CHAPTER 1: Creating an Overall Strategy

As you know, the Internet is constantly evolving and presenting something new everyday. So the real trick is how to get online and consistently stand out from the crowd. To put it simply, you must have a plan of attack in order to successfully promote yourself online. While there isn’t an exact formula for success, this chapter will teach you how to spot online trends and exploit them.

Most importantly, Creating an Overall Strategy sets the pace for using your local offline promotion (word-of-mouth, gigs, and press coverage) to open niche markets online (email lists, newsgroups, search engines, ezines, Internet radio, online vendors, distributors, etc.). But before we begin exploring the finer details, it is absolutely paramount that you understand that your efforts online are not independent from your efforts offline.

Cyber-Artists Need Not Apply

It is easy to get caught up in all the hype about the Internet and immediately start thinking of getting global exposure. With a bit of planning, an independent artist can grow from a local scene, expand into niche markets and onward to the global scale. While traditional methods of promotion translate easily into the online realm, there are completely new methods you need to take advantage of. Even though the Internet is one of the cheapest ways to get exposure, it is important to understand that traditional methods of promotion are still valid and integral to your success. This is because the Internet is merely a new medium, not a departure from the “old ways.”

Again, before delving into the gory details of getting online and selling music, let’s walk through an overall strategy that will help you build a stronger online presence. Most of this strategy is a natural extension of the offline promotion you are already doing.

Plan of Attack

A web site is like a business. It must be carefully planned and executed to measure its success. With a well-developed plan, you will be able to analyze the elements that are responsible for causing your promotional campaign to fall short or become a smashing success. Here are the five key points to developing your overall plan and the chapters in this book that cover them:

• Getting Your Act Together Deep Thoughts: Do you have finished, mastered songs and a finished CD? Do you know your market? Have you gathered all your information?
  
  
• Securing Your Online Presence Chapters: Online Basics & Putting Your Music Online, How to Become a Multimedia Dynamo, and Elements of a Successful Web Site
  
  
• How to Integrate Your Web Site with Your Offline Promotion Chapters: Starting a Propaganda Machine, Using the Press To Your Advantage, Using Email Effectively
  
  
• Using Your Online Presence to Leverage More Exposure Chapters: Understanding Search Engines, Submitting to Search Engines, To Yahoo! or Not to Yahoo!, Internet Radio & Online Publicity, Where Does the Money Come From?, and CyberPrise: Thinking E-Commerce.
  
  
• Cultivating Growth and Longevity Chapters: Covering Your Bases, Measuring Your Success, Protecting Music Online, and CyberLaw.

Getting Your Act Together

Now that you are ready to get your music online or even if you already have some kind of online presence, you need to make sure that your image is polished. That means having well produced songs and a finished CD to sell as your main “product.” You will also need to create a press kit or convert your existing one to your web site. Elements of a Successful Web Site will explore this and show you how to design your site to have the most impact for your intended audience – fans, the press, and industry professionals.

Securing Your Online Presence

The first step in creating an online presence is to get connected to the Internet and begin searching for a place to put your web site. Online Basics & Putting Your Music Online covers in detail where to find the best places to store a web site based on need; how to pick a web address; and how much all of this will cost you.

The next step is to start building your site. Elements of a Successful Web Site and How to Become a Multimedia Dynamo show you what your site should contain and how to organize it for the most impact. Note: this book is not a tutorial in web design. Unfortunately, web site design is a subject for an entire book, but don’t worry. If you are a “do-it-yourselfer,” there are online resources where you can learn web site design listed throughout this book.

Securing your online presence is the largest step but not the most difficult. There is a great deal of work involved with building a new web site and announcing its grand opening. If you don’t own a computer or know the first thing about web design, don’t let that stop you from getting online. There is always somebody around to help. ( A geeky third-cousin, perhaps? See first coupon in the back of the book. )

To start you off in the right direction visit Newbie-U at http://www.newbie-u.com to learn more about the Internet and basic concepts of networks; how to use any of the popular web browsers, email and news reader programs; and where to get your hands on useful file utilities. With WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get) web page editors, there isn’t much to learn about HTML anymore. These nifty editors take care a lot of the tedious programming work for you. Many of the popular WYSIWYG web page editors are available on a trial basis. See the table on the next page to find the best one that works for you. Also, be sure to visit the CGIP web site – http://IndiePromo.com - for more useful tutorials and online education.

