I am not a hater. I would like to thank the Universe for the challenges and opportunities, and I would like to thank the people who made this article possible. I didn’t write this: dozens of anonymous correspondents, most of whom I’m dealing with the for the first time, wrote this for me. Without your shining example of Prime Stupid, I would have had to make this shit up and that’s hard work for any writer.
And as always, to the critics: I agree with you, you’re completely right, please, keep doing what you’re doing exactly how you’ve been doing it.
1. Comment and message spam.
The best part about the music business isn’t the music—it’s the unintentional humor. Like when people talk about their “Myspace marketing plan,” I always get a huge kick out of that one. I have a Myspace marketing plan, too, and although I’ve been making good money licensing it to Universal and Def Jam, I’m willing to share it for free here on Audible Hype:
Yo, [generic greeting]. I like what I hear! We’re [insert name] an up-and-coming artist and we just [meaningless local achievement]!!! Check out our mixtape, this shit is hot right now, featuring [famous artists we’re stealing a track from] and [dude you’ve never heard of] and [insert name]. Check out [album name] dropping [release date] on [your label] presented by [drug dealer friend who actually paid for this].
Except...quantity is no replacement for quality. No matter how many times you post your spam comments, it’s still a net loss.
This is even more true for email. It seems sensible that you should send out as many promotional emails to as many people as possible, but in reality, that just means you’re pissing off more people and working hard to make sure people have bad associations with your name. Just because I sent you an email doesn’t mean I want to be on your promo list. Just because I’m on the promo list of someone you know doesn’t mean I want to be included on yours. The foundation of any working, effective email promo campaign is this: respect your audience’s intelligence, their privacy and their attention span.
BONUS INSIGHT: TYPING IN CAPS LOCK DOESN’T ACTUALLY MAKE YOU ANY LOUDER, HOMEY!!!
2. Mass invitations to social networks and membership sites.
This is a tricky one. What I’m trying to say might go over the heads of the audience that actually needs to hear this, so should I actually include it? Let’s give it a shot…
My point is this: the future of social networks is in aggregation, not innovation. Social Network systems theory is pretty solid now, folks: you have a profile, you connect to other profiles, you communicate. You decide which prisoners you want to deal with, and you get to decorate your cell however you like. And if someone is already doing that, you’ll be hard pressed to sell them with a sales pitch of “come do that same thing over again, somewhere else.”
This leads directly into the next dipshit move…
3. Creating Your Own Social Network.
Bottom line: if you announce the launch of your new social network, how many of your fans will sign up in the first week? If the answer is less than 1000, you’re out of your mind type stupid. If it’s less than 10,000, you’re still just wasting your time. If you are trying to build a fanbase with a new social network, you’re missing the point.
Contrary to what we see on TV, mostly in beer ads, you don’t make a dope party happen by pulling in attractive, well-dressed people off the streets. I’ve tried that many times—not only does it not work but some of them will make a lot of noise about “unlawful restraint” and “kidnapping.”
Nah, you make a dope party happen by knowing a large, mutual network of dope people who like to party and inviting them in advance. You make sure you incentivize it by offering something awesome—my suggestion to promoters: FREE WHISKEY NIGHT—and you advertise. (The second you pull it off, you book the sequel, start a website, and hire someone to make a better logo.)
You build a fanbase on existing social networks. If you’ve got 10,000 friends on myspace, that probably reflects about 2 - 3 thousand actual fans. Keep using myspace. (If you didn’t hear about this, Facebook is actually larger and faster-growing than myspace, which is rotting from the inside thanks to pop-up ads and shitty code and database architecture.)
4. Getting Angry at Media For Not Promoting You.
I seriously got this email:
I don’t know why I’m even bothering, but for real you need some clarity about where you stand. You talk the talk about hip hop and promotion and supporting the Underground but we been out here longer than you dog point blank, grinding putting out mixtapes, doing the free music thing, and you’re interviewing clowns like Icon cuz the white kids like him and cuz he knocked the fuck out of Copywrite and that’s it. You’re just chasing celebrities like anyone else.
