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We post our calendar in our weekly online newsletter, our My Space page, as a bulletin on our My Space page and Outrageous Productions My Space page.

We suggest these local sites for you to post in their message boards to help promote:
www.cincymusic.com
www.cincinnatimusic.com
www.cincypunk.org
www.cincymetal.com
www.localmetal.com
www.neussubjex.net
www.cincinnati.com

The first six websites in this list also have message boards! Please visit them and let people know about your show! If you find another fantastic place to post our shows... LET US KNOW ABOUT IT! We want people in the club just as much as you.

Please email us an MP3 prior to your show to outrageousproductions@gmail.com. We will stream it from our site prior to your show so people have an opportunity to listen to you when they're making their decisions of where to go and who to see.

If you send us an electronic version of your flyer, we will be happy to post it on our site on the front page as well as our calendar section. We will also use it to do an event page for you from the Dirty Jack's My Space page! Please email to outrageousproductions@gmail.com. We print some of our own flyers, but it can get expensive, so we cannot print and hang your flyers that you send us unless prior arrangements have been made.

CLICK HERE FOR OUR LOCAL MEDIA LIST

Promotion School Youngins!

We aren’t trying to make you feel silly, but it surprising how many bands really don’t have a clue how to promote a show or are using old school tactics that don’t really work anymore. In our efforts to better music scenes across the US, here are some tips. Nothing is surefire except that not doing anything will result in a bad show for everyone and we like people to leave happy, including us!

If you are a serious band, you will realize that a band is a job and that you can’t just be good and expect people to come for no other reason than they should have telepathic powers or just trust you. A band that wants to tour full time, gain fans and sell merch will usually work 40 hours a week **faces of shock** just like a real job!!!!!

1. No matter where you are and where you play, you are generally required to provide the customers the night of shows, especially bar shows. Some original music bars simply don’t have an advertising budget, don’t have a street team and rely on the bands to bring the people for their bar sales. Without that, the bar can’t stay open for you to pass through again. Fans are looking for a connection with a band, band member or their music. They can drink anywhere and they will unless you tell them why they should be drinking where you’re playing. Here are some simple things you can do.

a. Make flyers. Don’t just make flyers and toss them in the air though and expect anyone to care. Think about what grabs your attention to a flyer or would make you hang on to one. Try to hand out your flyers to people you’ve talked to about the show. Tell them a bit about it, help make that personal connection. Like it or not and as cheesy as it is people like saying their friends are in bands and that they’re going to see them, so you have to make them feel like they’re a part of your inner circle sometimes to do that.

b. Find a few easy, highly trafficked online calendars to simply post your show dates on. My personal favorite is Reverb Nation (www.reverbnation.com). It provides you with a “widget” that you can post easily on any site that accepts html, so whenever you post a new date, it will update your calendar wherever it is posted. You can also encourage your friends to post it on their pages and they will receive continuous updates on your upcoming shows. Other favorites include My Space, Pure Volume, Garage Band and, of course, your own personal website. Make sure that if you have a personal band website (and you should) that you update and not just you’re My Space page. If you are truly lazy or the person who runs your website is, then make your calendar page refer to your My Space page for upcoming dates.

c. Post bulletins and event invitations on My Space. Put your personal feelings about the popularity of My Space aside and realize that it truly does reach more of your fans people of the general area than any website has ever done. Who knows if it will last forever, who cares if all your friends are doing it so you wanna be the one that different, just like everyone else… it is hands down the quickest way to reach the most people at one time.

d. Try to make every show some sort of event. Sit down with a calendar and find all the events that you might have going on that year, whether it’s a nationally recognized holiday, your birthday or a festival you want to create. Pitching an idea to club is much more appealing than just saying “my band is called this and we’re awesome”, no matter how true it is. Tell them you want to have a zombie festival, a toga party, a wet willy contest, anything you can think of that will keep anyone’s interest. Not only will it catch a venue buyer’s eye, but it will keep your fans wondering what your next show will be like and cause them to tell their friends to maybe gain some more fans.




2. Touring bands will want to approach things the same way, but you may have to work hard and be a bit more creative. Especially if you have not played the area before. If you have done your marketing budget for your band look at how much you are spending on things like flyers and think about reapplying that money towards your fans. Flyers really aren’t going to have as much impact. I’m not saying don’t make flyers, always make flyers, but maybe just not as many. If no one’s ever heard of you making 3,000 flyers will not even earn you back one admission many times.

a. Let’s face it people love free stuff, whether it’s stuff they need or not. Think about providing raffles or compensating your bands for their tickets or drinks. If your budget is about $20 a show for flyers and promo then maybe you could offer to pay off someone’s beer tab at the end of the night by raffling it off and reimbursing them for their admission. If you’re making really shiny flyers and posters and mailing out CD’s and really trying to make a promotion push of $100 or more think about reinvesting that money back into an even bigger prize. Maybe pay for everyone’s first drink of the night. Advertise that “you should come see 'Your Band' and the first drink is on 'Your Band'”. It sounds like a lot, but these are the people that will remember you and come back again. Also, the bar will love you for bringing people, buying some drinks and look forward to you coming back. This can sound like a lot when you’re scrimping for gas money, but you’ll start scrimping less if you can make true fans that will always return to your shows and venues will start being happy to promise you some gas money because you can promise them business. Every business usually starts out a bit in debt so that they can have better results. “Spending money to make money” is something you should look at as well.

b. Keep a few promotional CD’s, business cards and press kits on you at all times. You never know who’s going to be at your show and may want to book you at their club, radio station or with their band. Treat them professionally and have something available for them. Ask for their information in return so you can follow up if you don’t hear from them in a few weeks.