When taking on designing your own web site, keep one thing in mind. You get what you pay for. Also, if you have a “friend of a friend” maintain your site, it will be difficult to get any changes made in a timely manner and it will look like a “friend” maintains your site, instead of a professional public relations firm. Many of my new clients’ web sites are repair jobs because they are victims of amateur web masters.

Integrating Your Web Site with Offline Promotion

While you are building your web site or having it done for you, start tagging all of your merchandise and literature with your email and web address. I can’t tell you how many times I have seen this overlooked. Most of the artists that I meet at lectures complain how a single soul has never visited their site. I have found that a majority of them do not put their online contact information on business cards, CD’s and merchandise. On the other side of the coin, make sure the web address you want isn’t already taken before printing up cards and CD jackets!

When your site is fully functional, announce it to the local press with a news release and inform existing fans through email and snail mail. You can increase interest by holding a contest or making a special offer to encourage people to visit your site - something like, “Order a CD from our new web page and get a free sticker and T-shirt. Offer limited to the first one hundred.” The word “free” will have a huge draw, while “limited offer” adds a sense of urgency.

Notice how search engine submissions are not part of this step! This is because a new artist site will get more results from the “word of mouth” than from search engines. Your time is better spent using other techniques to draw visitors that are more likely to buy your CD because they are familiar with your work. This is called “product recognition” in marketing circles and will lead to stronger sales. The next point of the overall strategy covers the first part of the online gamut.

Leveraging More Exposure

At this stage of your online presence, your site should be fully integrated with your offline promotion. Your existing fan base knows about your web site and can give you invaluable input on its effectiveness. With their help, you can “fine tune” your online presence in preparation for the global scene. You are now ready to conquer search engines and to begin submitting your music to Ezines, reviewers, Internet radio, and online “music stores.”

Understanding Search Engines and Submitting to Search Engines teach you how to optimize your web pages for all of the major search engines. Internet Radio & Online Publicity, Where Does The Money Come From?, and Cyberprise: Thinking E-Commerce will show you how to use your web site to leverage more exposure and increase CD sales.

However, even after your online promotion kicks in, a majority of traffic will still come from word of mouth. A client of mine received 12,000 hits from word of mouth alone, before I submitted her new site to search engines. Those hits came from 400 plus visitors listening to all of her music, exploring the site thoroughly and interacting with band members. The reaction to her new site was a direct result of mentioning her site during gigs while on tour, putting it on flyers, imprinting it on CD’s, and including it in press releases. Imagine what would have happened if my client submitted her site to CD Reviewers, Ezines, MP3 sites, and Internet Radio, too!

Cultivating Growth and Longevity in the Global Scene

This is the easiest part of the overall strategy. When traffic starts to die down at your site or you want to go to the next level of intensity, Covering Your Bases and Measuring Your Success will show you how to attract new fans and keep long-term interest in existing ones. All you have to do is spend just a few hours a month following the methods outlined in the chapters above and search for more ezines, reviewers, online “music stores,” and Internet radio stations to place your songs. Resources like these pop up everyday so there is always a way to generate interest in your music. Spending just one hour a week finding new resources will make a huge difference in the traffic passing through your site.To help you keep track of your progress, a checklist is at the end of each chapter, starting with chapter 3. For your convenience, Appendix A contains a comprehensive checklist.

Keeping Track of Your Progress

We realize that the Internet is constantly changing and it is impossible to keep this book up to date as soon as it is on the shelf. To ensure that you have access to the latest tips and techniques, Tim and I have put together a companion web site for CGIP - http://IndiePromo.com. There you can get updates to chapters in this book, the comprehensive checklist, tutorials, more study materials, software, online resources, and advice to help you develop your music career. All you have to do is come visit us at: http://IndiePromo.com/updates. You also get a limited-time free membership to our “Indie Insider” section. See the coupon at the back of this book to get your personal access code.