distribute material online and to wider audiences.

Online Music Channels

As mentioned in Streets to studios, new online music platforms such as SB.TV and watchlistentell have enabled artists to distribute various types of content, to wider audiences, on a daily basis. Online music blogs Hypetrak and Pitchfork give artists the exposure needed to either gain popularity or create new fan bases. Although fans mainly use these channels, it is just as important for new and upcoming artists to keep updated with current music genres and audience expectations.

If you are a new artist or band, looking to gain more YouTube views or even to exposure your music to wider audiences, contact music platforms such as SBTV. Although this won’t guarantee you a record deal with a major label straight away, the exposure could result in an extra 50 or 100 new fans who attend your next gig.

Mixtapes

Over recent years the music industry has been battling against the rise in illegal downloads resulting in many artists having to compete against free duplicates of their own material. To combat this threat, artists have turned to a more traditional way of distributing music, using mixtapes.

Before the technology revolution gripped the industry, mixtapes were a common way of releasing new content from many unsigned and unnoticed artists. Handing out cassette tapes to strangers in town centers became a part of life for many hoping to fulfil their musical careers. The ‘Mixtape’ has since faded from a physical copy into an online experience with new tools allowing artists to interact more closely with fan bases and offer free, high quality material with a click of a button.

Music distribution platform SoundCloud, enables artists to upload music online and make it accessible to users via a free download straight onto a computer. This type of distribution is a great way for new artists to expose content legally without having to use the platforms previously mentioned. Dubstep producer Jakwob has recently used this method to promote his new mixtape The Prize and making the 9-track mixtape available via free download on his website.

Jakwob:

Other artists such as Devlin have also used similar marketing strategies and offered a new 5 track EP in exchange for a user’s email address. This method also allows artists to email fans monthly newsletters, another great way to keep audiences informed and updated on tour dates or future projects.

Acoustic sensation Nina Nesbitt and solo newcomer Delilah also offer free downloads on their websites again, in exchange for an email address.

Nina Nesbitt:

Delilah:

There is a such a wide range of opportunities new artists can take when it comes to distributing music to audiences whether it is to share exclusive projects, gain subscribers to a newsletter or even just discovering new fan bases.

To Achieve Ultimate Exposure:

• Make a YouTube, Twitter and SoundCloud account.
• Follow music blogs and magazines for updates on the current climate of the music industry.
• Contact media platforms.
• Create a simple website or even use plug-in’s such as Root Music to allow users to download music in exchange for email addresses.
•  Use SoundCloud as a way to give fans the opportunity the chance to preview your material.
• Contact music distribution companies such as Horus Music to help get your music onto iTunes and achieve ultimate exposure.

Written By Michael Dodsworth

Copyright 2012 Help for Bands.  All rights reserve.

One major obstacle for a new band is the first recordings of their music. An all too common occurrence is where a band rushes their first recordings because they are excited to get their music out there, but end up compromising on the quality. Poor quality recordings not only do not showcase the material well, but often require re-recording further down the line, generally an unnecessary waste of a band’s time and money. If you are going to do it, try and get it right the first time!

An important decision is to decide what tracks to record and is one that requires you to be objective about your music. This is not always easy as having written the music yourselves, you are often too involved to critically assess your music. Even highly successful musicians have to source other opinions at times; R&B artist Akon tests his music in strip clubs and believes if the girls like dancing to a track then it will work on the radio. Not that you have to go this far, but try to get some more neutral opinions on your songs; ask fans, friends, family their opinions because they may have an insight you can’t see.

Another issue is where to record. Recording studios range in price, size and quality and it is important to choose wisely. Try and look at previous recordings done by the studio, don’t judge the music but listen for a well mixed track; it should be clear with very little ‘noise’, all the parts can be heard, the instruments sound like they should and the volume is at a decent level. If possible, see if the studio has a history of recording any successful artists. It is also advisable to know what equipment a studio uses to judge their general capabilities and to assess whether it is the right set up for your group. Similarly to the previous article on Gig Preparation, it is also vital to make sure you bring all the necessary equipment that the studio does not provide; studio time is expensive and it is not profitable to spend some of that time going out to fetch leads or pedals.