It goes on, obviously, but the really remarkable thing about this email was the context: it was from someone who has never contacted me before. My general policy is to chalk up all hate mail to good people having bad days, and I’m sure this dude was no exception. Still, I’m not interested in interviewing him and I’m not even gonna name the dude here.
Remember: nobody anywhere owes you anything. (Not even “the white kids.")
5. Make Deals With Anything That Moves
Here’s another real-life example:
I WANT TO GET AT YOU ABOUT CO-BRANDING WITH YOUR SITES I LIKE YOUR STYLE AND WE GOT THAT AUDIENCE THAT YOU WANT. I REPRESENT [like I’d put you on] CLOTHING AND WE SHOULD BE HAVING A CONVERSATION!!!
*We offer 25% for affiliate sales and we offer full online support and digital distribution to music artists
The list goes on, but the funniest part about this message was the link he provided to learn more about their “digital distribution”—yeah, I was curious enough to click it—and it turned out to be his personal eBay account. Audible Hype is interested in doing interviews with anyone in the business who’s willing to talk details, but I’m not going to waste anyone’s time selling clothing, or energy drinks (actual offer), or your anti-drug breakdancing musical (sad but true).
6. Begging vs. Networking
My name is Justin Boland, I’m 27 and despite having a large digital footprint, I’ve got very little real-world power. For no money, I provide publicity to artists who I think are creating dope and meaningful music—like The Loyalists, Stink Tank, That Handsome Devil, S. Maharba, Witness, The Aztext, or Inverse. All those people are very diverse, but they’ve got two things in common.
First, they all make really damn good music. Second, none of them ask me for it. None of them expect me to help—because they’re already working hard and taking full responsibility for their own hustle.
In closing, here’s a simple question: is J. Dilla famous for his promotion and marketing, or his music? Which do you think he spent his time on? Building a solid foundation that attracts talented and powerful people is the original zero-maintenance networking plan.
7. Email Fellatio
I’m guessing this is true for most people, based on personal experience: most of us get uncomfortable when they’re getting praised. Although I feel like we’re pretty much kicking ass with the World-Around Records project, I’m also very aware of the fact we’re learning through full-contact trial and error. (We’re fortunate enough to have really dedicated, unusually artistic and intelligent fans.) Remember, Audible Hype is a learning process, not a set of answers. I don’t take this nearly as seriously as Andrew Dubber or Steve Gordon
8. Too Much Literature: or, Don’t Hand Me a Bible
If I’m just asking you a simple question, and you give me 3 pages worth of cut’n’paste html promotional code, I just overdosed on your bullshit. There are biological limits to how much any human being can take in. Honestly, three paragraphs is almost too much.
How your group formed is irrelevant. Who you’ve worked with in the past doesn’t really matter. Your future plans are a fairy tale, just like anyone else’s.
Most of all: a list of who you’ve opened for isn’t as impressive as you think. Getting an opening gig is usually a reflection of your relationships with local club owners and promoters, not actual talent. Those of us who actually do gigs know all too well that 90% of the time, you’re barely even speaking to the headliner. It’s dope that you got free drink tickets, but opening for Immortal Technique really doesn’t imply that he’s down with your crew. He still doesn’t even know you, and he never listened to that CD you handed him, either.
10. Don’t Be This Guy
So real I had to commemorate this for Internets history:
Obvious lesson: don’t fuckin lose your fuckin temper online. It’s just words on a screen, do it with class, do it with style.
11. ...You Tell Me.
I’m sure there’s a couple dozen forms of herd animal behavior I forgot to include here. For the sake of all humanity, please add to this list so that future generations can be slightly less stupid than those who came before them.
More importantly, don’t get too discouraged if you recognized yourself on this list. This is a learning process and we’re all in it together—every single day gives you a prime opportunity to change your ways and start running a smarter, tighter operation.