c. Keep a list of all media lists for each area. Keep a schedule of when you should send your press releases out. The first press release should be sent 6-8 weeks (time permitting), the second 4-6 weeks and one more the week of (as a gentle reminder to invite the press out if they so choose). Written articles, radio interviews (even on smaller local stations) and being able to recognize your name are all more important than buying a full page ad in the local media rag.

i. Note: If you are receiving press in several areas, make a press board. Clip out your articles and post them on a poster board or frame them on your merch display. Let people know that someone is taking notice of you, so maybe they should too. Don’t overdo it. As you get more press, maybe think of making a book to keep on the table and just keep posted the more exciting reviews.

ii. If you happen to open for a national act or meet someone with some clout in the media, try to get them to make a quote about your band. It’s the same things that writers do for books, so why not get people who know about music to make them about your music. Especially if they show interest as a fan as well.

iii. See if you are in a college town. College radio will be the most receptive to playing your music and having you in the studio. Some high schools even have a radio station. They are not as controlled by corporate handcuffs, such as Clear Channel and will be able to do more to help you out.

d. Keep a mailing list. A better way than maybe making a notebook with a list is to make business card size papers to leave around on the tables for people to fill out. Have them list things like their zip code, birthdays or anything else that you might use to track your fans. Leave a bowl, bag or box up at your merch table for people to drop them off in. Ooo! And guess what else! You can reuse these for raffles and the like to encourage people to sign up for your list. It’s all a vicious cycle. One you should be taking part of.

i. Reverb Nation (www.reverbnation.com) is a great site to use for your mailing list as well. The benefit to this is that it will also allow people to sign up for your potential street team as well and will allow for you to keep everything in one place, which can be important especially while you’re on the road. It will also allow the members of your team to enter their demographic information, which is important for when you are booking shows or potentially shopping your band for management, agents, radio stations or labels.

ii. One of the most comprehensive free sites available to bands right now is Fan Bridge (www.fanbridge.com). It allows you to track pretty much any demographic you were hoping to track with your fans. You can fine tune your mailing list to certain areas, so you’re not always harassing fans that most likely couldn’t possibly make it to your show in the first place. It also allows for SMS text messaging which is always good for day of show reminders or trying to get fans to vote for you to play Warped Tour (because we know there isn’t ANYONE doing that right now ;) …).

e. Make a book with a standard form page in it for bars and bands to fill out. Something like this:
Venue/Band Name:
Contact Name:
Contact Number:
Contact Email:
Band/Venue Website:
Band/Venue My Space:

Okay, you get the point, put in any other information, address, style of music, style of bar… it really doesn’t matter what you put in there as long as you have a way to contact the people you need to the next time you come through town. Some venues may want you to rent the room out and book the lineup on a show and this will be a great way to find the bands you’ve played with before and see if they can help you out. Put the information into an Excel spreadsheet. You can then sort by state, name or whatever other information you would like to sort by. You can even provide a place to ask if they mind if you put them on your mailing list to help you fill in those demographic blanks. Let bands know to contact you if they are coming through your area. This is a business of favors and we can all use all the help we can get.

f. Keep a list of record stores in the area. Call ahead of time. See if they do any in store performances, even if it’s just the acoustic of your guitar player and singer or whatever will work. Meet people at the record store. Ask if you can bring CD’s to consign as well.

g. Some of the silliest and cheesiest things are some of the best ways for people to remember you. Bring flowers, candy, your homemade cookies or whatever you can and offer them to people in the audience before your show.

h. ALWAYS, ALWAYS, ALWAYS try to talk to some of the audience members before your show. Maybe when you offer them your cookies tell them you’re in the 2nd or 3rd band of the night and you hope they’ll stick around. You are going to get more people to stick around and pay attention, once again, if they feel they have that personal connection to you in some way.

i. Street teams. Lots of people will sign up for street teams, but it’s hard to get them to do the work. These are basically fans that will work for you for free or in exchange for free show tickets, merch or to be the first to hear your album on a secret download page. Make a place on your site where they can print up a show flyer. Ask if they mind making a few copies (offer to reimburse them up to a certain amount with a receipt) and if they can hand a few out and tell people about your band. Ask if they’ll run to the local CD store and see if your CD is at that store. If they show their receipts, offer them free passage to the next show in their area. Be creative, but be careful. A lot of times you’re going to get a lot of people who seem excited and are well intentioned, but just don’t have the time or slack off. Just be smart with how you work with your street team. Maybe make a place for them on My Space, give them a special name such as “Your Bands Dorks” and make them feel special. Ask one that you know is working hard to make a fan page for you in that area. Again, be creative.

j. Especially if you are attending a conference, get in touch with hotels. Ask if you can leave promotional CD’s in the lobby or if they would even mind dropping one in each room on the pillow, desk or on the info display in each room. Try not to put them to too much work as this leads to eye rolls, but if they seem receptive it won’t hurt to ask.

So, these are some of my suggestions and ideas. There are many more. Please visit Joe Taylor’s site at www.spinme.com and sign up for his newsletter and maybe sign up for some teleconferences for more ideas. He’s the bomb and writes some of the best books you will ever read on how to manage your band, grow your bands audience and more. I heart him and so should you if you really want to take your band to the next level.
I am also the equivalent of a D&D geek about local music and ways to make scenes better. If you have done something that has worked well for you in the past, let me know and if it’s not completely stupid or repetitive, I will post it here! Just email me at outrageousproductions@gmail.com!

For more articles on things to consider, more promotion ideas or to post some of your ideas or comments on me being a big, fat know-it-all, please visit Jem's Promotion School Youngin's.  Future articles and other ideas will be posted here, along with our My Space page, and the Outrageous Productions My Space page.