Whether your field is rock or rap, the music licensing companies connect you with leading brands in the circle. Since competition is higher in this field, struggle to get the first seat is tedious too.

The music licensing company offers you services allowing you to publicize your potential to the world. They prepare a pathway for budding and struggling artists to reveal their skill in the field of music. In order to gain worldwide recognition the contribution of music licensing companies in promoting singers and music composers simply knows no bounds. Here are some of the major functions of music licensing companies:

Image credit: lambertwm on Flickr

• Safeguarding your creation: Being a music composer, your music is just like your child. After months of dedication and timeless efforts you give birth to music which solely belongs to you. No one has the right to bring about a change in your creation or hamper its quality. Neither anyone has the right to copy it without seeking permission from the creator. Music licensing companies’ help you get your music licensed, so that no third party is able to duplicate your creation or claim it as theirs. They ensure the safety of your composition. Yes, with copyright done with your composition you don’t have to worry about your creation being duplicated or copied by others.

Believe me, if you catch anyone violating the copyright rules and copying your own composition, then you can simply file a lawsuit against the person, group of persons or the organization concerned.

• Promoting your music: Soon after the licensing of the composition is completed, the music licensing company takes a step further to promote your creation. They leave no stone unturned to publicize the composition, so that it reaches to the maximum audience base and has an impact on them. They give in their best efforts to make the opus popular and reach it to the maximum number of audience. This way your product gets launched and finds a way to win the hearts of the millions of people tuned in to your music.
• Assisting producers in finding a unique composition: The market is already saturated with duplicate music and people are more into copying and remodeling them. However, the music loving audience is tired of listening to such fake compositions. They only want authentic and unique numbers. On merging with music licensing companies, producers are able to find desirable and unique music products.
• The music licensing companies give their very best to make the opus popular: Yes, a typical music licensing company has a music library where compositions of popular as well budding artists are stored. The producers then pick a unique composition as per his tastes. This way your creation gets noticed and popularizes in the field of music.

Now you should know why it is important to contact a music licensing company.

Guest post written by Darcy Matthew.

I see a good deal of bands that have a review section on their website or on social media sites that always are from their backyard and never that far away. That Seattle band for example that only has reviews from Seattle proper and about a 25 mile radius does not come off like a band that is anything more than a band that plays Seattle.

How Do I Get My Music Heard?

When you ask the question, How do I get my music heard? You should also ask, where should I get my music heard?

Why not reach out to a wider audience and other states or even other countries when you are going after getting better indie music reviews? This can help make you look a little more worldly in a sense. It gives you the appearance of more traveled group that is being heard by a wider array of fans and music industry people.

This can be done in emails and basic research very easily and requiring a limited amount of time. Do the research of different reviewers, review sites, review bloggers and email five a day with a basic template review letter that is personalized to the person or company you are reaching out to.

Getting indie music reviews is easier than you think, and the more you can build up for a wider mileage, the more that will be out there about you! There will be negative or bad reviews too but no worries. As a music consultant, I get asked how to get rid of bad reviews and I always respond, asking why. It is not bad to have bad reviews out there. It is more marketing. Your name, your album, your song is now out on another page or another site that it wasn’t on before.

Try it. It’s five emails a day and some research. Tell them why they should check you out, what you are about and go in to some basic detail to make some one want to check you out and possibly review you. Think about the fact that these people receive hundreds of requests, so make sure you do not sound like the masses in your email.

And again, the best music consulting tip I can give regarding reviews is to research and email out to five a day. You could easily find thousands and you never know which ones will give you a review or help you, your music or your website reach a whole new audience you have not been able to reach before.

Loren Weisman is an accomplished music producer, author and music consultant. He is the author of “The Artist’s Guide to Success in the Music Business”, a book to help independent artists, musicians, bands, labels and managers achieve self sufficient and sustainable success.

What you’re immediately introduced to are two columns with our life’s events hanging off of a lithe, blue, never ending trunk that’s topped off by a summation of our identity – who we are, where we are, what we do, what we like – enclosed in a 851px wide white rectangle. Amid the changes, we retain one recognizable feature, our Profile Picture. But behind the recognizable, lurks an over-sized opportunity to personalize yourself, which Facebook calls a “Timeline Cover.” To leave it blank is almost a sin.

You may have noticed friends taking creative advantage of the Timeline Cover, or you may have caught Amy-Mae Elliot’s compilations of creative Timeline Covers on Mashable. While you can take advantage of third party apps to achieve pictorial harmony between Cover and Profile Picture, where is the fun in that? Luckily for you, I did the math so that you can pull out your favorite photo or vector editing programs and create a uniform Timeline and Profile Picture.

As you’ll notice right away from the pictorial representation above, the size of the Cover is 815px wide by 314px high.

Cover (red) = 815px wide by 314px high

Here what you should recognize is that the Porfile Picture, represented in blue, is 125px by 125px. A white 5 px wide frame borders the Profile Picture, but for designing purposes we will imagine that the Profile Picture was superimposed and centered on a larger 135px by 135px box represented here in yellow.

Profile Picture (blue) = 125px by 125px
Outer square (yellow) = 135px by 135px

Before proceeding further, for simplicity and efficiency’s sake, superimpose the Profile Picture over the Timeline Cover and build the Cover around the Profile Picture according to the following dimensions:

When designing, omit the white frame (in yellow) and position the Profile Picture as leaving a 28px space between the left edge of the Cover and the left edge of the Profile Picture (in blue). The correct vertical positioning of the Profile Picture is achieved at a height of 87px from the top of the Profile Picture (in blue) to the bottom edge of the Cover, as illustrated by the red rectangle.

