Strategy and steps for online shameless self-promotion

Cut from an interview Dave did with Ariel PR:

Dave Carter: Based on the Musicadium study I think it comes back to basic marketing – deliberately and thoughtfully construct a web presence that engages the type of people you want to speak to through media they use. This sounds simple but in practice it can be very difficult and requires a lot of trial and error.

Step One: Find Them & Strategize
Figure out whom you want to talk to, where they’re listening and what you have to offer them. Then develop a strategy that helps you attract and engage your target audience through the types of media and services they use. An effective promotional strategy is useless if it doesn’t result in outcomes that mean something to you and so it’s also important to think about what you actually want to get out of the exercise (a bigger email list? more punters at gigs? better gigs? increased merch or recording sales? radio airplay?) and how you will achieve this.

Based on my observations very few of the artists studied had considered their online strategy in this way.

Step Two: Start in the Real World
My own personal advice to artists just starting out would be to make sure you’ve got something happening off-line – this doesn’t have to mean international touring or massive radio exposure but I think that for most people the online space is still an extension of the real world. Your online promotion should to be an extension of your off-line promotion and they should both result in outcomes that mean something to you.

As a starting point I would suggest a new artist might want:

– Something that tells the world who they are, what they’re doing (gigs etc.) and find out more about them (like a website)

– Some sort of regularly updated content like a blog, vlog or similar

– A way to communicate with their fans, like a Facebook page or similar

– Third-party hosted streaming content, ideally in a format that can be easily shared such as YouTube videos and streaming widgets. I’d include Myspace pages and Flickr photo’s in this category.

– Downloadable content (this could be through digital retailers but doesn’t have to be)

– A way for fans to give them something of value (not necessarily money and not necessarily in exchange for downloadable content)

– A way to collect information from their fans (email, location) that can be used to promote future events / releases via email

– Links between each site and service the artist is using, with prominent links to content, ways for fans to give them their details and / or something else of value.

This might be as simple as a Blog (who you are and what you’re doing with updated content), Twitter account (communication with fans), Last.FM page (streaming content), an email list (collecting information on fans) and having recordings distributed via the iTunes Music Store (downloadable content in exchange for $).

It’s not the tools that count it’s how you use them…
But for this to be effective the artist involved would need to really work at building a fan-base through these services and off-line activities. It’s not the tools that count it’s how you use them.