We break down our promotional campaigns into 4 parts.

1. Social Tools
2. Email Blasts
3. Social Network Posts
4. Press Release & PR Campaign

http://www.facebook.com/djpainone

Remember, there is no specific order here, maybe someday I will come back and organize these thoughts, but these came to me on the plane from LA to MIA overnight, enjoy.

• Fail often
• Create often
• Stagnancy is your enemy
• Work for free, often, if your work creates value you will be compensated in some way!
• Work on your passion
• Never begin a conversation with “How much will I be paid?”, EVER
• If you create value in the marketplace you will be compensated as such in one way or another
• Work with as many people as possible, many partnerships fail, but don’t be discouraged, out of those you will retain life long positive relationships
• Be up front. Secrets will never help you in any way. Transparency at all times in all aspects of your business.
• Graphic Designers-
• Work for free doing projects that get your name out there and work on various sites, blogs, facebook.
• Until people are knocking down your door to hand you money you have not created enough value to the marketplace.
• Keep it up.
• Video Creatives -
• Work with as many artists as possible for free to get your product out there.
• Create unique compensation agreements with artists (have them put an ad budget together for the video when its out instead of paying you, etc.)
• Until people are calling you off the hook offering you top dollar for your services, you are not a professional. So don’t even think about charging professional prices
• You will know when that point occurs
• Artists -
• Invest your money – Throw concerts, free concerts, parties, free music, give to fans
• Work with as many people as possible
• Fail often, it is the only way to learn
• Until the phone starts ringing off the hook for bookings and verses you are not a professional. To become a professional you need to invest more money and time.
• If you can not invest the money and the time then give up now and try to find something to do that aligns with your passion as well as allows you to find time to do music as a hobby, not a profession
• You will know when people are demanding your music, only at this point are you a professional and you have created value and can charge anyone for anything

PROTECT IP / SOPA Breaks The Internet from Fight for the Future on Vimeo.

As I’m sure you are all aware of there is a revolution today, we here at New Industry Tips support the freedom of the internet and are against the PIPA and SOPA acts currently circulating the hill.  We constantly preach about the need for licensing, publishing, copyrights and more but the general health of the internet is at stake here. Don’t let them fool you, this is not all about protecting Intellectual Property, it is about power and control, something that does not mix well with the freedom the internet provides.  If the government is allowed to start banning DNS it will for one not stop any piracy as you can just type the direct IP, and second it will damage the general landscape of the internet and allow the government to attack sites without warning and not only shut them down but shut down their legitimate business accounts in PayPal and Google Adsense, etc.

Overall this is a very poorly written bill to combat a phenomenon that only affects a small percentage of the economy, trust me, entertainment busienss will be fine and continue to grow, but sacrificing the entire landscape of the technology industry would disrupt more than you can imagine! Take the time to let your representative know that this bill needs to be rethought! It’s not worth it!!