Cover Edge to Profile Edge Positioning Dimensions = 28px wide by 87px high

For your reference, I also added an additional reference rectangle, illustrated in green at 5px high and 23px wide, in case you’re looking to manually reposition and center the frame (in yellow) behind your Profile Picture.

Cover Edge to Profile Frame’s Edge Positioning Dimensions = 23px wide by 5px high

Now that you’ve been enlightened, share with us links to your creative Timeline Covers that best represents yourself as a musician, or your band.

Francis Bea is a New Yorker turned Chicago co-founder of Musefy.com (in development), Proptone.com and writes Musefy’s blog Musebox. You can find him at @francisybea or @musefy.

But now I have a “real job” and I’m producing and marketing an album from home in my “free time.” It’s really reinventing the wheel since a big record deal and mainstream radio play are a longshot and physical stores are disappearing. So I thought I’d share with Dotted Music readers what I have learned over the last year from my own experience and from leaders and pioneers of this new internet music scene such as John Oszajca, Tunecore, Jango radio, Reverbnation, and Indie Bible. Here are my current 10 Commandments to reach the goal: Getting Known and Being Paid through the Internet.

• X Thou shalt make of thyself a graven image
• IX Thou shalt love thy fan base as thyself
• VIII Thou shalt have thy songs mastered
• VII Thous shalt focus thine efforts on the few most powerful websites
• VI Thou shalt give away free stuff
• V Thou shalt make a video
• IV Thou shalt not put thy music on a streaming cloud without reading the fine silver print
• III Thou shalt not neglect thy copyright
• II Thou shalt not dishonour thy timetable
• I Thou shalt GET it in WRITING

X. Image

Image credit: eatshitmotherfucker on Tumblr

Create your band image and do all your bio, design and photos to emphasize that. Be consistent. As Vanessa Carlton said, “Be Not Nobody.” Not everyone will like you, will they. Let them go… But some will love you! So be what you are, and do it HARD!

Remember, the only way a journalist is going to want to do a story on you is if you HAVE a story, something unique. So define it and then play it up. And if you have snagged a radio interview, excellent! So have some predefined answers to work from, that cement your image to listeners.

Also, radio stations and record companies/distributors want a press kit. That will include a bio that is well-written and creates a mental image, 8×10 photo(s) and of course your CD with its album art and liner notes. Having all of this ready and shiny creates the image that you are professional and serious. Moreso, that you understand the industry you are entering and you want to help THEM do THEIR job. If they have your well-crafted 8×10 to pull out again later, then they’ll shudder each time (which is good), if you’re an evo death metal band, or if you were a fun-loving and upbeat dance band then look and be reminded “yeah, he was a riot.”

IX. Fan Base

Image credit: crsan on Flickr

Try to start dialogue with your fans on Twitter and Facebook. Ask them questions, demonstrate care about their lives. The most engaged fan will probably turn around and buy the interactive CD, buy the video boxed set, SHARE you, tell two friends. After all, they discovered you. On Jango internet radio, for example, if someone clicks to become a fan, the site lets you write individually to one fan, or do 2 mass emails a week. Make it personal and grateful, not just pushing your gigs or product. Reward them. Once I wrote some musical suggestions to singer on a big label. She didn’t write back. I would have liked that. I would have thought she was cool.

Speaking of Twitter, if someone follows you, you might want to follow them back. Check them out first of course. I tend not to follow anyone who tweets to their b*ches since that will be reflected on my page. If you follow back they say, hey she’s real, and maybe is even interested in me. You can always unfollow later.

VIII. Mastering

Image credit: bartku on Flickr

You’re good, youre studio’s good, your recordist is good. But you need to sound equivalent to what’s on the radio. A professional mastering engineer listens all day to new songs, shaving off the annoying peaks, increasing clarity, beefing up the bass, making your songs as loud as the world’s songs. No you don’t want to compromise or flatten your mix, but if each of your songs has the same deficiency, because of your speakers, the mastering engineer will pick it up. It doesn’t mean that anybody sucks. It just means that not all rectangular rooms and not all speakers and amps were created equal.

VII. Websites

VibeDeck

Commandment VII is probably the core commandment. Websites will help build your fan base. Twitter, Facebook, streaming radio, your videos on Youtube, Blogs. But choose maybe 3 or 4 to which you can commit to a schedule of adding content and interacting, while people’s attention is still intact. One writer commented that 4 times a day is too many tweets and one a month is too few. Have a good mix of promo and being personal with fans.

Yes, they’ll discover you on those public sites, but you need to SQUEEZE them to your PURCHASE page, perhaps to your band’s website. Consider that you got them there and they might lose interest quickly. So tell them “get my new single” or “share my player on your page” so that they’ll come to your money engine and act.

About your own personal band website: I was worried that I had to contact Moneris or somebody to give me credit processing on my page, and a web host that could set me up with adequate band width for viral downloads… and I was intimidated. Enter the WIDGET! No, not the Bruce Lee movie. The widget is enough computer code to paste into your html page so that the selling machine that someone else already created can be placed on your personal page AND handle downloads and payment! My band Max Jam is able to sell MP3s on Reverbnation, Bandcamp, Vibedeck, The Sixtyone, AmazonMP3, iTunes etc. etc.

Now, iTunes does reportedly 80% of internet music sales in the world. So you want to be there. To be there you must pay Tunecore to launch your music, and then they collectively keep 30% of your sales. Enter Vibedeck! They have decided that they will always host for free and will always pass 100%, of sales collected, straight to you through Paypal, without touching any money! When I regained consciousness…

I tried to embed just the player/selling engine on my page. Was only able so far to embed the whole Vibedeck artist page. In the interest of time, I instead embedded just my Reverbnation player (2 inches square) and created a link which opens Vibedeck/Max Jam into my own page’s lower frame when the visitor clicks “Buy MP3.” Here is my temporary website if you want to read the source code.