Always plan the session. Work out what you need to do and in what order, this way everyone can be focussed and you won’t need to waste time discussing. Lyric sheets are usually a good idea as it takes the pressure off remembering them and allows vocalists to concentrate on hitting those high notes. Likewise, it is good to write down or tab parts if there might be a tendency for slip-ups and plenty of rehearsals beforehand can also make you more accurate. Forward planning will help you be more efficient when you are in the studio, allowing you to be done quicker and save money or giving you extra time to really get things perfect.

Here are a few practical things that I noticed myself when recording. Guitarists: large amounts of effects pedals can be a hindrance to a quality recording because of the internal noise they can generate, especially large multi-effects units.  If pedals are not required for a particular song, unplug them and if the desired effect can be easily added digitally, then often this will give you a cleaner recording. It might sound obvious to most, but singers make sure you stand to record, no matter how long the day has been, because sitting down restricts your lung capacity and you will sing much more clearly stood with your arms by your side. Also, make sure you take plenty of water if you are singing, recording sessions can be long and require many takes and it is important to keep your voice at its best, especially considering those later tracks will probably be the ones you use. When recording vocalists pop filters can make a big difference to the quality of vocals, especially if they are loud and powerful. Most studios will have proper vocal equipment but smaller set-ups may not and if you try home recording it is something to consider getting. Pop filters are normally quite inexpensive but if money is tight, they can be fairly well improvised with a wire coat-hanger bent into a circle with a pair of tights stretched across the hole. It is also quite easy to create makeshift vocal booths using packaging foam and music stands, while obviously not as effective as the real thing; just having something around the mic can reduce any ambient noise from your recording room and give a cleaner, drier sound. Similarly, this technique can be used when mic-ing acoustic instruments and even amplifiers.

Most importantly when it comes to recording is not to rush. Yes, studio time is expensive so don’t waste any time, but you want to make sure your the money you spend is reflected in a good quality recording. Remember the better the recordings, the more likely people are to buy them and if the tracks showcase you well, the better chance you have of scoring that all important record deal.

Written by Matthew Briggs © 2012 Help for Bands

Picture – Victor Grigas

In the past two parts of our series about how to get online promotions, we have talked about what types of promotional opportunities were available and what you needed to do to have a chance at getting them.  Everything in the end rests on your ‘Sales Sheet’ also called a ‘One sheet’ or ‘sales note’.  Its simple to do, but can make the difference between a highly supported campaign and one that is not.

So what is a one sheet / sales sheet?

The sales sheet is a document that you use to present your release to your distributor and the stores you want to be sold in.  The sheet is no more than two sides of one piece of paper and will tell the reader all the compelling reasons why the store must give you a promotional feature above anyone else who is also asking for their attention.

So what does a sales note include?
There are three parts that need to be addressed.

1.  General Release Information:

• Artist Name
• The release name
• Release date
• Barcode
• Catalogue Number
• The label / imprint.
• Cover art
• Genre
• Track listings (include bonus tracks and hidden tracks).
• Parental Advisory notice if applicable.  (Put ‘Yes’ or the graphic if applicable.)

2.  Information about the release itself:

• You could include a small paragraph or sentence about the artist especially if there is some interesting facts or links to other famous musicians / people.
• A brief description about the release itself, what makes it different to other releases out there or from your other releases?
• Key Territories – List what territories the release and marketing will have the greatest sales impact.

3.  Marketing:

• Your plans on how you are going to launch this product to the market and promote the release.  This will include plans for radio press, TV, and other marketing that you may be doing.  It is very important that you don’t list all the stations your disc has been sent too, give factual information about which stations or press are supporting and how e.g. playlist or feature interview to be published on this date.  You can say you are servicing all major radio stations but don’t list them unless they have confirmed support for you.
• If you have a PR team you can mention them here if you wish.
  Tour plans.
• Tour / what performances will you be doing, on what date and where.  If you will be supporting some major artist, then put that here too.
• It is vital that you keep this sheet up to date and during a release period it can change by the hour.  At the end of each week / or start of the new week, send an updated copy to your distributor.

How do you present this?