http://fightforthefuture.org

ADVICE CONCERNING MIXTAPES

• Presently the Mixtape market is very over saturated. There are too many mixtape projects being released freely into the marketplace without any defined purpose or mission. The end result is nothing but clutter!
• CLUTTER MUSIC equals Sub par, mediocre, throw away music. And this is what most rappers are putting on their mixtapes.
• ‎”Clutter music” clogs up the market place and brings down the intrinsic and monetary value of other quality music in it’s lane.
• The Sad thing is that most indie rappers have no idea why they’re giving away their music for free. They are just following everyone else. SMH.
• What worked for Lil Wayne, Drake and Wiz Khalifa as it relates to giving away Free Mixtapes will not work for every indie rapper out there.
• And the fact is that Most Rap fans don’t want FREE music. They want GOOD music that appeals to their emotions. And they will pay for it if it’s marketed right.
• There’s a big difference between FREE music & GOOD music and some rappers confuse the two. Give the fans what they want and they’ll show support.
• The Free Music Mindset causes some artists to slack when they go in the booth, because subconsciously they know that the music will be just given away “Freely”. So they don’t give it their all.
• If you’re going to give away your mixtape for FREE then try to derive revenue from sponsorships and advertisements..
• There are several important factors you must consider before releasing a mixtape.
• Firstly, make sure the mixtape is recorded properly, mixed down correctly and sounds crisp.
• Equally important, make sure your mixtape content, cover and concept are unique to stand apart from the competition. You must be able to define the mission and philosophy behind your Mixtape.
• Strive to make a “Classic” mixtape not a “Clutter” mixtape. Don’t just make “clutter” music that you give away for free to clutter the marketplace. Make “Classic” music with passion and feeling that music afficianados can appreciate.
• If you’re going to do a remix of a popular song or rhyme over a well know industry instrumental, then make sure that your version is just as good or even better than the original.
• It defeats the purpose to pay thousands of dollars for a feature and the featured artist out shines you on your own song. Bring Your “A” Game!
• Don’t Get Caught up in the “Mixtape Madness.” Don’t release your 3rd free mixtape in 3 months if you haven’t properly promoted the first two.
• Most indie Hip Hop artists release a mixtape without even promoting it. Some rappers spend thousands of dollars to get a “big name” DJ to host their mixtape and then spend zero dollars marketing it.
• And If your only MARKETING strategy is sending out tweets on Twitter and posts on Facebook every hour about your mixtape, then you’ve already lost.
• Develop a plan to make people excited about downloading it. Create Hype about your mixtape before releasing it. Send out press releases, create a contest. do giveaways, get reviews on it, do radio interviews, etc. Make it an extravaganza.
• Moreover Promote your Mixtape by investing in a marketing strategy that includes Online Promo, PR/Publicity, E-Blasts, Video Promo, Radio interviews, Press Releases,
  Street Team/Club Promo. We suggest our partners at Coast 2 Coast Mixtapes for proper mixtape promotion.
• Before dropping a mixtape, release a single and develop it virally. Inform the public that this is the 1st single from the upcoming mixtape. A week or two before releasing your mixtape, do a couple of mixtape release parties and invite the press, fans and DJ’s. Perform a couple of songs from it.
• In addition, to promote the mixtape, use a small budget to sponsor local events. Advertise with your local internet radio shows that support your music.
• And don’t just spend money on a Mixtape Marketing company. Work the project yourself as well. Make your fans part of the experience!
• Put a snippet of a bonus single on your free mixtape and then sell that bonus single in its entirety on Itunes. Additionally, make a music video of the bonus single, put it on Youtube and advertise that it’s a bonus single from your mixtape.
• Also try to Do something different with your mixtape like tie it in to your favorite charity whereby you can get awareness for the charity as well.
• If you’re going to pay a so called big name DJ to host your mixtape, then try to have an agreement which stipulates that the DJ has to promote the project as well.
• Now that your free mixtape has been downloaded “5000″ or more times, what’s next? That’s what you should be asking yourself. (Movement Calculations)
• The purpose of giving away free music is to advertise your brand for opportunities that make money like paid live shows, endorsements, merchandise sales etc.
• If you don’t have a follow up plan to generate money from your “Free Mixtape”, then you’re just wasting your time. Monetize your Movement!
• In fact, forget about putting out (3) three mediocre FREE mixtapes in a row and concentrate on creating (1) one CLASSIC ALBUM that you can market and sell.
• The little bit of advice I just gave on “Mixtapes” is priceless! I hope it helps so that we can get rid of some of this clutter of free Mixtapes that are put into the marketplace without any Rhyme or Reason. 

  By Jesse Atkinson, CEO of Urban Threshold Inc. and Founder of The A&R Power Summitwww.TheARPowerSummit.com and The Underground Music Awardswww.UndergroundMusicAwards.com

* Research the kind of video you want

These sites find and feature the best music videos on the internet, use them for inspiration:

Vimeo Staff Picks http://www.vimeo.com/staffpicks

Lost At EMinor http://www.lostateminor.com/category/music/

Music Vid Kid http://www.musicvidkid.com

Submarine Channel http://2pause.submarinechannel.com/#/new

Promo News http://www.promonews.tv/

VideoMilitia http://www.videomilitia.com/

RadarTV http://www.radarmusicvideos.com/videos

When you’re briefing potential directors, give them links to music videos you like.

* Thumbnails

Thumbnails are the MOST important aspect of presentation and by far the biggest reason someone will click to view your video or not – particularly if they don’t know you and your music. If the pre-selected thumbnail isn’t excellent, without question you need to change it.

Most sites allow you to choose thumbnails – YouTube partners and Vimeo users can upload images. Dailymotion allow video scrolling and frame selection. If you’re not a YouTube partner, the pre-selected images you’re offered are taken from the beginning, middle and end of the video. Ask your director to end the video with static footage of the thumbnail you want, so you can be sure the thumbnail will be included in the three pre-selected images offered.

Ideal images include a close-up face with eyes looking to camera. Simple, strong, colourful images also work well. If you’ve got a few thumbnails to choose from, half-close your eyes and note which image stands out most.

*  Video Description

Use your video to pull potential fans into your own networks.

Include a call to action and a link in the first sentence, preferably in the first 65 characters – this is how many characters you see in Youtube’s preview, +/- a few.

If you’re concerned calls to action and links smack of hard sell, consider instead that it’s good manners to help people find your links easily.

Example calls to action are “join our newsletter”, “follow us on Twitter”, “like us on Facebook” or “buy on iTunes”. Always follow up with the link.

A good, short story about the video or the artist in the rest of the text encourages comments and helps your video turn up in Google (also known as SEO, search engine optimisation).

* Pay for an advertising campaign.

This is about getting direct access to potential fans. You’re buying access to the right people and enough repeated visibility to get your message across.