VI. Free Stuff!

Image credit: brendanmills on Flickr

Napster pioneered free stuff. Unfortunately. Now it’s expected. Yes, do give away a song, but I would do it as a reward for what you need: more fans, more exposure. I personally wouldn’t give away the song that I expect to gross the most money in sales, unless it’s to the hardcore fans that have true respect and have shown loyalty. You share stuff in order to reach more people, to foster gratitude, and once they know how cool you are, to attract them to the paid stuff and concerts. Saying “come and download my single for free” might bring lots of people to your page, so maybe make them earn the single by sharing your link or your player somewhere else.

Also, here’s a sort of Digital Copyright Management that I think I invented: If you’re giving away CDs to strangers, that you made from wave files, you’re basically giving away your master. No, no, no. Only for paying customers. Instead, use iTunes to convert to a 256 or 320 kbps MP3 file, then use iTunes AGAIN to convert that MP3 back to WAVE!! Now you can burn, basically, a 256 quality CD which sounds as good the net, probably quite good, but if they rip it to put it on torrents… ooo… what’s that nasty warbling? I heard of a DJ who lowers his mixes to about -50 dB on his CDs, so people can turn them up to hear them, but not enough to DJ with them! And if you now Normalize that, you’re going to be the proud heir of artifacts from heck.

V. Video

Image credit: sko11ie on Flickr

A music video is like a ribbon on a gift, or value-added packaging. It makes the music sound better than it is. Even if it’s just home-movie of your band playing the song through once, it’s more content to enjoy and to get to know the musicians and build your image (see commandment X). Yes, do a pro video if you can afford it, yes, submit it to MTV. But if you can’t, you can still do a great job with a high-end Nikon or Canon photo camera and a TRIPOD and free software. The critics are saying that even MTV is dying slowly.

When you put it on Youtube, make sure you fill out the tags, and make most of the tags for all of your videos identical, so that all of them come up together. There is another cool idea out there: do a cover and tag it to resemble the original hit singer. This could be your first big exposure on the coattails of someone who has guaranteed traffic.

As for editing programs, I have torn out more hair using Windows Movie Maker, but Cyberlink DVD PowerDirector rocks my world. It has effects, picture in picture, titles, the list goes on.

IV. Cloud

Soundcloud

I think “the cloud” is designed to steal revenue from CD sales and even iTunes. It’s more like “the smokescreen.” Apparently people want it. So you’ll consider putting your music there but: READ THE FINE PRINT. Do they say that they have the right to “copy, distribute, use your music in any medium existing now or in the future, without restriction, in perpetuity?” What do they mean? Is that what you want? You can’t remove it?

Should you click AGREE?? Maybe just not your hit, eh? And do read your options carefully, because you may be able to set your song as preview-only, or hidden except to invitees. This is the case on Soundcloud where technically you could create a private listening room to which you “invite” DJs or A&R reps but no one else can enter. Incidentally, those scary rights paraphrased above are from Soundcloud!

III. Copyright

Copyright

Learn what forms of copyright you will own. Performance Rights (to broadcast, perform, or stream the composition), Mechanical Rights (to reproduce and sell copies of the master recording), Synchronization Rights (to grant a licence and be paid if someone uses the song in a radio ad or a movie).

You will only have performance right if you wrote the song, and you will only have all of it for sure if you get it in writing with your band who wrote what, and how much. Lyrics are 50%, music is 50%. The owner of mechanical rights and sync rights will be the person who paid to record the album, who recorded it, who bought or licenced the rights. But only one of those people, and only the one who made it clear. You should deposit your recordings with the U.S. Library of Congress to prove your copyright in composition and prior use, and register your songs with a collector of performance royalties, such as SOCAN in Canada, BMI in the U.S.

Collectors of mechanical royalties such as the CMRRA (Canadian Musical Reproduction Rights Agency) and AMRA (American Mechanical Rights Agency) will police your physical master use if you register your work with them. Then if someone wants to reproduce your song on an anthology, for eg., they will have to negotiate the licence with CMRRA/AMRA if you’re in N.A.

II. Timetable

Image credit: webbr on Flickr

Dude, if you’re going to create hype for your album, your album better be ready for paid download or shipping when you release it. If you’re going to get local radio play, your album better be on consignment in the local CD store the next day. If not, what did you just hype? Either leave yourself enough time for snags to occur, or scale back your goals when you realize that you’re behind. You are creating DEMAND, so you had better have the SUPPLY ready, or you just lost your chance.

You might find it easier to do one single at a time, therefore, which has the benefit of keeping the hype flowing. You might want to hold off on getting a review or interview until the 4th song of your 4-song EP is mastered (somewhat autobiographical :)

I. Get It In Writing

Image credit: mr.curtispope on Flickr

And the corrollary: get it in writing. Did I mention getting it in writing? This includes…

The Split: of what band member is responsible for what percentage of lyrics and what percentage of music composition.

The Deliverables: your manager or PR firm will do what for you, how often, for what total fee or percent of GROSS? or NET?

Usually you want it net, because you know the costs are going to come from your pocket.

Any licensing deal: where they’re going to use your song as a theme, or a background, make sure they’re going have the right to use it only for a defined period, only the length and number of times specified and only in that medium. Run like heck if the contract says they can use it “in any medium, existing now or in the future, and in perpetuity.”

