Social Media for Bands and Songwriters

Social media has taken hold.  Web 2.0, the second revolution of the internet, whatever you want to call it, the web is now social and that means you must tap yourself in or get out of the way.  This development impacts all industries and that clearly includes the music world.  It’s time to get serious about using social media for your online music promotion efforts.

Check out the newly redesigned website for rock star, Chris Cornell.  Aside from being a cool and clean design, it truly embraces social media websites and makes them the centerpiece of his web presence.  Right on the home page, you have an integrated twitter feed (it appears Chris is an active twitterer), headlines from his blog, and links to his myspace, facebook, and youtube pages.  Rock on.

Finding success as a band or a songwriter is all about promotion, promotion, promotion.  Spread your music to as many ears as possible.  Increase your head count at live shows as much as possible.  Expand your audience and fan base as far as you can. The question is, given the new state of the music industry, and the changing scene on the internet, how do we do all of these things?

If you haven’t already, you have to stop sleeping on social media and dive in.  That means really making the effort to work it into your daily routine, even tap into it several times in the day.  These days mobile computing makes this very easy.  The thing about social media is that you really have to get consumed in it for it to take effect.  Just dabbling in it won’t do you any good.

Ok, so you’re ready to get in the mix.  Where do you start?  It seems there is a new social media outlet emerging every single day, adding to the endless list of social sites out there already.  The question is, which of these web hotspots are worth investing time in?

Before I get into the descriptions of the most important social media websites, I want to note an important factor in your social media success.  That is, choose only a few of these sites to focus your time and energy on.  If you try and tap into all of them, you will spread yourself too thin, minimizing the overall impact you bring to these communities.  And of course, the lesser the impact you bring, the less you gain in return.

Here is my list of important social media outlets.  Aside from being the most popular ones out there, these sites have the most potential to help the promotion efforts of working bands and songwriters…

Songwriters on Twitter

By far the most explosive social media phenomenon in recent months has been Twitter. It’s popularity has spread like wildfire. Two previous posts cover all things twitter: Why Songwriters Should Get on Twitter and Twitter Links for Bands & Songwriters. Just about everyone who isn’t familiar with twitter has the same reaction off the bat.  ”I don’t get it”.  All I can say is you must give it some time and eventually you will be hooked.

The best advice I can give you about using Twitter is to be real, and be interesting.  Let your real personality flow into the twittersphere (yup, I finally coined my own tword.  Hey, I just did it again!).  Despite the fact that the homepage of twitter asks the question “What are you doing?”, don’t necessarily tweet about every one of your mundane daily tasks.  You can tweet about what you’re doing, but make it something interesting, unique, funny, witty, or bold.  You could also tweet with a link, promoting a recent blog post, an interesting article you just found, or a link to your latest songs.  Maybe you just posted a youtube video from last night’s gig.  Tweet it.  You have special pre-sale ticket pricing for upcoming tour dates.  Tweet it.  You’re in the studio, crafting your next batch of musical goods.  Tweet about it.  You get the idea.

Facebook Band Pages

Chances are, you’re already on Facebook.  I mean, who isn’t these days?  My parents and aunts and uncles have opened accounts, so that means Facebook has clearly hit the mainstream.  Here’s a previous post about Facebook.  A good idea is to create a dedicated Facebook page for your band.  This will give it some separation from your personal Facebook profile.

The big piece of your social media puzzle that Facebook brings is event promotion.  It has been my experience that most people turn to Facebook to promote parties and gain attendees for special events.  It’s also a great way to get an idea of who’s planning on coming out to your next show.  Somewhat related is the community aspect of Facebook.  Not only can your fans connect with you through Facebook, but they can connect with each other either through your page, your event pages, or a fan group created about you or your band (should you become so popular).

Myspace Music

It’s still important.  Sure, it may be a bit out dated in terms of web 2.0 evolution.  But for songwriters and bands, it’s still key to host your music on Myspace and design an awesome presence on the site.  Many potential fans will look for you on Myspace before trying your band name + .com or googling your band name.  Since Myspace is the online home for so many bands and songwriters, it’s also a prime spot to network with fellow bands and arrange for gig swaps and touring arrangements.

The biggest word of advice when it comes to your Myspace presence is to come up with an awesome design for your myspace page.  Don’t settle for those free Myspace design generators.  You will only end up looking amateurish.  Find a skilled designer who specializes in Myspace design (this is a specific skill, not for just any web designer).  Check out this previous post about design links for bands.

YouTube For Bands

Again, nothing groundbreaking here, but super important for bands and songwriters nonetheless.  Utilize the power of youtube to host videos from your gigs, behind the scenes footage of your rehearsals, studio work, or even funny / interesting footage of you and the band hangin out.  The fans love video.  Web surfers love video.  Get on it.

Beyond hosting videos, YouTube offers a ton of social media features.  Customize the look and feel of your youtube page and connect with as many other tubers as you can.  Link to your YouTube presence on all of your other social profiles and your website.  Embed your YouTube videos in your blog, website, Facebook profile, ect.  Promote new videos in your Twitter feed.  Do you see where this is going?  It’s all connected.

Flickr for Band Photography

For your still photos, create a presence on Flickr.  It has become the most popular photography websites out there with a ton of social media features. Bloggers turn to Flickr when searching for engaging imagery to post in their articles (I do this myself).  Users comment on photos and share them. You can embed your Flickr feed in your website and blog.  Awesome photos are still a super important piece of the big picture for any band and Flickr is the go-to hot spot to promote photography on the web.

FriendFeed

FriendFeed is a somewhat lesser-known social media outlet, but one that is growing in popularity quite fast.  It shouldn’t be totally new ground though, because what it does is connect all of your social media updates into one feed.  I must admit that FriendFeed is somewhat new to my personal social media use.  Here’s an excellent article I found which details how to connect and utilize the power of FriendFeed.

Blogging

This is a pretty general thing, but blogging is becoming a hugely important factor in any promotional strategy.  If you haven’t already, it’s a good idea to seriously consider starting a blog for your band or for you personally.  Take into consideration that if you do start a blog, it requires a large amount of time investment and must be updated regularly in order to reap the promotional benefits.  Here’s a previous post which talks about the importance of blogging in the new music industry: The Music Industry and the Blogosphere: Two Revolutions Unite.

Obviously, blogging is social by nature. Each article is meant to begin a discussion with the comments that follow. Readers pass on links to your articles through twitter and social bookmarking sites like digg.com, stumbleupon.com, and reddit.com.

Over to you…

As always, I turn the conversation over to you.  Which social media sites work best for you?  How do you prioritize them?  Any useful suggestions for how to promote yourself on these sites?  Share your secrets!

Related posts:

1. Friday Roundup: Twitter Links for Bands & Songwriters
2. Links Roundup: Artwork and Design Inspiration for Bands and Songwriters
3. Why Songwriters Should Get on Twitter
4. Myspace vs. Facebook For Songwriters
5. Bandcamp: Super Sweet (and Free) Features for Bands

Enjoyed reading this post?
Get articles sent to you via EMAIL or RSS (what’s RSS?)

Thanks for being part of the conversation at Serve The Song. We have a simple comment policy (with thanks to Tim Ferriss) - critical is fine, but if you’re rude we'll delete your stuff. ’Nuff said.