How to Promote Your Indie Band

Band promotion is a big deal, without gigs and fans the band can't really survive unless you've got a trust fund watching your back... Nowhere is this more true than for indie bands, those just starting out without a label (maybe those protesting labels?) It is possible to become popular and financially successful without a label and one of my favorite bands doing this right now is Temple Scene (check them out). So here are a few tips I've learned on how to jumpstart your promotional efforts based on what me and some of my friends have done and what I've observed over the years.

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Get a MySpace account

Sure it's outdated compared with Facebook but it's still the leader when it comes for bands. Get your vanity URL (ie. myspace.com/bandname) so people can find you easily and spend some time matching the colors and uploading images. Obviously you'll also want to put some of your songs in the player.

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Get your own website

MySpace is great but having your own website reduces the clutter of ads and gives you more freedom over things like an email subscription lists and having an RSS feed people can subscribe to. One of my favorite services for this is Bandzoogle because it's simple but fully featured, it is also one of the most affordable solutions out there at $15/mo and it even includes a free .com URL so you can brand your site a bit better.

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Get on Twitter

This step may not seem like a huge deal but it can help you get ranked on google and get found. Get your band name at Twitter and be sure to list your website in the information area (which includes a free link) and suddenly you'll be ranking on search engines. I also see a lot of bands cross promoting from MySpace and Twitter by putting their Twitter name in their MySpace description and vice versa, just helps to get more fans and more eyes viewing your concert schedule.

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Play concerts

Yep... it's a key step people. How about that local roller skating rink or maybe the arcade or coffee shop? I live in Northern California and a few entry spots to play include San Jose Skate, Red Rock Coffee in Mountain View and Nickel City which is an arcade.

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Get on TheSixtyone

This site is an amazing resource for indie bands and it functions almost like a role playing game for listeners. Every member gets a set amount of hearts to spend on songs they like each day, if you (as a band) put up good songs and they rise in the rankings you'll be getting massive exposure. This site is way more Web 2.0 than MySpace and includes an image gallery, comment fields at the song level and a notes section that you can use to promote your album, website, bio... whatever.

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Share your lyrics

Because it helps fans find you. What if they hear your song in a friends car but forget to ask the name of the group or it's on the radio and it isn't announced? What if they see you at a small venue or opening for a larger band but miss your group name there? Well, if they like your songs they will probably remember a line or two and if you've got your lyrics posted somewhere online you've got a chance that they'll find you! I recommend indilean.com because there's no spammy ads or spyware like some other sites, second it is permissions based meaning everything that's posted is adhering to copyright laws, and third I provide three links for bands to use on each song page to help them promote their music.

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Battle of the bands

Depending on what level you're at and how old you are you can probably enter some sort of battle of the bands competition. High schools and colleges have them all the time and sometimes there are non-school related organizations that also set one up. The Vans Warped Tour actually has a long running battle of the bands that awards a spot on the tour for the best bands.

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Sign up for Sonicbids

This site helps artists get booked for gigs and it has one of the most clean and multifunctional interfaces of any site out there. It was started by a guy who wanted to play the guitar but got interested in being a promoter instead, he worked with some of the top bands with large labels and then realized he could empower smaller bands by building a connections site. Sonicbids is just as useful for people looking to book an indie band, it really goes the extra mile to fit the band to the venue so everyone is happy and more concerts get played. They booked over 60,000 gigs in 2009!

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