I say get it in writing, but it should be proactive, so PUT IT in writing and get them to sign. Sure they might disagree, and sure you might renegotiate the split, but hey, at least you’re still TALKING, and you haven’t lost any money yet! If you feel guilty because you want to take the contract to a lawyer to have them read it over, then you must be Canadian. Take it to a lawyer. You can’t afford the $100 bucks visit, nor can you afford to give away the $100, 000 because you were sued for 50% copyright. But don’t take it to your cousin the labour lawyer, take it to an Entertainment Lawyer. Search online for one.

These ten commandments for independent music making were presented in a top-ten list format, not just to confuse the church, but moreso to focus attention on Commandment I, Get it in Writing. You can do all those things, but if it’s not in writing, all you have is 99% of the good will, while your bass player only has 1% of it :) In summary, if you know who you are, and what you are trying to sell, and when, then coordinate all of your media to support each other, you will have a reference point for fine tuning your plan, and you will maximize your success.

By Christopher Dicks, Recording engineer, Producer, Co-writer of Max Jam.

• Give your CD cool cover art. Make your album cover and liner notes so cool and amazing that they can’t not buy it! This doesn’t mean your CD has to look tacky or gimmicky – unless that’s your style – it just means that the imagery and print quality should both be really good. They say never judge a book by its cover but that’s precisely what we all do, and the same applies to albums get yours noticed, make it look so cool that they want to have it in their hot little hands to show off to all their friends.
• Individualize or personalize the albums – this can be done in multiple ways, it just depends how much time, money and effort you want to spend on them. Some ideas include numbering the albums by hand to show just how limited a run, and therefore how valuable the CD is, autograph or draw pictures or write jokes or whatever takes your fancy on each album – make them all so different that the die-hard fans will have to buy more than one copy just because of this.
• Give something extra with the CD, whether that be a special download code for hidden tracks or remixes, stickers, buttons or other small tokens, to full on prize packs or gift packs with tshirts, your CD, stickers and some kind of limited edition or novelty item like a keychain lanyard, or tour-specific item for example.


Image credit: CuteDrop on Facebook

• Do something really interesting with your CD packaging, such as offering it packaged in a digipak with a foldout poster to put on the wall, or get your actual CD stamped with an interesting image or in a certain color. Get creative with it.
• Make your own zine, featuring beautiful high quality printed photos of your band, a bio and some anecdotes or interviews with band members and such and package your disc on the front, attaching it like it’s a giveaway with a music magazine and sell it for a slightly higher price – people love unusual, limited edition or creative items and packaging, it makes things more special.
• Don’t use a CD at all – instead have a DVD with your regular CD tracks and creative content like an interactive game or video clips of your band, or sell the whole thing on a small custom USB stick. Get creative, thinking outside the box and adding a little value to your CD is a great way to up your CD sales and make your fans happy.

This is a guest post by Pandie Suicide of Mixonic, a CD duplication service based in San Francisco. Click to like Mixonic on Facebook.

Here are some words of wisdom from those in-the-know:

Do Your Research

“You’ve got to have a very solid plan and go up to brands that are going to reflect your lifestyle.” – Samantha Pickard of Strut Entertainment

Read The Fine Print

“Know the terms of the deal and honour that commitment with the brand.” – Spee Chalkiotis of Neverest

Don’t Take Just Anything

“If you’re going to accept an endorsement, make sure it’s something you actually want to use and a company you stand behind.” – Dan Hay of Amos The Transparent

You Are What You Use

“Do these things with integrity and remember that the people who will see you play or wear certain things will associate these items with who you are as an artist. It’s important to be honest with your public.” – Jeff Stinco of Simple Plan

Make It Happen

Getting endorsed is not like winning the lottery. Artists that have a plan and know how to pitch themselves make for perfect candidates. If you’ve been booking your own shows and handling the publicity for your act, the pitching part should come fairly naturally. If you lack that experience, the best way to gain it is to dive in and learn to talk the talk.

You would speak differently to a music programmer at a radio station than you would a talent booker. The same can be said for gear companies. What needs to sit at the core of any pitch, however, is the mutual benefit attained by both parties involved in a prospective deal.

Image credit: oooh.oooh on Flickr

You need to demonstrate how your supplier is going to increase sales by offering you easier access to whatever it is you’re asking of them. If you’ve never toured, don’t have an album, or you’re playing one show a month at the local watering hole, you may want to reconsider the request. Tell them how many people you usually play to or which well-known artists you’ve shared the stage with. Anything impressive is going to show that opportunities come your way – opportunities that will come their way should their logo be somewhere onstage. Remember: They’re running a business, but so are you.

Every band with a good business plan should be able to demonstrate growth and profile, two key items that will open the gates to discounts and free wares. Drop a few hints about your goals for the next year and how they can involve the company. Be realistic: It’s hard to believe that a band drawing 50 people a week is going to be playing Glastonbury. (Not to say it’s impossible.) Useful items including how long you’ve been together and where you’re at in your discography would help as well. While your website and press releases should be available to them, you still want to make it easy to digest a fractional but punchy slice of what you’re all about so that they are inclined to research you further.

Stress your mandate. What is so special about you? There are some companies who are going to want to jump on the “next big thing” while some might feel safer about working with an artist who is fairly homogenous. Align yourself properly. Do your research and try to get a feel for what they look for and understand if it matches what you do.