How many times do you need to see an ad before you act? Here’s what people on Quora suggest: http://b.qr.ae/w3Q1at

Advertising includes Google Ads, Facebook Ads and adverts on music blogs and newsletters.

Do a lot of small advertising campaigns on different platforms and testing different messages. Always have a call to action and measure the success of each campaign relative to the cost.

Get the complete “Ultimate Guide To Getting The Most From Your Music Video” by signing up for a free account on Radar, which you can do here http://www.radarmusicvideos.com/login

Radar is a worldwide network of talented music video directors used by record labels and DIY artists to commission and promote excellent, popular music videos. They also publish useful articles.

With today’s technology, artists feel that once they have recorded a record and are completely excited about it, all they need to do is SoundCloud it, post it to their social media sites, and they are off and running. That is just WRONG! I have experienced good records, which could have been worked on a bit longer and been made great. They were lost because of an artist who was TOO anxious, and they destroyed a song’s chance before it had even had an impact—not allowing the record to marinate and build the right plan.

There is an opportunity to expose a record to the maximum potential IF, and only IF, a plan can be put into place. The plan must include all aspects of marketing and promotions, no matter what your budget. It does not matter if you live in a city of 15k or 1.5 million, the setup is virtually the same, but the money and EXPENSE of the plan are different.

If you do not incorporate streets AND viral, then you are blowing money, and your vendors are the only ones that will win. I was on a call with the Nerve DJs a few nights ago and Yelawolf said it best: “Streets still reign, viral is nothing without them…” This is so very true. We are in the age of digital and mobile formats in order to have access to music, but what makes a potential fan and consumer look up your brand? It is what they hear and see on the streets.

I am not giving you a formula or a plan. That is what you must come up with, based on your market. I am only providing suggestions of what should be put in your plan to set up your record and brand. The objective is to get your music to the ears of as many consumers (= $$$) as possible.

 Step One: Is your record viable?

I am not saying it must sound like what is on radio right now; what I am saying is does the “sound” (recording, mixing, and mastering) quality equal what is on radio? Does the record match the artist and speak for the artist when he/she is not around? Does it leave an impression? Does the hook get stuck in your head? Are the lyrics “real” for the artist?

 Step Two: Marketing tools

What do you want to use to get the word out? Posters? Flyers? Stickers? Download cards? CDs? Social media? Website? Videos? A mobile app? What will get your brand and sound out to the consumers the quickest and with the most impact?

The logo and image are what will make the first impression. Have you taken the time to truly consider your name and image? Does your logo fit you? Can you live with it for the next ten years? Please make sure you take as much time on defining your image and logo as you do on creating your music. It is what sells you when you are not there. Always ensure the images you are using on your street marketing materials are the same images that are used in your viral campaign and advertising. People must come to know your brand. Use the same images and logo in all street and viral material. Yes, you will get tired of it. Just like you will get tired of doing the same song over and over once you create a hit, but it is all relevant.

Social media is a blessing and a curse. Having access to building a direct fan base is a wonderful thing. We did not have it in this business ten years ago, and we still broke records and quality rose to the top. With the access artist have to people via social media, there are opportunities to connect directly with fans and with music professionals. As you build your social media awareness, make sure your marketing efforts in the streets coincide. It all must work together.

Step Three: The DJ

This is your first “gate keeper” to the consumers. No, they are not the assholes you consider them to be. Remember, they have a job to do at a club or a party. They MUST keep the floor full and the bar ringing. First consider who the DJ is playing for. Does your music work in the type of sets they do? Does your music work in the type of club they are DJing at? Have you approached the DJ with respect as a fellow businessman or woman? How is your product being presented? Find out how the DJ wants to have the music delivered. CD, MP3, thumb drive. Take the time to research who you are dealing with and understand they are in the business of making money just like you are.

To be continued…

Janie Jennings

industryworks@gmail.com

Twitter.com/industryworks

Google recently shocked both the tech world and the music industry with the launch of Google Music, basically a cloud version of iTunes which allows you to keep your music in the cloud as well as purchase music throught he Google powered Android Marketplace. We all knew this was in the works for google but the big surprise for me came with their ease of integration with the indie artist with the new Google Music Artist Hub. From inception the Google Music program includes allowing ANY artist to create their own page/profile, upload your music to Google, and begin selling music through the Google Music app and Android store. The service also allows artists options such as setting their own price for songs (a la Bandcamp) as well as other features and I’m sure many more to come.

Anyways as we all know Google is the powerhouse of the tech industry so it will definitely be a good idea to start early and get your music listed on the service! Here at NewIndustryTips we encourage you to take advantage of every outlet, big or small to expose your music to the maximum potential audience, but this service will surely be a top contender in the long run so it is more important than ever to become an early adopter! Sign up now!

Check out a screenshot of their welcome page: