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Citation preview

LOW BUDGET MUSIC PROMOTION AND

PUBLICITY

A “Do-It-Yourself” handbook on how to promote your music while working with a limited budget.

Fola Folayan THE NAIJA ARTISTE HANDBOOK SERIES www.dearartiste.com

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BOOK 1

Copyright © 2014 by Fola Folayan All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

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What’s inside this e-book? Acknowledgement

4

A Word From The Author

5

JUST THINK!

5

Low Budget Music Promotion

6

Can I Really Promote My Music For Free?

6

Low Budget Internet Promotion

7

Low Budget Radio Promotion

12

How Things “Supposedly” Work In The Average Nigerian Radio Station

12

How Things Really Work!

12

So What Can You Do?

12

Social Media: Low Budget Promotion

16

Twitter

17

Facebook

19

Instagram

22

Thinking Outside The Box

24

Keys To Thinking Differently

24

Making Low-Budget YouTube Videos

27

So What Is A “Viral Video” And How Does It Work?

28

Learning To Be Your Own Publicist

31

Press Release Format Guide

32

What Is An Electronic Press Kit?

35

Other Matters To Consider

36

Plan Not To Go Broke!

37

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENT This handbook could not have been written without the help and support of certain amazing personalities. I thank the Lord Jesus Christ for his grace and his wisdom he has bestowed on me for this project and for making my life count for something. I appreciate my Editor, Mr. Jude Chukwuemeka for his patience and his valuable advice and dedication. (I like to call him Bros Judeehhh!) I can’t help but thank my friend and my brother, Tunde Ogubajo (a.k.a Dx Snipe). So many #DearArtiste™ Projects would not have seen the light of day if not for his motivation, his push and his unconditional support. I also thank him for the beautiful cover design of this book. The #DearArtiste team would not be complete without Charles Oyarekua (Angel Charlie!) Thank you for your quiet support, encouragement and coming through when I’m almost out of my wits. And finally, I appreciate all the talented emerging artistes whose passion and hunger for success motivated me to do this! Love you all!

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A word from the author JUST THINK! In the course of working as a radio presenter

what it’s not, how to build relationships and

over the years, I have met so many emerging

work with the media and so on. Some parts of

music artistes and having spoken to, listened

this handbook have been adapted from articles

to, hung out, and dealt with several, I have

on the #DearArtiste™ website, because I have

realized the majority are plagued with the same

found the knowledge in them to be timeless and

problems, chief of which is “lack of information”.

immensely useful. So, sit back and have a great

So many set out to build a career in music

time learning!

without a clue about what to do and how to do what they want to do. I have done seminars and the results have shown me that there’s an information gap that needs to be filled. This book is a first of many that will attempt to bridge that gap. Because the average emerging music artiste in Nigeria has a very limited budget, in fact, some operate without a budget and they practically have to scrape non-existent resources together to kick-start their career, this book will focus on giving practical ideas that can work for such artistes. This is the first of the series, and I have decided to start with PROMOTION and PUBLICITY because it’s one of the key areas that easily frustrate the emerging artiste who is financially

Fola Folayan

handicapped. So in this book, you will learn what

With a degree in Mass Communication, Fola is a versatile and talented broadcaster who has done several stints in broadcasting, hosting several shows, both on Television and Radio, and also lending her voice to several Radio Commercials. Fola is a broadcaster with a passion for making good music and nurturing young talents

good music promotion is, how to promote your music yourself while working with a low budget, the difference between music promotion and artiste publicity, what good publicity is and

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Chapter 1

Low Budget Music Promotion It is the entire set of activities that communicate your music to your audience, with the deliberate intention of making people aware, attracted to and inclined towards accepting and buying your music.

Can I Really Promote My Music For Free?

I

f the above question is on your mind, let me answer you quickly. NO! There is nothing like “Free music promotion”. It can be cheap, it can be easy, but it’s never free. Music promotion will always cost you something; time, energy, creative efforts, and of course money. But for an artiste on a limited budget, there are creative ways to promote your music and still get great results. Now that we have addressed that, let me back up a bit and open up what promotion is all about. In this context, let’s examine the word “Promotion”. It is the entire set of activities, which communicate a product, brand or service to the consumer. The idea is to make people aware, attracted to and inclined towards buying that product, in preference over others. Relating that to music, we can conclude that it is the entire set of activities that communicate your music to your audience, with the deliberate intention of making people aware, attracted to and inclined towards accepting and buying your music. Music promotion is a big deal to artistes, and record companies all over the world because without promotion, there are no sales and no profit and as for the artiste, there is no career. For the emerging indie artiste however, the ability to self-promote on a low budget is one you have to master. First, you have to realize on your part that it’s going to take genuine love for the profession to be successful in this business without a steady income or a financier. So before you take the plunge, do you really love this or is it just a hobby to pass time while you figure out what you want to do with your life? You can’t promote your music effectively by doing it every once in a while, when you happen to find time to squeeze it in. Don’t think about self-promotion in terms of the big media buzz. A lot of artistes use terms like “push” and “hype” and believe that one big wave of promotion will launch a music buzz that will somehow continue without any further effort from them.