Probably the most important aspect of your pitch should be your love for what they provide. Have you actually been using their stuff or are you just excited at the idea of someone helping you out? Here’s a test: What was the next thing you were going to purchase before hitting the road or playing that showcase? What do you need to replace? Is there something you can’t perform without? Find out who makes it – that’s the company you should be targeting. The best position you can put yourself in is to approach someone who could give you a discount on something you were going to buy regardless of the deal. If the deal doesn’t happen, you didn’t lose anything by trying. If they take a pass on you, thank them for their consideration and, if you’re still interested, touch base after you’ve developed your career some more. Building that relationship is more important than any material help.

Be sure to keep yourself in check and mull over the reasons why you’re looking for an endorsement. You can get caught up in the very idea of it and start to lose sight on the bigger picture. As cool as it could be, the sponsorship should be nothing more than another tool in your business plan. The last thing you want to do is start measuring your success by how many brands are backing you up. You’re an artist, not a stock car.

While it’s easy to talk about instruments when you’re on the topic of endorsements, there is a wealth of products out there you use night after night that could make your life easier. Basically anything that you can pay for has some kind of markup. Fortunately for you, this markup translates into a margin of sponsorship. With ever-evolving trends and fads, clothing is one of the bigger expenses you will face as an artist. You present yourself to people in photos, onstage, and at conferences, so you have to look your best within the parameters of your genre’s norms (unless you want to shatter those standards).

Pop-rockers Neverest – who’ve recently come off a tour with New Kids On The Block and the Backstreet Boys – aligned themselves with PF Flyers and Lucky Brand Jeans in order combat the war with laundry while on the road. “Clothes are definitely at the top of the list, especially when touring,” says lead singer Spee Chalkiotis. “The wear and tear of a tour is unbelievable.” Chalkiotis would like to drum up more lifestyle-oriented sponsorships with beverage companies, car companies, or cell phone providers to further cut down on daily expenses. “Everyone has needs.”

Neverest have been very happy with the relationships built with the brands they love. One thing Chalkiotis has noticed is the room for opportunity an endorsement can open up including subject matter for the red carpet, invites to perform at corporate events, and in-store concerts. “That not only brings business into the store, but we get exposure.” The discounts and free wares are only the beginning. “Don’t be afraid to start small and build on that relationship. Think outside the box.” And while he recognizes the need to promote the products used by Neverest, the singer couldn’t be happier to help. “We’re basically ‘walking billboards,’ but we definitely look forward to that.”

Atypical Clothing

If you’ve got the goods but lack the ability to negotiate a deal with your target sponsor, you may want to enlist the help of someone like Samantha Pickard, VP of PR firm Strut Entertainment. 3 Street Management gave Pickard the responsibility of hooking Neverest up with threads so that their resources could be better spent promoting and booking the act instead of dressing them. “They’re sweating through clothes on a nightly basis,” she says. “It’s very important to be saving that kind of money.” Seeing an opportunity to help the band stay on budget while looking good, she demonstrated to companies like PF Flyers how they could benefit from having a high-traffic, well-received group showcasing their line in the public eye. “Brands with less money to spend are looking at more grass roots partnerships.” She built a win-win situation for the client to digest and the deal was born.

Atypical Clothing, a relatively new apparel maker run by co-owners Logan Traynor and Matt Gardner, has been relying on the help of up-and-coming Canadian bands like The Artist Life and Victory Sweet Victory to spread hype about their designs. Without the ability to launch a multi-million dollar advertising campaign, the boys worked on the niche they were carving out and sent t-shirts to some of the bands they wanted to work with. Traynor thought the collaboration would benefit everyone involved: “It’s really hard to start out as an independent brand. The bands really help us grow.”

Those who accepted were usually so excited to represent the brand that they would immediately do photo shoots and post the pictures online for the fans to see. Atypical Clothing doesn’t feel the need to outline any promotional expectations with their artists because of how important it is to maintain this level of excitement with them. “You can’t get better than people on the Internet wearing your shirt,” observes Gardner. “A lot of bands wear their clothing sponsorships as a badge of honour.”

Once you’ve secured and nurtured one sponsorship, the rest are easier to come by. “Once you’ve built one positive brand relationship, you can leverage that in other categories,” advises Pickard. For those companies who have formal endorsement applications, you’ll often notice they ask for a list of other companies who are working with you already. This will not only demonstrate that people want to endorse you, but it also shows them whether you are picking products that match your lifestyle or if you’re just being whimsical.

Ryan at SABIAN also thinks it’s a good spot to determine if there is a conflict of interest between brands: “There’s kind of an unwritten rule in the industry where you don’t go out trying to steal people from other companies.”

You have to wear a lot of different hats in order to further your career in this industry. Convincing someone to give you things for free or on the cheap can be tough, especially if it’s too early in the game for you, but recognizing when an opportunity presents itself and how to capitalize on it is paramount.

If all else fails, you can always redeem your Air Miles.

Originally posted in the September/October 2011 issue of Canadian Musician magazine. Chris Gallant is a singer-songwriter and touring musician from PEI who likes to write about the things he wished he knew before entering “The Industry.” He can be reached at chris.s.gallant@gmail.com.

Do you have a difficult time deciding what guitar exercises to practice despite sifting through countless guitar practice materials daily? Are you feeling confused about which guitar learning method to turn to as you seem to be pulled onto many different paths with dozens of guitar books, websites and videos? Do you want to find out once and for all which guitar exercises to focus your practice time on in order to achieve your musical goals?

Image credit: allaboutyou16 on Flickr

From teaching hundreds of guitar players over the last 25 years, I have found that most musicians do not have a shortage of “things to practice” on guitar. The problem that I see many guitar players run into is not knowing how to organize all of their guitar exercises into an effective guitar practice schedule that moves them towards becoming better musicians. If this sounds like you, then I want to show you how to determine what you need to practice on guitar to improve your musical skills in the fastest way possible.

