The 3 Most Essential Internet Tools for New Artists

By Justin Boland on October 07, 2009

Hip Hop 2009, Promo, Tech, Workflow

23 comments

I’m writing this because I have divergent opinions. Everyone is trying to hype up their websites, and for the most part, everyone is lying. (This is pretty much the same in every other industry, too.) Audible Hype is written for smart kids, nerds who have (or at least want) actual lives and abundant free time to be outside.

Social media can be fun. However, promoting music on social media is only “fun” if you are literally and legally retarded. My list of tools reflects that opinion.

You want to get your music out there, you want to connect with the people who like that, and you want to get their money. You want to spend only 1 or 2 hours a day on that. This is for you.

1. Bandcamp

Not perfect, but definitely the best so far. Bandcamp is, yes...another place to put your music online. Here’s why I strongly recommend taking the time to do it, ASAP:

a. You can sell your work directly, set your own prices, include bonus tracks and additional files, collect email addresses, and this money is dumped directly into your paypal.
b. It looks damn nice and it’s a way better media player than myspace, facebook, or any of the “____Share” hosting sites that blast your potential listeners with popup ads and blinking flash bullshit.
c. Unlike myspace, it provides detailed data on where your traffic is coming from and how it converts. Unlike Reverb Nation, their branding is almost non-existent, buried down at the bottom left of the page. Unlike iTunes and Amazon, you get to set the pricing. Plus it’s free.

2. Wordpress, Blogger, and Beyond.

Honestly? It really doesn’t matter what you go with. You just need a website. Audible Hype is fancy because we’re Vermonters who like to show off—this is running on Expression Engine templates built by Back Brain Media.

For most of you, that’s too much gibberish. The easiest, best-supported method is to register and buy hosting for your own .com domain and install Wordpress. If you’re sticking with Free, then I do recommend Blogger for hosting—it’s just more flexible, and it doesn’t hurt that they happen to be owned by a company whose name is synonymous with the fucking internet. Speaking of whom…

3. Google, Motherfucker

I’ll admit, I judge people by their email address. When you’re being offered something for free that’s better than any of the alternatives, even those you have to pay for...and you turn that down? Good to know.

This one should be so obvious you’ve already stopped reading the article: if you haven’t already gotten a Gmail account, set up alerts in your name, and trained google to automatically deliver analytics reports on all of your sites, do that at some point today.

Tomorrow, take the time to explore google Documents and Groups. At World Around, we use Groups to co-ordinate specific projects and Documents to do collaborative work. We’ve also started using google documents to set up and collect online surveys for us...which is a service millions of businesses still pay for.

That’s That.

Sure, you could dig deeper than this, but why? If you’ve actually got a fan base you can be selling directly to them with just the tools I’ve outlined here. I didn’t include google analytics on that chart because really, you shouldn’t be sweating your numbers like that...it’s not healthy.

In conclusion: the internet is a gaping maw of bored people with money who love music. All social networks and search engines exist for the sole purpose of bringing traffic to your blog/site so they can hear your music on Bandcamp. If they like what they hear, they will spend money on it, you’ll get a notification to your gmail account every time, and your paypal account will increase in size, allowing you to invest money in merchandise, start selling physical copies of your music on CD and vinyl, and fund tours so you can start taking your operation on the road.

If that’s not the point of your life, I have no idea why you’re reading this. Tell your friends, though.

23 responses to "The 3 Most Essential Internet Tools for New Artists"

Oct 08, 2009 at 1:55 AM
MalaKai

Simplicity. I like it.
Oct 08, 2009 at 8:53 AM
Justin Boland

Another loose suggestion, in keeping with this theme: collect the big articles and print them out, every day. If you’re like me, you digest a couple dozen articles a day for no reason at all, and research puts me into the triple digits.

When something is good enough and long enough to really focus on, don’t stare at a screen—print it out. Put it into a pile and read it when you’ve got free time, good coffee, and a comfortable seat.

This is a small and simple step but the “Quality of Life” gain was BIG.
Oct 08, 2009 at 9:44 AM
Joe Martinez

Holy fuck. I love these articles. As we speak, I’m migrating all of our Yahoo! mail to our Gmail account.
Oct 08, 2009 at 12:25 PM
refe

I get where you’re coming from - simplicity. And you’re right about the ridiculous amount of time most people waste online.

But to ignore Twitter is not wise. I probably post on average 10 updates to Twitter per day. At less than thirty seconds per update - adding in the time it takes to read updates from the people I’m interested in hearing from - and I’m still spending less than 15 minutes total on Twitter each day.