The information above can be presented anyway you like, there are no set rules.  But it is important that:

• You only use one sheet of paper – both using both sides is fine.
• The presentation and layout is clear.
• The sheet is no more than 2 megabyte’s in size.
• We recommend sending as a PDF so that the layout cannot change, as word documents can look different on each computer.
• Make the document stand out.
• Keep to the facts not list what you hope for.

Copyright 2012 Help For Bands

Online Promotions and Marketing – Part 2:

In our previous blog (Online Promotions Part 1), we described many of the types of promotions that were available to artists and bands and it doesn’t matter if your signed to a major label or not as the stores these days go out of their way to say they are available to everyone.  I think its fair to say the major record companies still dominate the top positions but often they have the best marketing campaigns in place and can show the stores a demand for their music, so naturally the stores will want to attract those customers to the store who will hopefully purchase lots of music.

The key to all this was just answered, its all in the marketing and how much the person the other end really enjoys your music.  If its not a good recording, then your not going to get anywhere, but if you have a great track (regardless of genre) and you can show you have worked on marketing yourself to get the message out there that you have this great music coming out, then your well on the way.  There is a third part to all this, and that exclusivity, but I’ll mention that later on.

So you have recorded a great track, tracks or album and are now ready to sell this.  Regardless of if you are selling this online or in the physical world or both, marketing is very important, but can be very costly too.  But don’t let that put you off, you don’t have to spend a lot of money to start gaining traction with your marketing and raising your profile and you can sell a good number of units on a tight budget.  In fact I’d go as far as to say, you should do this yourself for a while until your selling enough that you can afford to buy in expertise as you don’t have to time or have hit a point where raising the game has become very difficult.

So here are a few things to help.

• You should think about your release campaign as a three or four month window of marketing buildup before the release, especially if your bringing out an album.  Even when your album or single is out, it shouldn’t just stop being marketed and you keep going until your ready with the next.  Of course for a single, you should consider bringing the track out immediately as soon as the press or radio pick it up and support.
• Make sure you are everywhere possible with your social media presence and more importantly spend time building up relationships with your fans.  Sell, sell and sell is going to turn them off very quickly.
• At the start of your campaign, approach newspapers and magazines to get them to print reviews, features or run competitions with you offering a prize such as a signed copy or free gig ticket.  Do the same with online fanzines and magazines.
• Plan a tour that goes to as many places as possible.  Ensure you approach all the papers in the towns and cities where you are going.
• Six to eight weeks before the release you should be approaching the producers of radio shows and letting them know about your tour and magazine and newspaper support.  They want to know the story of what has happened, this is just as important as the music.
• Start getting radio stations to give you spot play, advertise this and get your fans to request more plays.
• Try to give radio interviews, live performances on radio and even live performances in record stores.  If you’re not an acoustic artist, this is the time you should have your songs ready to perform acoustically as most places will not be able to cater for a full Marshal stack, drum kit, keyboards and everything else you need.  They like it quick and simple.

So the digital store likes your track or album, they are then considering what is going on.  You need to show them you have been active in marketing yourself and what results you have achieved.  You do this by also sending them a one sheet or sales sheet, which we will cover in our next blog.

If the store can see you have been active, then they are going to be likely to give you some support, it may be genre page support, but as your campaign grows, so does your promotional opportunities.

I mentioned that hiring professionals who do this is expensive and it is a lot of money, but what you are paying for is that persons relationships with people at newspapers, magazines or radio stations that can give you these opportunities.  The radio / tv plugger or press person usually has the chance to speak to the media person face to face, or in a social situation, it goes a long way and usually gets your music and story heard above the rest.  Many places won’t even listen to your music unless its come from a known source such as pluggers.

At the start I said there was a third element and that was exclusivity.  One way of helping to get a store being supportive to you is by giving them the promise that your music will only be available for purchase on their store for a certain period of time.  It does not mean, tell them you will be exclusive to them for a period, but actually you still sell the music everywhere else because they will find out and it will mean when you ask in the future, you won’t get any support.  This is a good way of building up a relationship with a store and can work well for you and mean than you get even better promotion going forwards and can make a big difference to sales as new people can more easily discover you.

It is pleasing that stores are being more upfront about how to get promotions so do ask your distributor / aggregator about getting promotion.  The one thing that is clear is that you must be able to show what marketing you are doing.  A distributor who says they can get you marketing or make you believe they are getting you promotional support from stores without you doing anything or taking from you your sales sheet or marketing updates is misleading you so watch out.

Written by Nick Dunn.  Copyright HelpForBands 2012.

One of the biggest dreams for any new band or artist starting out is to play at a major festival.  There are more and more festivals emerging all over the country each year. This year more than any other festival organizers seem to be looking into their local and wider communities and giving more and more new artists the chance to perform on a festival stage.   For an artist the difference between a festival slot and a normal gig cannot be underestimated it is giving a new artist the opportunity to play to a whole new audience and potentially gain some new fans.  Festival audiences differ from gig audiences in that they tend to be more open and more willing to give artists they have new heard before a chance simply because they have paid their money and they are at the festival for a day or a weekend unlike a normal gig where chances are the majority of the audience have brought tickets to see a certain artist.  These are some tips on how to get yourself on a festival stage this summer

Be Active

The planning for music festivals for bands and artists should start right at the beginning of the year. Make sure you have a press pack put together ready to send.  Make sure you are actively gigging few festival bookers will book a band that is seen to be inactive a lot of smaller festivals rely on word of mouth and recommendations from others so its important to be seen even if it is just on a local scale.  Make sure you are also active online and have a social media presence which you keep up to date.  Its becoming more and more that promoters and festival bookers first port of call when they look you up will be your Facebook or Twitter page so try and update these once a day at least.  Looking you up online will be more than likely what any new potential fans will do also so its vitally important.

Press Pack

The aim of the press pack is to stand out from the crowd.  In a press pack you should include a CD or a link to some of your tracks usually 3 tracks is enough for someone to decide whether they want to book you.  You should also include a short concise bio along with a small photograph.  The bio should focus on the bands achievements to date (releases/press/radio/tv/support gigs).  Most importantly alongside your tracks should be a video preferably live which will give potential festival bookers a chance to see what your like onstage.

Start Small

Target all the festivals in your local and wider area find out who is putting them on and get in contact and make sure they are aware of who you are.   Make sure your music will fit in with the other bands at the festival.  If you have to enter some sort of competition, which is becoming more common with a lot of festivals then you should do it simply for the experience and it will help get your name out there and make more connections with the right people who could perhaps help you in the future.  It is also worth exploring the possibility of playing one of the many festivals overseas and across Europe.  However there are several more factors involved in performing overseas such as insurance for yourselves and your instruments costs of flights and accommodation and mostly importantly having the correct paperwork such as a arnet which is an essential document that lists equipment like instruments and amplifiers.  In effect a carnet signifies the intention of people transporting it to use for a performance but also affirms they will return it to its original point of departure without selling it or disposing of it along the way.  Having a carnet makes travelling from country to country with instruments and other equipment a lot easier

Be Prepared

If you do get offered the opportunity to play at a festival you should get prepared as soon as your performance is confirmed make sure you know what you need to bring in terms of equipment and make sure any equipment you bring to use at a festival no matter how small has been PAT tested. Make sure on the day of the festival you arrive prepared.  Bring with you any merchandise you can sell this always goes down well you’ll be amazed at the number of people who just wander round the festival site looking at the various stalls.   You should also get some small cards or flyers made up with your contact details and links to your online pages distribute these throughout the festival site so people have something they can take away with them this is another way of exposing yourself to a new audience as they will have the resources to look you up and potentially come to another gig or buy a CD.  Every festival a new band plays is another step up the ladder toward playing larger gigs and larger festivals.

Before social media came about, the promotional structure for a new release was always quite similar. During the run up to the release date, it’s all stops out to get your promotional copies out for review, interviews and features in regional or even national media (if you are big enough), getting the bands new photo’s done, getting back on the press to get your launch party publicized, all leading up to an arbitrary release date. Once released, there was typically a few weeks of activity which slowly died away, and that was that.

Does this method work for everyone?

While it might still work for the big players, it is not very effective for most other people. Printed press is declining, and regional print magazines and circulars are becoming less and less common.  Printed press is still a powerful medium though – while circulation numbers have been declining, an article in printed press has a much longer life – weeks or even months if it is a weekly or monthly print.  Conversely, an article on an Internet news site will often be read by many times more people, but the article life is barely a day. On social media, the lifespan of a post is often a matter of hours, or in the case of twitter, minutes!

The music industry on the whole is in a state of flux at the moment – the way we consume, share and talk about the music we listen to is changing. It is an exciting time for the industry and right now, there isn’t a definitive one size fits all marketing model for the new era – we are all trying out new ideas.  From here on, I will be sharing some ideas on using social media.

How can we use social media effectively?

Social media is designed to enable its users to communicate and interact with other people, no matter where they are geographically. Through websites like Facebook and Twitter, you can now interact with your fans every day of the week, no matter where they live, or where you are.

We can and should use our social media to support the traditional approach of press by sharing links, letting people know you are going to be on BBC Midlands News, or your local radio station at 6PM. Where I see most artists go wrong though, is they simply link their Facebook and twitter posts and post nothing but self-promotion and selling posts.

The personal touch.

If continuous self-promotion and selling non stop is the wrong approach, then what should you be doing? Engaging and interacting with your fan base. Your interactions do not always have to be strictly related to the band – comment on something that’s going on locally and create a discussion. Use that classic British favorite and comment on the weather. Share an interesting article you have read. If you are a band doing this, sign off your posts with your own initials – this adds a more personal touch to the post, and lets your fans know whom they are talking to.

What About My Releases, Gigs and Merchandise?

Now that you have built up a rapport with your fan base, you can post about your new release, or an upcoming gig, or where your fans can go to buy your t-shirt. Because you have interacted with them before on a more personal level, people are more likely to read what you write, click your links and therefore buy your stuff. This approach works in the long term too to promote a release long after its release date.

It’s a difficult balance to get right – as an artist, you want to get your material and products out there, you want people to listen to your stuff and come to your shows. If that’s all you post about though, people will simply stop reading it. By interacting with your fans like you would interact with people in general, your posts become a lot more effective, and the end result is you will have more people at your gigs, you will sell more tracks on iTunes and you might even have to order another run of T-Shirts.

Imogen Heap has been wowing audiences for some time with her innovative use of digital effects and sampling, combined with a wide range of acoustic instruments and her ethereal voice.  However in recent years she has been gaining attention for her innovations regarding social media and fan interaction.  Heap has always made communication with her audience a priority since the early days through Myspace but with the introduction of Twitter, she has become more and more creative.  The making of Ellipse was heavily documented on the web via Twitter and she also posted video blogs about the album’s production and her personal life throughout the two year journey.  Fans were engaged on an intimate level which lead to an increase in her Twitter following and a greater anticipation for the record.  This so-called ‘new business model’ is described in detail on deepdivemarketing.com, and chronicles the many steps she followed prior to the album’s release.  This includes live previews of the album in several locations through TweetUps, where Imogen invited local followers to listen to the album with her providing comments and answering questions, and the successful prevention of an early leak on eBay by urging fans to bid on the stolen album until the price reached $10 million and eBay pulled down the auction.

These responses show the fantastic rapport that Heap has with her fans and in my opinion this is heartily deserved because the trend has not stopped with the release of Ellipse in 2009.  For the US tour that followed the album release, she used an online virtual auditorium called Vokle to audition cellists to perform the song Aha with her, choosing a different local performer for each leg of the tour.  She also auditioned singers to perform with her by asking fans to submit YouTube videos and gave each show’s winner a short slot of their own at the gig.  While the approach she took with Ellipse was fairly revolutionary, the methods she has employed for her fourth solo album are even more radical.  With a target of recording a song roughly every two months, Heap is again charting her progress using Twitter but keeping her fans more than just ‘in the loop’.  When it came to the creative process of the first few songs, the fans weren’t just informed, but asked to participate!  On different occasions over the first months, Heap asked fans to submit contributions of varying types; lyric ideas, artwork, photographs, videos, instrumental solos and a wide array of sound samples from the ordinary, to the interesting, to the frankly bizarre…