The first significant mistake that guitar players make with regards to guitar exercises is practicing “too many” of them. As a result, too much energy is spent trying to decide (at random) what exercise to play next, instead of concentrating on getting the most benefit out of each exercise being practiced. In reality, you can very often achieve a lot more by intelligently focusing on a smaller, targeted list of guitar practice materials than you can from a longer list of guitar exercises that are put together at random (more on this in a moment).

Another reason why guitar players struggle to make progress with all of their guitar practice materials is because they make the mistake of starting to look for “things to practice” before becoming clear on why they need to practice guitar exercises in the first place. Keep in mind that guitar practice materials can only make your guitar playing better when they are practiced with a specific objective in mind. Mindlessly playing through guitar finger exercises will not make your guitar playing any better until your mind is clear on several things:

1. The long term guitar playing goals you want to reach and how a given exercise fits into the big picture of developing your musical skills.
2. The exact guitar playing challenge(s) you want to overcome by using a particular guitar practice exercise.

Above all, you must remember that the only reason why guitar exercises are needed in the first place is to help you solve various guitar playing problems. As simple as this concept is, most guitar players do not practice with this understanding in mind. The more specifically you can define your guitar playing problems, the easier it will be to find the most effective exercises to overcome them. For instance, rather than saying: “I want to increase my speed with scale sequences“, you need to identify an exact problem such as: “I need to practice the picking hand motion that happens when my pick is caught inside the strings“.

In order to determine whether or not a specific guitar exercise should be included into your practice schedule, ask yourself this question: “what guitar playing challenge will I be able to overcome by working on this exercise and will this exercise move me closer to my guitar playing goals?” To help you with answering this question, here are several important points to follow that will make your guitar practicing a lot more productive:

1. Identify (in specific terms) your guitar playing goals.
2. Work backwards from your final goal to prepare a list of steps that you need to go through to reach the objectives from Step 1. Check out this free resource about improving your musical skills if you don’t know what steps go into the process of reaching your musical ambitions.
3. Put together a very targeted list of guitar practice exercises that is specific to developing the skills (and/or solving guitar playing problems) that you identified as important to your goals from Step 2.
4. Learn how to create the most effective guitar practice schedules. To do this, you must know how to efficiently divide your guitar practice time among the exercises that you have selected in Step 3. This will help you to avoid wasting valuable practice time and will enable you to make faster progress. If you don’t know how to do this, read this page about how to make your guitar practicing more effective.

Keep in mind that ultimately it is you who is responsible for the results you experience in your guitar playing. Even after you have correctly put together the list of effective guitar practice exercises, you must remind yourself to stay focused at all times on the specific problem you are trying to solve while practicing. Don’t allow your hands (or your mind) to go on autopilot. As you get better at doing this, you will likely realize that you don’t need to practice as many guitar exercises as you imagined before. In fact, many guitar exercises can often be used to develop multiple skills simultaneously (see an example of how to practice guitar in this way in this video about the best way to learn to play guitar).

If you take guitar lessons from a proven guitar teacher (who has helped many people to become great guitarists), he/she should be familiar with the concepts I explained above and should be structuring your guitar lessons with these ideas in mind. However, if you have had a hard time with making progress on guitar up to this point, implement the ideas from this article into your guitar practicing and you will see your musical skills start to improve at a much faster pace than ever before!

Tom Hess is a guitar teacher online, composer and a touring musician. He plays guitar in the epic metal band Rhapsody Of Fire. He teaches guitar players in his rock guitar lessons online. Go to tomhess.net to get more guitar playing resources, guitar playing eBooks, and to read more guitar playing articles.

These days the presence and existence of stolen music is not as much of an issue, with services like Rhapsody and Spotify putting the practice of torrenting and music theft partially out to pasture, the environment for free flowing music to once again thrive (this time legally) has been firmly established. Additionally, there are new and untapped opportunities for independent artists to gain control of their music and distribution like never before.

Image credit: cbhdesign on Flickr

Recently, Social Media Juggernaut Facebook expanded its pay per click ad system to include a link to privately owned third party website landing pages for website and business promotion. And (not surprisingly) bands and independent artists have taken advantage of this new feature and ad system with relative Gusto. Facebook’s simple but effective PPC platform makes it possible to target your ads so they are only seen by possible fans who share like minded interests.

For Example, if you are interested in promoting a release from a German industrial act, you can set the parameters of your campaign filter so that your ad will only appear on the pages of people with keywords similar to that musical genre. What’s more, you can target your ad geographicallyso that you can promote your release by the region and demographic where it is bound to get the best bang for your buck. Ideally (in this situation) you would set an age and demographic filter to specifically target people of a certain age and geographic bracket who would already be fans of your musical genre.

Facebook’s notorious data mining system that they have compiled about their users since the launch of the social media behemoth may now potentially serve as one of the most game changing digital advertising tools that everyone from a major label band, to an independent musician, to a music marketing websites to a wedding dj can potentially use to target their exact audience. What’s even more interesting is the ability to filter ads so they only appear on the pages of people who are “friends” of “friends” thereby increasing the odds that a “click” will turn into a “like” exponentially.

Increasing the odds that a “click” will turn into a “sale” is the name of game in PPC advertising. Lowering your Cost per acquisition, while increasing the probability that your ads are showing up in the right place (to the right potential customer) is one of the most defining principles of paid search. And with 250,000,000 million active and highly engaging users, Facebook is a great starting point when considering where to launch a social media campaign to take control of your musical career.

Ryan Michael Farrell is a former Professional Drummer for the international punk rock band Guttermouth and is currently working for Wpromote as a digital advertising and search engine optimization professional. Visit his blog at Rumstreet to learn more.

To grasp an idea about the impact of Google+ among the social media domination that is Facebook, Twitter and Linkedin, we can briefly take a look at Wordstream’s case study on incoming traffic from Google+. While Facebook remains the majority referrer of traffic to Wordstream’s blog, in the month that Google+ has been open for beta invites, Wordstream was surprised to learn that Google+ had overtaken Linkedin and trailed right behind Twitter. More specifically:

• 1st Place: Facebook with 47.26% of visitors
• 2nd Place: Twitter with 27.51% of visitors
• 3rd Place: Google+ with 15.42% of visitors
• 4th Place: LinkedIn with 9.81% of visitors

While Google Plus is showing signs of life, the functionalities that will rival Facebook pages have yet to take effect. For those companies and bands antsy to jump onto the social media platform, Google is slated to release an enterprise app (a competitor to Facebook Pages) for Google+ by the end of 2011. But don’t sign on with your band name just yet. Google will shut down accounts without your own real name.

In the meantime, while we’re waiting on Google Plus’s version of Facebook Pages, here are ten ways you can take advantage of Google+ under your own name, and as the face of your band.

1. Organize Your Circles

The first suggestion is a simple one. You’re given the opportunity to aggregate your fans into groups, called Google Circles. When you set up your account, set aside circles for your band mates, fans, publicity contacts, and business contacts. Remember to set the privacy parameters when creating a new status update, whether it’s intended for your friends and family or your fans.

(Strategy) VIP Circles: There are various benefits to interacting with your top fans, the very people that have gotten you to where you are today. You can find these fans by using Openbook and Social Mention as I outlined in an earlier Dotted post. To leverage this concept with Google+, I would suggest that you invite an inner circle of “VIPs” who would receive exclusive updates and offerings, that your non-VIP fans would otherwise not receive. You can limit this exclusive invite to an X number of fans, and publicize this with a contest or any strategy of your choosing. To take it a step further, you can sell your VIP slots as a subscription fee.

2. Twitter+Facebook=Google Plus Circles

The way I see the psychology behind adding users to your circles is best described as the marriage of Twitter and Facebook. Twitter is a community wherein following people you may not necessarily know is encouraged, while on the other hand, most people would only add a Facebook friend, if that individual is at the least, acquaintances. Google+ borrows from Twitter in enabling you to view news feeds from those you add to your circle (even if the users you add do not necessarily follow you back), while maintaining the security of keeping your private life from your business contacts, as you do with Facebook, by permitting you to specify the circles you’re willing to publicize an update or link to.

Those LOL Cats photos you like to share with your friends don’t necessarily have to reach your business contacts. So feel free to add the A&R that you met the other night or follow your favorite musician. They don’t have to see those crazy antics that you’d rather hide behind closed doors.

3. Extended Reach

While you’re reveling in the ability to share information with specific circles, you should know that Google+ offers criteria that allow you to post updates and links in your “Stream” to those that have you in their circles, even if you haven’t added them in your circle (called “Public”) plus your circle’s circles (called “Extended Circles”).

Google Plus Stream

4. Cold Commenting

The benefit of Twitter is that you’re able to reach out to just about anyone. Cold Tweeting is an accepted practice, which leads to forming impromptu professional relationships. Likewise, if you’ve added someone to your circle that you admire or would love to talk to, but they haven’t returned the favor, don’t fret. You’re able to comment on the updates and comments that they have made available to the public. Maybe one day with the right comment, you’ll finally be able to grab their attention.

Cold Tweet

5. Your “About” Page is SEO Friendly

You’ll notice something entitled, “Search Visibility” in the “About” tab of your profile. What this means is that your “About” page is search engine friendly. Fill out your profiles as descriptively as possible with keywords that will get you noticed by Google and ranked higher on their search results page. For example, in your “Introduction,” you may want to refer to your band as being similar to X and Y, or specify your genre. In turn, your Google Plus profile may appear in the search results for those queries that people search, which in this case would be bands X & Y, or your genre.

(FYI) Hyperlinks and URLs are a NO NO: When writing your “introduction” don’t use hyperlinks and .com URLs. Google ignores them in their search engine results page. For example:

Do not use links in intro (click image to enlarge)

6. Hangout With Fans

Facebook has attempted video chat, but it’s limited to a face to face interaction. On the other hand, Google+ encourages video chat with up to ten individuals at a time. “Hangout” is an opportunity for you spend time on chatting via webcam with nine of your fans (Google Hangout supports only ten individuals at a time). A perk to this application is Google’s utilization of Google Translate to allow for multi-language communication, which means that you can use this functionality to diversify your fan base internationally.

(Strategy) Win the Chance to Hangout: Leverage “Hangout” by holding contests. For example, the top nine fans who publicize your upcoming gig win thirty minutes of your time to “Hangout” with you and ask you anything you’d like.

7. Be Mindful of Your Top 3 Links

You’re able to add links to your “About” page. But before you add links and forget about them, stack what you believe are your best three links that exemplify your work, whether it’s your Facebook page, blog, Bandcamp or Myspace page. When your Google Plus profile shows up in Google’s search engine results page, only the links that you place at the top will appear under the excerpted introduction.

Top 3 links Google (click image to enlarge)

(Strategy) How to Choose Your Top 3 Links: As a gesture of love for those fans, bloggers, or A&aR scouts that stumble on your Google Plus profile, make your top three links the following:

1. Your personality (Twitter, Facebook, etc.)
2. Your music (Bandcamp, Myspace, etc.)
3. Your website (Blog, your own domain, Facebook, etc.)