Yet those 15 minutes drive more than a third of my site’s traffic. That’s not a bad return if you ask me.

Sure, you can get sucked in and suddenly realize you’ve wasted an hour consuming mostly pointless information. But if you have a little self control that doesn’t need to happen.

Also, the other day I went to a music conference here in Chicago. Over a half dozen people recognized my name tag from Twitter and came over to strike up a conversation. Now those people are real connections. Can’t beat that.
Oct 08, 2009 at 1:40 PM
Justin Boland

I’ve gotten a lot out of Twitter, too—then again, we’ve both got more to say than just “CHECK OUT MY MUSIC,” “BACK IN THE STUDIO,” and “CHECK OUT MY MUSIC”...I think a lot of Audible Hype readers don’t have the content stream to make Twitter work for them.

On the other hand, if a rapper’s already got a built-in audience and a name, no matter how smallish, then Twitter is probably a no-brainer...fans will provide the content for you, you’ve just gotta reply and interact with ‘em.

I’ll be chewing this over. I definitely appreciate your points, man.
Oct 08, 2009 at 2:31 PM
Chris

Always, always, always—Audible Hype is the best site for non-bullshit music biz tactics.

Way back when Justin, when you suggested using Blogger for a website, I called foul on the idea. I hang my head in shame, since having a website is key.

So I took your advice, and if you can even find a fan who will do work for minimal cost, you can have a website that looks like this through Blogger:

http://www.sakesalive.org

The site was built through some fancy thinking. Blogger is just a blog, but the template is fully manipulative. And if you use blog posts as your website “pages”, you now have a full website completely for free.

Google is such a no brainer. You can fully manage and operate your business operations, again, for free. No need for 37signals, or Bandize, or any other beta, bug-riddled service. I have spreadsheets for everything on there. I even migrated all my word documents onto Google Docs. Google Photos allows you to store imagery for your band, and even gives you hosting links. The need to pay for an FTP host is now null and void.

Twitter is something that I’d love to hear some advice about. Cause advertising “Buy My Record/ Buy My Record” is pointless. But I have a hard time coming up with content to fuel 10 Twitter posts a day, etc.

Thanks as always.
Oct 08, 2009 at 2:49 PM
Alex

On that note, Justin, the problem I find with Twitter is that I really hate making noise. I like being a part of something when the signal-to-noise ratio is pretty high, and Twitter can be like that if you pick your network. On the other hand, since I feel absolutely no need to tell people every detail of my life, I’m not any good at twittering.

Like you say, I’ve not got the content stream to give much of anyone an incentive to follow me.
Oct 08, 2009 at 5:22 PM
Exacto

I’d like to know more about using Google Groups + Documents! How do I set up the surveys, especially...that’s something I’ve been wanting to do for awhile, get some better feedback on my music/beats.

I mean, I see the general features of Google Groups but I’d just like to see what’s working for you guys, because World Around is definitely doing something right.
Oct 08, 2009 at 5:39 PM
Roger from Zapp

So I’m starting to “manage” a friend’s career and he’s totally set up on Reverb Nation. I agree with you on all points but I’m wondering—what’s the “pain quotient” for changing systems like that? What does my man stand to LOSE by abandoning one platform (or whatever its called) for another?
Oct 08, 2009 at 6:51 PM
Chris Bracco

i have been neglecting bandcamp, thinking it was useless if you had an official website.....but goddamnit now i’m considering it haha.

thanks for this.

_chris bracco
Oct 08, 2009 at 6:55 PM
Chris Bracco

i also highly recommend the print & read thing you suggested above...i travel back and forth from school & home a lot so i re-read articles during this downtime to keep the important stuff in my brain.

_chris

(sorry for the double comment).
Oct 08, 2009 at 8:04 PM
HubertGAM

Those are good offerings for your newest of the new artists, but I think any artist that wants to consider making a real run at a career needs to make sure they know how to grin and bear it. At the end of the day, folks are buying into the things that they have some sort of personal connection.

A band could have the sickest drummer and guitarist, but it doesn’t mean shit if they are assholes. The same goes for rappers, DJs, bongo players… etc, the ones that are winning today that weren’t established by The Machine are the ones that people actually want to befriend. When I see Ra Ra Riot on tour, hanging by their merch table, I can see why they’re blowing up. When I see Slug of Atmosphere selling posters and signing them before shows, I see why he’s part of THE premier indie hip hop act. It’s about being a good genuine person these days. You can have all the tools, it doesn’t mean a damn thing if you don’t know how to use them.