“The best time to plant a tree is 100 years ago. The second best time is today.”—Chinese Proverb
32 responses to "10 Highly Effective Ways to Market like an Asshole"
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Mar 25, 2009 at 10:58 AM
Teech
Great post. No Fellatio.
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Mar 26, 2009 at 6:13 AM
squibs magoo
while mr. boland may not, i will totally sell energy drinks, but only if they contain amphetamine precursors and you set me up with the bulk supplier not sure if that qualifies as “marketing” or drug-dealing though
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Mar 26, 2009 at 9:09 AM
louis
that was a great article - funny and nearly insightful
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Mar 26, 2009 at 9:22 AM
Sean Allen
damn squid took my post.
squid, stop reading my mind.
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Mar 27, 2009 at 5:28 AM
Greg Rollett
As always Justin - great and honest. One thing though being the devil’s advocate - as much as I hate the auto-posting BS on Myspace, the site has become a numbers game, which is also part of the reason the site is shit. Real fans are not made on the site anymore. Real fans are made through honest and open communication, playing live and giving fans the best shit/music/videos/extras that you can afford to pump out of your talent.
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Mar 27, 2009 at 4:14 PM
Kevin English
Ok. You got me. Where is the RSS button?
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Mar 28, 2009 at 5:10 PM
Matt Rod
Haha. Funny.
So here’s me being an asshole! No seriously though, if you read this you may be interested - a case study on how bands are using (or not using well enough!) the online world
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Mar 30, 2009 at 8:45 AM
Justin Boland
Yeah, the Case Studies are interesting, but re-assuring—I’m going to be doing a similar series this year, but with the added dimension of actually contacting the artist and their team. Good selection of artists, though, it’s all people worth studying.
And as a general rule, if you’re doing something about DIY Hip Hop, by all means, link away here. I appreciate shameless self-promotion, as long as that shit is relevant.
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Apr 02, 2009 at 9:11 AM
Emcee R-Two
also insightful. keep em coming.
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Apr 06, 2009 at 1:12 PM
Semantik
Justin, you speak the truth! Sadly, the people who need this info the most are too busy grinding to bother reading it.
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Apr 14, 2009 at 4:59 PM
Casey
Awesome post, Justin—couldn’t agree more.
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Apr 20, 2009 at 7:45 PM
Mario Mendoza
Nice article Justin, Its amazing how many people still use some of these approaches and complain about album sales not being good.
I think a lot of musicians starting out were caught in a Myspace warphole that seemed exposure was the only goal, comment after comment. Come to find out, I gained more loyal fans from comments left without my blatant html code all over their page. The point is discussion and being human. Show a personality. The approach now is getting a dedicated base of fans that can add value to my music, and if its a small base then I will treat those loyal fans good. Build a strong foundation and the skyscraper will come in the long run.
I also like the point you made about knowing how many fans you got and setting goals for those fans in terms of site sign ups. You are right, no need to build a social network if you have no fans or estimates of who might sign up. I try hit and miss projects sometimes but you want to spend time where people will see your music the most.
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Apr 22, 2009 at 6:10 AM
Justin Boland
I’ve been noticing lately that Twitter is like a whole new sandbox for clueless artists to shit in with their caps-lock spam.
I guess the joke is that none of these lessons will ever be heeded by those who don’t already get it, and there will always be new tools and platforms for the e-tards to make the same mistakes. Fun stuff!
Meanwhile, there’s an actual industry of people who know what they’re doing, make good music, and create money out of that.
In Vegas, the magicians are secretive and paranoid, but the reality is, you could pass out flyers explaining every trick with diagrams and 95% of the audience will still be gasping and clapping when the curtains drop. I’m not worried about people stealing my sauce, I’m just glad there’s people out there listening.
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Apr 22, 2009 at 7:48 AM
J Beattie
I finally have something to paste to the idiots spamming my MySpace.
Thanks.
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Apr 22, 2009 at 8:45 AM
JeffroDigi
Dope read as usual.