Twitter followers were also asked for their opinions on things such as lyrics, passages of music and titles.  The new songs feel so much more personal and intimate because her approach has allowed the fans to feel like they contributed to the final product and the level of Imogen’s gratitude has been heart-warming:

Showing a genuine interest in her fan’s thoughts and taking on board many of their ideas, I believe Heap to have made a dramatic step forward in the relationship between artist and audience.  She has done so by expertly using new online technology such as Twitter, Soundcloud, Vimeo and through microsites created for submissions and is now nearing success into a new technology she has been developing for live performance.  She is developing a set of ‘gloves’ which are an extension of her recent habit of taping microphones to her wrists while performing to amplify and process a variety of acoustic instruments rather than to individually mic everything.  Apparently these gloves will also allow her to record and loop the sounds they pick up, play virtual instruments and manipulate sounds and digital effects through a series of gestures.  Really a very original and innovative artist in many respects; Imogen Heap is definitely one to keep your eye on as she continues to push the boundaries of what artists are willing and capable of doing.

Follow Imogen Heap on Twitter

See her website for the first 5 so called ‘#heapsongs’ and further songs and news

Written by Matthew Briggs  © 2012 Help for Bands

Picture – Marcelo Teson

In the hey-day of MySpace, online band promotion was made obvious. Upload my music, take an action shot of on-stage guitar-bashing, add my friends and…done! Social networking has dramatically evolved since then, widening the influence and variety of online promotion, however it seems not a lot of bands have evolved along with it. Fans love to interact and appear ‘close’ to bands – that’s why they’re fans – so what better medium to do this than through disciple-augmenting social networking overlord, Twitter. From those artists who have abandoned the MySpace mantra for the Tweeting future, many see the platform as merely an opportunity to test-drive left-field lyrical content, rather than engage with those that share, buy and listen to their material. There is a clear deficiency here, if rectified, can be a great source of promotion and fun to both band and fan. So here’s a few tips to help those bands tweeting about broken guitar strings, mend online relationships with fans and rack up some new ones along the way.

Choose A Good Handle – When setting up a Twitter account for your act, be sure to choose a practical and relevant handle (@yourband). It has to be memorable so usually the band name would suffice, however bands such as ‘…And You Will Know us by the Trail of Dead’ or ‘Joe Lean and the Jing Jang Jong’ using their name as a handle will obviously overwhelm the character restriction and struggle to get mentions from fans.

Customize your background – It’ll make you seem more legitimate when speculatively following others, setting you apart from spammers and those who fail to interact with followers. It also serves as an opportunity to increase your band image in what is a very limited profile page.  Take time over making the right background to reflect your sound and persona, one option is using a third-party site such as Twitterimage to do this.

Attach Handle to Contact Details – When sending out demos to promote your material, whether this is by e-mail or in physical form, include your Twitter handle in the contact details. This shows demo recipients that you engage fans through social media and are interested in building a following. You could even pick up a few key industry followers this way.

Follow artists similar to yourself – Those who you admire or have more of an online command yet similar sound can be looked to for strategy tips. Tweet at them – you have nothing to lose – and build online relationships, which may also lead to jam sessions, collaborations and gig opportunities, as well as making it easier for new fans/followers to discover your material.

Use Keywords – When tweeting, keep a list of buzzwords in mind. This doesn’t mean warp your tweets into lingo-fueled nonsense. Rather, think carefully about how your tweets can arise in search engines and Twitter keyword index. Maybe regulate inclusion of local music venues, genre tropes or anything that grounds the band’s image.

Tweet for A Track – Some small bands with strong fan base are using Twitter to release music whilst gaining a wider following. Asking for a mention or retweet in exchange for a free track can be a great way to increase followers and appear to be very ‘fan orientated’. Be sure to do research on your followers prior to launching something like this; assess who’s likely to want your track and whether the amount of exposure gained will be worth giving away your music for nothing!

Interact with your Followers – Maybe the most important aspect of all. Be vigilant of opportunities to converse with those who follow you, offer opinions on their tweets and answer their problems and questions where possible. Don’t be afraid to channel your personality and treat followers like fans you just met in a bar. Again, this will make your act appear ‘fan orientated’ as many will return the favour, sharing your views and tweets with their following and increasing exposure for your material.

Written by Mark Lloyd.  (c) 2012 Help for Bands

One of the most important things any new artists can do to help themselves is put together a press release that they can use to promote themselves.  Alongside your music your press release should be one of the most important things you put together.  A good press release can help you stand out from the crowd and also get people’s attention.

Your press release should be used to contact the press.  Your press release could be to promote any gigs / tours you are booked to play or it could be to inform potential customers about a forthcoming release or a competition you may have won.  A good press release can also help you acquire new fans.  As the press release may be the first thing somebody reads about you, the main thing is it that it captures their attention and their interest.  It should be distributed to as many places and people as possible and if used in the correct way it should go on to be one of your main promotional tools that accompanies everything you do to promote yourself and your career.

A good press release should read like a story of you as a band or artist and your musical development.   However it differs from a biography in that its focus should purely be one specific story.  Some of the most common things to include in a press release include:

• Date:  Always make sure you include the date of when you want the news to be released to the general public.
• Contact information:  The person receiving it should know who to contact to ask further questions.
• At the bottom of the press release you can include a little bit of background information or any other helpful information such as a short history.
• Keep story of what your press release is about interesting and to the point.  Your story should be only ½ page long preferably or one full side with a further half page of background information.  Either way don’t send pages and pages.
• Is the news item really news and informative.  Will the readership want to read this?  Would you read this in a newspaper or just ignore it.  If you would ignore it, chances are, most others would too and it wouldn’t get published.
• A crafted press release will often be used without being edited.  News teams have tight schedules, so if the news is well written for them, they will not only appreciate you doing the work well for them, but will print it as you have written it.

The benefits of having a well-executed press release are huge.  The main thing people will look for when reading a press release is an interesting angle or a story that will get people’s attention and set you apart from the crowd.  Any sort of press is good and should be welcomed especially free press which is always better than having to pay someone to say good things about your music.  Press is massively important for any band or artist as it raises your profile in both the industry and to the general public.  It shows that you as a band / musician are active and are putting in the work to get your name and your music out there.   Another vitally important thing the press can do for you is help you find out if people are interested in you and your music.  If there is consumer demand for your music your profile within the industry will only continue to grow.

Written by Joseph Docherty.  (c) 2012 Help for Bands

The music industry is a constantly changing, evolving business – an industry in which everyone, including bands and artists, need to keep up to date with and understand the direction in which the industry is heading to survive. One metric we have to see where we are at now and where we are potentially heading is through monthly, quarterly and yearly sales statistics. This post will summarise last years figures and highlight the major changes.

Subscription services like Spotify, Deezer, We7 and Pandora are on the increase, reaching an income of £24M for the first time, a staggering 47% increase over 2010, and represents 8.5% of all digital income. Most of the growth came from paid services too, with ‘freemium’ (ad-supported) income remaining at around £10M.

While per stream income from these services is much lower than per sale income from digital stores like iTunes or Amazon MP3, these numbers show that subscription services are a growing market and if its growth continues, it could potentially become the main way the public consume music.

Online music stores like iTunes and Amazon MP3 continue to grow too. Total revenues from online sales are up year on year by a considerable 24.6% from £193M to £241M, with the biggest growth within this sector coming from album sales, which were up 43%. This puts revenue from singles and albums approximately equal.

Unfortunately the physical side of things continues to shrink. Total revenue from physical sales dropped by 14.1% due to a combination of prices getting lower, and less units being sold due to the massive increases in the digital sectors.

Overall, total industry revenues have fallen for 2011 by 3.4% down to £795M. While this is the lowest it has been for nearly 25 years, the drop in total revenue is nowhere near as high as it was between 2009 and 2010, and while the overall revenue has dropped again, it is clear that the industry is growing fast in the digital markets. This continued growth means that we could see an increase in year on year revenue some time in the next few years, and shows that despite the overall drop in revenue, the industry is still thriving and growing, and is evolving to exploit the ever changing technological landscape.

Subscription services and online stores are the future of the industry – the CD single died years ago, and if the current trends hold true, the CD album will eventually follow. However while one form of media is on the way out, two more have replaced it – online stores and subscription based services.

Written by Gareth Dawson.  (c) 2012 Help for Bands