Music Marketing Tips: Free Publicity for Indie Artist Promotion

You are a famous musician in the making if only someone would just hurry up and discover your break through brilliance. You feel pretty confident that your popularity has a shot at extending beyond just a local appeal but you don't have any hot contacts anywhere beyond your hometown's live music venues. What does one undiscovered indie artist do to rise to stardom without spending a fortune or resorting to launching national tours using the schmooze factor?

Well, it is simple, really, if you sit down and ponder it. You simply promote yourself to fame for free. Read on.

What many people in any business, but especially the entertainment and performing arts industry are not aware of is that advertising does not always cost hundreds, thousands, millions of dollars. Sure, some might argue that such funds give a person or organization advertising leverage or more options and room to work in when targeting their hopefully future fame but if you are willing to work at a more hands on, grassroots level, an equal amount of, if not more effective tactics can be utilized for very little or no cost to yourself. You just have to be willing to put your heart and soul into your own self promotion.

If you are one of those innovative individuals who likes feeling in control of his own image, reputation and personal branding efforts, this type of marketing and advertising using free publicity may work perfectly for your tastes. There are endless ways to obtain free publicity or advertising for yourself or your band, and surely as you begin your promotional campaign one idea or source will lead to another. Here are some easy ways though to at least get you started in generating awareness through free publicity:

Social Networking Sites

Surely you know of My Space and Facebook already, but are you aware there exists hundreds of other social networking sites where you can share your music and interests with and meet other people from all over the world? While My Space, Friendster and Facebook seem to be the most popular for the college student generally, you may want to try and branch your efforts out even further with profiles and active memberships on similar sites who, even better, focus on the sharing of music. MusicSpace, ReverbNation and Pandora, just like My Space, allow you to post blog updates, photos, profiles of you and your band and share mp3s. Sign up for the sites that fit your image and interests and future die hard fans will in no time have immediate access to your music.

Get Reviewed

Solicit reviews of your mp3s. Most people are familiar with the traditional approach to concert bookings and radio airplay through the mass mailing of their often prized demo tape (or CD hopefully, these days), but most musicians have to save up for quite some time in order to afford it. Between postage, shipping, packaging and the cost of producing the CD in the first place, a band, collectively, not to mention a single artist ends up spending a good bit of their own cash.

Fortunately, though, there happens to be thousands of music reviewers out there who not only accept mp3 submissions by independent artists or unsigned bands but they prefer them. The proper way to submit your mp3 depends on the reviewer and the applicable medium you are dealing with but instructions and guidelines in detail are very often located on the websites. If not, look for the contact email of the Music Director or Music Reviewer or otherwise the manager of some sort and inquire. And never send mp3s unsolicited.

There are several outlets available who will accept your mp3s by email for review but a few great places to start include: radio stations, particularly college-run stations, internet radio stations, music related print or electronic magazines and general interest websites or print magazines.

Identify with a Charity Organization or Nonprofit

Finally, a great way to obtain free publicity as an independent artist or unsigned band is by identifying with a charity or nonprofit benefit of some sort. Think about it this way. You want publicity but you can't really afford to pay for it. You also would like to have more fans but it is obviously hard to collect them without publicity. However you are so confident about your musical talent that you feel certain that once potential new fans hear your music they will be instantly hooked and loyal fans. You just need the opportunity to demonstrate your work and the music will speak for itself.

Well, aside from securing a gig as the opening band for a larger, more popular band where you can hopefully recruit some of their existing fans, the challenge of increasing your exposure is a bit tricky, for all musicians but especially for those artists that are independent or unsigned. However there are ways to accomplish this.

One great way to get your music to potential new fans is to identify a particular performance with a charity or nonprofit organization, ideally one you are passionate about. By playing as a tribute to a larger cause, you are offering another reason for people to take the chance of paying to listen to your music that they have never heard and may not even like. If there is another cause involved that interests them, they can justify spending money.

There is also the fact that those interested in the charity benefit will subconsciously think more positively about your music because you are associated with the cause and obviously the nonprofit organization whom they respect, respects you.

Finally, there is the whopper of a bonus which consists in the form of free advertising. Depending on the charity you hook up with, they have an agenda to raise funds themselves so they will be doing a lot of their own advertising for the event. In more cases than not, they will promise live entertainment by your band in all their press releases, flyers and email marketing. If you are lucky they may even provide a link to your site.

The charity performance is a superb opportunity for independent artists or unsigned bands to take advantage of. It may mean playing for free, or donating the generated profits from the show, but it will definitely pay off in more ways than one.