With that, I would Twitter is a vital tool to connect with [potential] fans. I try to engage with a new person every day, because you never know where the connect will lead. I see my man Refe chimed in here and I just met him in Chicago the other day. A couple days before, I pinged him on Twitter.
Oct 08, 2009 at 8:31 PM
David Sherbow (MusicBizGuy)

Justin

Live music connections are more essential than ever given the necessity of building strong direct to fan relationships. Please take a look at my new site that just went up http://www.livemusicmachine.com a widget that allows an artist to be directly booked from anywhere on the internet. Check it out. I would love to get your support. Thanks

David
Oct 08, 2009 at 11:43 PM
refe

Hubert - you were actually one of the people I was referring to in my previous comment. Never would have known I needed to interrupt the conversation you were having with your friend and introduce myself if not for Twitter.

Twitter doesn’t necessarily have to mean tons of content. For a blogger, certainly. But for an artist its more about the personal touch. Just be yourself (unless your a jerk - then be someone who isn’t a jerk.) If you already have fans they’ll probably initiate a lot of the conversation anyway, so just respond and engage. Same thing you’d be doing at the merch table anyway, hopefully.
Oct 09, 2009 at 1:25 AM
Quiet Entertainer

Hey Justin;

love your site as always…

Just don’t judge me by my email address! My domain name came with a free email address. I’ve got 7 email addresses all routed and organized in the same gmail account. But nowadays, when I send out a Quiet Entertainer email, it might as well be from my dotcom. Good for subtle promo and I still get the gmail functionality.
Oct 09, 2009 at 10:34 AM
nek4life

@Quiet Entertainer:

You can always always sign up for Google Apps which will allow you to use a gmail account with your domain at the end of it. You also get google docs, calendar and a small portal as well. There may even be more I’m not aware of anymore. It’s been a while since I’ve checked in, but we do use that for our email addresses at http://worldaroundrecords.com. I will say it can be a little involved to set it up, but if your domain registrar lets you mess with your DNS settings it’s not that difficult. If it’s something that’s of interest I could help Justin write an article about setting that up.
Oct 09, 2009 at 8:40 PM
Quiet Entertainer

@nek4life make it so.
I appreciate all tidbits and any help.

Maybe I can figure it out. I took the blogger advice and finally figured out about the DNS/domain stuff. But keep the coming.
Oct 17, 2009 at 11:47 PM
verge

Great read.
All on point. Props.

Regarding the cats mentioning Twitter:
I agree with you and I try to use Twitter when I can.
I just can’t be on there all day and night trying
to respond to everything. I try to check in a couple of times a week and interact a bit, but I got work to do most of the time.
Same with FB.
But both these things are really great for connecting
and keeping everything down to earth with people.
I mean, what’s better than being able to reach out to your favorite artists and actually get quick responses from them?

All in all, great article. I’ve neglected my Gmail account and only use it for Twitter and hardly check it.
I better get right on that. My people have been telling me forever to utilize the Gmail.
They even have something now that will send all your contacts and forward everything from your other emails to Gmail.

Thanks for the article.
Oct 22, 2009 at 9:16 AM
sygo

thought id share how i integrated the bandcamp service directly on my website...simple, effective and you dont feel like ever leaving the website. check it http://www.lowpitchmusic.com

Great article btw!

Sygo
Lowpitch
Oct 23, 2009 at 7:49 PM
Daniel "Danny Dee" Aguayo

Great Article Justin!

Id like to comment on your comment about revisiting articles and also add to the 3rd tool: Google…

I agree using thier analytics is a bit much but RSS and docs can be essential in your day to day work flow.

Keep up up the dope posts.
Oct 26, 2009 at 1:19 PM
Objektiv One

Myspace now offers analytics. Just throwing that out there. As for these simple tools I really do agree. Yeah you did ignore Twitter, but honestly a much better thing to say is maybe use a top 5 social networking site. These sites change, grow, and die so fast that naming one specific one seems pointless.

Also, reading this blog is like reading Cracked only about the music industry. Haha.
Nov 01, 2009 at 7:53 PM
Dropkick

Yes, Bandcamp + Wordpress is about as engaged as a musician needs to get. Most of the artist twitter profiles I’ve seen are terrible and I would agree they’re better off just not transmitting “buy my shit check my shit” 5-10 times a day, nobody cares.

I think not including Tunecore was a huge oversight, though!
Nov 11, 2009 at 10:55 AM
Helena Bonham Zepplin

Artist Data is cheap and impersonal...good scheduling/automation is always transparent...when you’re doing branding on a 140 character product it just looks stupid....those fans don’t care about what widget or app is powering the update, they only want the update....so what works for that? How do we make updates on Facebook at 10 am when I’m still hungover and dreaming? Were rockstars after all.