8. Build a Discussion around Your Photos

Create discussions around photos, and make sure to upload them often. Google+ has its own photo page that aggregates all photos from your circles onto what resembles Google Images. A clean and user friendly interface for Google Photos, which sets comments off in its own chat bar to the right, encourages frequent commenting.

(Strategy) Marketing Your Gig via Google Photos: If you have an upcoming gig, share it on Google Photos by uploading a poster of the event, and build a discussion around that image. Google Photos is grounds for bored fans browsing their circles’ uploaded photos, which can result in them stumbling onto your poster.

Google Plus discussion via poster

9. Cross posting

It’s a pain to copy and paste your Google Plus posts onto Twitter and Facebook. Luckily, the guys over at Survival Guide for Idiots have written a comprehensive article on cross posting from G+.

10. Vanity URLs

Google doesn’t directly support vanity URLs just yet, but of course someone out there had the free time to be creating an entire app around this. Vanity URL providers are third party providers and have not been endorsed by Google. Really, it’s just a matter of time before vanity URLs will be offered for Google+. But if you can’t wait, you can jump aboard the bandwagon and show off your shiny new Google vanity URL, in a few quick and easy steps using these providers:

• http://dirpl.us/
• http://gplusnick.com/
• http://gplus.to/
• http://plus.ly/
• http://topl.us/

I personally prefer gplus.to or plus.ly for simplicity’s sake. I find it easier to remember plus.ly/francisybea than gplusnick.com/francisybea.

If You’re Not Seeing the Value in Google Plus…

With the potential for this new social media platform, it’s just a matter of time before Google+ becomes an essential tool in your social media marketing box. If you’re wondering about the potential, hop over to Chris Brogan’s article, “The Google Plus 50,” which should open your eyes to Google+’s benefits. On a final note, don’t forget to add a Google+ button to your blog.

You can find me on Google+ via plus.ly/francisybea and gplus.to/francisybea. Feel free to add me, and I will return the favor. If you don’t have invites yet, send me your email address via DM to @musefy or shoot me an email at francis@musefy.com.

Francis Bea is a New Yorker turned Chicago co-founder of Musefy.com (in development) and writes Musefy’s blog Musebox.

Fan of the Day

Social media is not just about creating a profile. The returning readers are the most important individuals in your pocket of fans, the ones who are most likely to tell their friends or re-Tweet your messages. If you have raving fans who are following your every social media footprint among the statistics that you’re consistently making an effort to increase, individually recognizing them is a compliment by both peers with shared interests, and of course by the band itself.

Aziatix discovered the popularity of this social media strategy and consistently feature a fan as the “Aziaddict of the Day” on their Facebook page. You can add a twist to this further, but asking your fans to re-Tweet or repost a specified message, and the individual with the most influence would be featured as the “Fan of the Week.”

Aziatix Contest

CD Giveaways

Giving away a CD is a common strategy that musicians with leftover EPs or LPs can afford to utilize. This is a simple strategy that is just as easily implementable whether you’re asking for re-Tweets, reposts, or clever reposts in return.

Eric Alper pursued a rather successful contest asking for re-Tweets by Sunday midnight for a chance to win a 2-CD giveaway. But remember, you will likely have at least a handful of international fans. You should be willing to shell out the extra money for international shipping.

CD Giveaway by @ThatEricAlper

Finders Keepers

The future of social media lies in the integration of the virtual social network with that of those IRL (in real life). For example, start ups like Meetup.com and Skillshare.com enable individuals to organize meet ups wherein people from niche virtual communities can meet face to face, sans webcam. But in a more short term and exciting music related endeavor, Donald Glover (yes he stars in Community, but he’s a talented rapper) and crew hid #IAMDONALD stickers in the city of his next gig. The task was to find the sticker, take a photograph of it, and Tweet the photo to @DonaldGlover (using yfrog.com). In return, the first person to photograph the sticker would win passes to his show.

Donald Glover Contest

By publicizing this mini contest on Twitter, Glover was able to keep his fans at the edge of their seats as he Tweeted hints in real time, while responding to the Tweets of struggling contestants.

Donald Glover contest: Twitter screenshot

You help me, I give you freebies

Can’t afford a street team? Why not ask your fans to lend you a hand. Of course, if they’re your fans and willing to brave the streets in the name of your band, they wouldn’t want anything but band freebies, which I am sure you have plenty of lying around your apartment. Add to that, you’re getting your fans into the physical promotion process, which thereby will encourage them to spread the word among their peers.

She Wants Revenge realized this opportunity and consequently established a way to promote themselves through the help of others. What are the benefits? Your fans will know the best places around their own town to post flyers and stickers, that you likely will not be aware of.

She Wants Revenge Facebook marketing strategy

Ask me anything, and you shall get an answer

Curiosity is a characteristic that drives productivity. More importantly, in social media, you’re seen as an expert, whether you talk about creating music or you’re discussing your own life. Q&A sessions are an effective way to have your fans interact with you, but more importantly, it’s a strategy to give back to your fans. Questions that you may encounter could range from generic questions about your influences and interests to technical questions about your gear or instruments.

!llmind of Smokey Robotic uses Formspring instead of Twitter for his Q&A platform to answer his fan’s pressing questions.

Illimind using Formspring

Let us know in the comments below if you’ve used a social media strategy that you have found to be successful.

Francis Bea is a New Yorker turned Chicago co-founder of Musefy.com (in development) and writes Musefy’s blog Musebox.