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How To Advertise And Promote Your Career On A Zero To Limited-Dollar Budget
Copyright Bobby Borg 2006, 2008
Remember the ads that showed people choking on cupcakes with the caption that read, “GOT MILK?” Or how about the ads by Wendy’s that showed the old woman at a take-out counter of a competitor exclaiming, “WHERE’S THE BEEF?” These ads spread like wildfire.
But what’s most relevant to note here, is that these ads weren’t successful just because they were creative and funny, but because we saw them over and over again—over an extended period of time—till they were burned into our memories. Can you imagine what this type of advertising costs?
Even at the local level, running an ad in a newspaper or magazine is gonna’ cost you a little bit of money if you count on making a significant impact.
This is why it so important to plan a realistic advertising campaign; one that will get you the most BANG for your advertising BUCK and guide you towards a number of FREE opportunities that exist. From partnering with “like” bands & businesses, to getting listed in free online calendars, be sure to write the following points into your own plan.
- Choose “appropriate” mediums. Choose “appropriate” mediums to place ads like in newspapers and magazines that specifically cater to the independent music scene—and not mediums that only reach the greatest number of readers. It does no good to advertise in your town newspaper that reaches a significant number of readers, but very few music fans. Remember that in advertising, it’s not the number of people who see you, but the number of “prospective clients” who see you. Advertise wisely!
- Synchronize with key events. Synchronize your advertising with key events in your career like with the release of your CD or a live club performance. While this might seem obvious, you’d be surprised at the number of bands who spend money on an ad consisting of a picture, phone number, and some caption like, “For Bookings Call…” in hopes it will get people to know they exist. By synchronizing your ad with a key event in your career, you’ll get so much more for your advertising dollar. You can include a special perk in your ad that triggers an immediate response from your fans—a “call to action” so to speak. For instance, you might instruct readers to “show this ad at the door and get a free CD with your entrance.”
- Partner with “like” bands or local businesses. When placing your ads, consider partnering with “like” bands that might be performing on the same night and in the same club as you. This will help you to minimize costs, to afford a larger ad, and to afford an ad that runs over a longer period of time. This idea can work in partnership with local businesses as well. For instance, you might approach a local tattoo shop and ask them to co-sponsor an advert that mentions both the store and your upcoming performance. This way both parties cut costs and reach their intended audiences in more creative ways.
- Seek “discount” or “per-inquiry” ads. Seek “discount ads” with newspapers and magazines that might have “unfilled space” at the “11th hour” of its publication deadline. Since most publications hate to go to print with unsold space, they might be more eager to cut you a break. Also seek “per-inquiry ads”—those that require no upfront costs, but rather a percentage of sales or income that come directly from your ad. For instance, at a live performance, a 50/50 deal might be arranged based on the number of people who show your ad at the door. The “per-inquiry” system is not something every publication would be willing to do, but by shopping around and using your business skills, you can stretch your budget.
- Get listed in free online event calendars and message boards. Get your upcoming gigs listed on the websites of most local newspapers for free. In Los Angeles, you can email your announcements to Music Connection Magazine (calendar@musicconnection.com) and LA Weekly (calendar@laweekly.com). Also check out free online calendars like Musi-Cal (www.musi-cal.com). And don’t forget to post announcements on message boards like LA Music Scene (www.lamusicscene.com) and Craig’s List (www.craigslist.org).
- Start a “phone” (“text-message,” or “email”) tree. Start a “phone tree” by calling ten of your friends and asking them to call ten of their friends who will ask ten of their friends to come to your gig (or buy your record). This basic concept of “word-of-mouth” promotion can be very effective since it originates from a personal source and it generally costs you nothing in advertising fees. The idea can be used for text messages or emails as well.
- Start a street team. Start a street team consisting of your dedicated fans who are willing to hand out CDs and flyers that announce your gigs. Just be sure to have your team handout information in places that will reach your audience, for instance, at the venue in which you’ll be performing or at similar or “like” venues. Promote in less obvious places as well like, for example, at clothing stores, “head” shops, and tattoo parlors.
- Create useful advertising tools: postcards, samplers, CD-R fliers, & stickers. Advertising tools can be distributed among your street team and kept on hand for yourself—you never know who you’re going to meet in line at the bank or grocery store. “Glossy post cards” (5.47" x 4.21") are like mini billboards that can easily be handed-out. “Three Song CD-R samplers” compliment your postcards and help people to make more of a connection with your band. “CD-R fliers,” samplers of your music with the dates and times of your gigs printed directly onto the CD-Rs, make for handy marketing tools. And finally, “Stickers” can be slapped on everything from bathroom stalls to telephone booths. A complete list of where you can get all these tools made for cheap can be found in How To Market Your CD and Create a Buzz, so be sure to pick up a copy today.
- Utilize your email lists. As long as your announcements don’t look like spam, email can be a very effective and cheap form of advertising. Build your email lists by collecting addresses at your live shows and by making new fans via community sites such as My Space (www.myspace.com). You might even be able to benefit from the email lists acquired by other like bands in your community. Do this by asking them to mention your show or CD for sale the next time they send out emails—and of course you’ll do the same for them when they are playing-out or releasing a CD. You just have to be really subtle about this as to not piss-off fans and make them feel their privacy is being violated.
- Seek music reviews. Seek music reviews (something that is viewed as being more credible than paid advertisements since it offers a more objective view) by submitting your music to local magazines in your area. If you have an interesting or “news worthy” story around your band you might even be able to get a feature story or interview. Submit to online sites like Pitchfork Media (www.pitchforkmedia.com as well. Check out the Indie Bible (www.indiebible.com) for additional sites that will review your music.
- Register your URL with directories. Register your website URL on free directories and draw fans to your site. Check out directories like the one provided by Google (www.google.com) and MusicDish Genome Project (www.musicdish.com/genome). There’s hundreds more. Just type something like “band + directory” into your favorite search engine.
- Exchange website links. Exchange links with interesting and highly visited sites to attract new fans. Start with Taxi (www.taxi.com) that allows you to post a link on its site (as long as you’re willing to post their link on yours). Also check out the Indie Link Exchange (www.indiebible.com), a service that allows you to post your URL and a short description of your site. By the way, exchanging links is one way to increase your “result ranking” on various search engines. So start exchanging!
- Monitor your efforts. Be sure to monitor your marketing efforts to determine what works for you. THIS IS EXTREMELY IMPORTANT! You don’t want to continue putting your time and money into an ad only to find out that one person out of 75 saw and responded to it. Don’t throw good money after bad! Advertise wisely.
We’ve just touched the surface of the number of things that you can do your get your career in the minds of your public—there’s other categories of promotion as well including: gigging, radio, Internet, press, sales, film & TV licensing, video, and also sponsorships. Once again, all of these topics can be found in How To Market Your CD and Create A Buzz. Learn how to take thousands of useful tips, formulate them into a plan of attack, and then execute this plan. Drop me a line after you’ve picked up a copy and share your success stories. I’m looking forward to hearing from you. Cheers.
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Warning: This material is copyright registered by Bobby Borg ©2006, 2008. All rights reserved. If you copy material from this web site, for use in any printed or electronic media, please ask permission of Bobby Borg first by email at bborg@bobbyborg.com. All credits, links to bobbyborg.com, and copyright notices must be posted.
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