One marketing thing you left out, although not an online thing, is the jerkoffs that stand on corners tryin to get you to buy their shitty cd for $10. In a day and age where people dont buy albums from people they know and have loved for longer than theyve knowin 95% of their friends, getting $10 for an album that most likely sucks aint gonna work. Plus the fact that these people reek of slimebag worse than any used car salesman I’ve come across. Ok. maybe not that bad, but still pretty stinky.
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May 02, 2009 at 11:04 AM
Subterfuge
I hate to say it, but man, what a waste of a blog post. Anyone who’d read it already knows this, anyone who needs to hear it will never read it. Glad you got it off your chest, but that’s about all the good this will ever do.
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May 03, 2009 at 1:20 PM
Binary Scar
I’ve seen you on Twitter and I like your style. You talk to people, you post interesting links, you’re not advertising. Yet it’s still advertising. You’ve got a really damn good roster, too. All in all, pretty awesome operation and Im happy you do sites explaining how to do all this.
When is World Around going to start releasing CDs that I can buy?
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May 04, 2009 at 8:25 AM
Underkut
UNSOLICITED BEAT SALESMEN. Nothing in the world of hip hop drives me crazier than these jackasses who clog up my label’s inboxes, from myspace to facebook to email and back, with their shitty animated .gif banners and their even worse beats.
I mean, the all-time success rate for that approach must be in the low single digits. I don’t know ANYONE who has EVER bought beats off some random dude who reached out to THEM. Simple rule of thumb: those with quality product are not desperate to make a sale.
When Internet Marketing contaminated the world of Hip Hop Production, I think the music world died a little. This horseshit has GOT to stop.
And that Postman dude? Who runs like 100 different sites, liveoffbeats.net and every other version of that domain, all selling the most ghetto, pathetic cell-phone video “tutorials” about using FRUITY LOOPS to CLONE EXISTING BEATS and then sell them to shitty rappers, it’s just....that ain’t hip hop. Something is seriously fucking wrong with that boy’s brain, fetal alcohol syndrome or something.
Yeah, that’s my 2 cents. Sorry for the rant.
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May 04, 2009 at 8:36 AM
Justin Boland
World-Around is going to have a real website and real product pretty shortly. One lesson learned: don’t announce deadlines until everything is completely finished.
Also, DJ Multiple Sex Partners will have a lot of music going up on iTunes and Amazon this summer. And yes, I will definitely be doing Audible Hype posts about that.
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May 05, 2009 at 3:38 AM
Vividology
Kids never get a manual, you know? Nobody’s teaching this. Too many dudes make a living as consultants or working with labels/brands. That Martin Atkins book is the closest thing I’ve seen to plain-english common-sense information about music promotion.
I like your point about how the whole vocabulary of work ethic and promotion in hip hop is getting out there by any means necessary...no real regard for whether or not those means are making you look like a human spambot. Way too many human spambots in 2009.
Funny, though, the phrase that came to mind reading this and a few other, earlier articles, was that you’re “telling mediocre people to be exceptional.” I’ve had success with the whole grooming artists gig, management, but it’s unspoken knowledge that the artists who are going to really blow up, they always had it. Especially here in the hip hop world, you’ve either got something to say or not, most artists don’t. I bet you deal with that doing interviews sometimes.
At the end of the day, dope website, thanks for doing this and good luck with World Around.
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Jul 01, 2009 at 11:27 AM
Jason
Myspace should add this post to their Terms of Service agreement.
I had a rap blog that I shut down like 3 years ago… I STILL get emails about, you know, WORLDWIDE UNIVERSAL ENTERTAINMENT CORPORATION UNLIMITED hosting an open mic ‘round the corner in a state I’ve never visited… Embarrassing.
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Jul 09, 2009 at 12:07 PM
Cameron Mizell
Well written. I’m always baffled by the lack of composure people who claim to be some sort of performance artist or business person. Then again, if everybody had their act together we’d have less to laugh at and hard work would be a little harder.
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Jul 09, 2009 at 1:35 PM
Pete
This article brings up some valid points. However these points are all symptoms of a much larger problem. It has become far too difficult to monetize music effectively. So what happens now that any idiot with a home computer and a microphone can make (mostly bad) music? The perception becomes that the music is the easy part and if you want to succeed it’s better focus your attention on marketing. So onto the internet we go and read articles from 8 years ago about how Myspace is taking over the world, and Google-search things like “selling my music online”. Those searches are met with elaborate scams and ineffective marketing opportunities that present themselves as “the way to go”. It’s a sad state of affairs. The truth of the matter is that if someone discovers a way to promote online, without touring or even playing local shows,the last thing they are ever going to do is tell YOU about it! So in the final analysis since at some point your are going to have to hype yourself somewhere, the very least you can do is make damn sure the music is good. It should go without saying but I’m out here listening and somehow it really doesn’t!
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Jul 11, 2009 at 5:57 AM
Desperate Times
It’s easy to be snarky like this when you’ve got an established blog and a label going, but for those of us just getting started, exactly how the fuck are we supposed to know what not to do? The ONLY WAY we learn is by making these mistakes. It’s not like there’s a book on this. Instead of making cutesy top 10 lists, write that damn book.
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Jul 12, 2009 at 4:56 AM
Dr. Quandary
@ Desperate Times:
Wouldn’t putting it in a book just create a barrier of entry? Instead of being able to get help online, you’d be forced to drop $12.95+ on the same information (which would be great for Justin, sure, but the rest of us? Not so much). Instead, I think you’d be better-suited to try and look past the snarkiness, because there are some great pointers for social networking promotion underneath the entertainment.
The point is, there are people out there who have already made the mistakes, and there are people out there who’ve already learned from them. There are even people out there who are willing to share the things they’ve learned for free on the internet. You don’t need to buy a book.
Learn from those who came before you, refine and build upon their knowledge, then pass it along to the next lot.
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Jul 12, 2009 at 8:45 AM
Cameron Mizell
Dr. Quandary is right, and to further the point, I believe the thing that makes most people succeed is simply the fact that they set out to do that research on their own. When you have a question, don’t ask somebody else how to do it, see if you can figure it out for yourself. The answer is out there, either on a blog or simply by following the good example of another artist.
And when it doubt, just try to make better music.
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Jul 13, 2009 at 3:33 PM
Nosferatu
I agree with the message in your most recent article, too, of REDUCING your social media footprint. That article is what led me to this list. You’re pretty dead on and I like everything here...I will be passing this on to a lot of friends.
Everyone wants to see their name everywhere, but most of the people who check out allhiphop.com will probably not buy your album. Some lesser known niche blogs, though, are probably 99% full of potential customers. I wish more rappers would focus on FINDING THE OTHERS like Leary said, instead of confronting people who don’t want to hear you spit. If you really think you’re spitting that real shit, guess what? Most people are dumb and don’t wanna hear your rhymes. Don’t waste your time sticking it in their faces.
Anyways, I got sermons for days, huh. I’m glad you’re doing this site, maybe I can rant less now. Ha. Probably no.
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Jul 13, 2009 at 7:15 PM
The Fucking Wendigo
This was good...I’d only add: Handing People Your CD When They Didn’t Ask For It. I get that all the time. I dress like a grown man so dudes always assume I’m an exec or promoter or some shit. I’m just a fucking sheetrock contractor with some fashion sense. I fucking hate your music and you didn’t even do a good job recording it. Everyone passing out their CDs needs to die. No offense or nothing.
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Jul 14, 2009 at 4:28 AM
Tent Revivial
This was way too long...don’t quit your day job.
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Jul 26, 2009 at 6:40 AM
Okeydoke
How about live bands and hip hop? I’d like to see you cover that.
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Dec 14, 2009 at 8:58 PM
JulieBee
Too true. I just read something like this, but focusing more on problematic PR people trying to jump on journalists. Great insight though. I just sent a link to a not-to-be-named promo jockstrap. Thanks for giving me a break up letter.
Grab your avatar at Gravatar.
My name is Justin Boland and I work for 
Mar 25, 2009 at 10:57 AM
squid