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That isn’t how it works. Stop thinking about the Big Push and start getting in tune with the idea of small self-promotion activities that you can engage in on a daily basis. Consistency is also very important. Your self-promotion efforts are in competition not only with other artistes out there, but with all forms of media – radio, TV, Internet, print magazines, and bla bla bla! So People will need to hear your message repeatedly before it’ll even begin to sink in. Without consistency in your promo efforts, your identity will become vague, causing fans to turn their attention to matters they can more easily get a handle on. For the purpose of this handbook, I intend to address three areas where successful low budget promotion can be achieved. These areas are: INTERNET, RADIO & SOCIAL MEDIA

So where do we start? LOW-BUDGET INTERNET PROMOTION At this point in history, it goes without saying, that the internet has basically changed the music industry for good. The Internet is one of the best ways to Promote Your Music on a Low Budget! With FaceBook, MySpace, Reverbnation, Spotify and all the other social networking sites and music sharing websites out there, distributing your song online is not so hard. Take advantage of social networking and connect with music bloggers. Even if some will charge you a minimal fee, your music online is an opportunity for you to reach a wider audience. If you don’t know anything about new media or how people communicate these days, none of this will work. So make sure you educate yourself. The internet has made the world a global village. With over 2 billion people all over the world connected to the internet (According to internetlivestats.com) that’s a huge global market space that could be exposed to your music at the click of an icon. Internet music promotion has come to stay and even major record companies are investing heavily in online marketing and promotion for their artistes. Look around you for a moment, CD sales are dwindling in Nigeria. The average music consumer, streams and most times buys music via the internet. When a new song is played on the radio, the internet is usually the first point of call for the music fan to search for it. Why won’t you take advantage of this global market? So what are the practical steps that you can take to maximize your internet music promotion efforts?

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1. Know Your Target Audience Everyone cannot possibly be your fan. When you know and understand the kind of music you do, you will be able to channel your online promotion efforts in the right direction. For every genre, there is always a niche audience. There is always a community of people online that will appreciate your sound. It is your responsibility to locate that community. Trying to appeal and push your music to every and anybody online is a sure way to fail because the message that you’ve been given (the gift and talents that you have) is for certain people, and if you do not find those people, or put yourself in a place where you will be found, your message will be lost in the cacophony of messages that is the internet. You need to identify your sound (your genre) and search for online music communities that are built around that genre. For example, if you are a Hip-hop/Rap head, places like www.rapbasement.com, www.hiphopdx.com and www.hiphopfightsback.com, are online communities where you are likely to find people who appreciate your music With consistency and participation on your part, you will get heard and gradually build a fan base. In addition, communities like these provide an opportunity for you to acquire the latest information about what’s going on in the world of ‘rap’, ‘reggae’, ‘soul’ or whatever it is you do. You can read blog posts from other contributors, listen to materials from other artistes like you, and get inspired by them. (Please note, I said “get inspired” not steal!)

2. Signup On A Music Sharing Website Music sharing websites give you more opportunities to expose your music to larger audiences and increase your fan base. For an emerging artiste working with a limited budget, these websites are key to your online promotion efforts because most of them come free. To help you make good choices, I will tell you about a few of them that you can easily work with and will most likely get your music out. Here they are:

Last fm

Reverb Nation

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Sound Cloud

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LAST FM: Last.fm has over 21 million active users in more than 200 countries, and like most music sharing and listening sites, Last.fm allows you to sign up, create a profile, and upload your music. It also allows you tag other users to draw their attention to your music and ensure that they listen. Offering your music for free download on Last.fm can give you a real promotional boost. Doing this means that your profile will become more visible and more accessible on Last.fm because they promote free content more vigorously than everything else. Your YouTube content can also be embedded to boost your profile. Besides uploading your music and completing your profile, they also offer paid promotions. And it has features that allow you to sell your music and get paid directly as an unsigned artiste. Cool, right?

REVERBNATION: In addition to digital distribution and aggregation services, ReverbNation offers robust social networking integration, profile pages, widgets, mailing list management and much more. ReverbNation also allows you connect your social network profile pages like twitter and Facebook to make your online promotion and sharing easier. You can track your influence online through their ranking, and see exactly how many fans you have been able to generate in that particular community. SOUNDCLOUD: SoundCloud players reach 200 million listeners worldwide. The fact is that SoundCloud is way too big for any emerging artiste to ignore. The beautiful thing about this platform is that it lets you stream your music and share it very easily on almost any interface. Bloggers can embed the player in their posts, you can share on Facebook and so on These are just three out of so many sharing platforms. I can’t possibly list them all here, but I believe these three will open your eyes to the endless possibilities out there.

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3. Create Your Own Website Since the digital takeover, emerging artistes have more resources and tools at their disposal than ever before to promote themselves and to create a digital presence that can evolve into a brand. I will have you know that simply creating a profile on music sharing sites, and getting music blogging coverage is not enough. To establish a noteworthy presence online, you have to create your own space, where you can share your content and where you maintain total control. A simple fact is that a personal website makes you look professional and serious about your career, and registering your domain name prevents others from claiming it. Most Nigerian artistes, wait until they have “made it” before thinking of having a personal website. (Some don’t even bother) however, having a personal website puts you in aposition of control over your own content. (Imagine if Reverbnation crashes?)

“To establish a noteworthy A personal website also helps you increase your online following presence online, you have to create and recognition by promoting and your own space, where you can driving traffic through your social share your content and where you media profiles and pages. Hosting is affordable and there are many maintain total control.” inexpensive options for designing your own site, so you don’t have to worry about the cost. And there are several DIY videos on YouTube that can tutor you and walk you through it. (After all, this is your learning stage isn’t it?) You have to understand that to self-promote successfully online, CONSISTENCY cannot be overemphasized. Your profiles on all platforms must be consistently updated with new information (whenever you have one) and platforms that provide fan engagement must be utilized to their full capacity. It’s an effort that requires time, energy and sacrifice, but I can assure you, it always pays off in the end. 4. Blogging When I talk to most emerging artistes in Nigeria about blogging, the response I get is usually an incredulous look, and a “what-the-heck-are-you-talking-about” attitude. As someone who has benefitted immensely, financially and otherwise through blogging, I must say that the power and reach that blogging can afford anyone living in the middle of nowhere with internet access cannot be overemphasized. Let me break it down for you.

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Here are some major reasons why you should blog to promote your music.

Blogging Keeps Your Fans Connected To You. A blog allows you to show your fans a “behind- the- music” view of you so that they can get to know you and form a bond that breeds fan loyalty. But of course, you know the decision on what and what not to reveal lies with you right? According to DAVE COOL, “Blogging also shows that you are active in your career. If a potential fan visits your site, enjoys your music, and then sees that you have months of regular blogging under your belt, they might click on a few posts to get a better sense of your personality. If they really like what they read, you might have a fan for life”. I couldn’t have said it better. Another good reason, why you should blog is that blogging improves your Search Engine Optimization (also known as SEO). What this means is that the more you blog, the more Google can find you and the higher your name will appear in the search results based on the keywords, titles and content of your blog posts. Now I can just hear you say, what on earth do I have to say or blog about? Trust me, if you look around you and open up your mind just a little bit, there’s always something to blog about. How about your passions outside music? Are you a sports fan? I’m sure “All it takes is a little creativity, you have friends who will like to read effort and commitment on your what you have to say and pass it around. part and you can make blogging You can also write about the shows you attend, your everyday challenges as an work for you.” upcoming artiste, the interesting things that happen in the studio where you record, the people you meet, other artistes’ music that currently inspires you, etc. All it takes is a little creativity, effort and commitment on your part and you can make blogging work for you. If you’re not such a great writer, there’s nothing to worry about. Who says blog posts have to be essays? You can have a photo blog or a video blog and still be cool. There’s a lot to say about low budget internet music promotion, and even though I cannot exhaust everything in this handbook, I believe the information I have shared so far will spur you into action and encourage you to go ahead and start something without necessarily waiting for the megabucks to roll in first. Remember some of the things you will have to do will require some funding, but in the grand scheme of things, you won’t have to break your backbone trying to raise money for any of it.

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LOW BUDGET RADIO PROMOTION Like I have previously written in one of my articles on the subject of radio, the Nigerian radio industry couldn’t be less friendly to most independent new artistes. However, that doesn’t mean there isn’t some significant radio airplay available to you if you know what you’re doing. That being said, one major mistake emerging artistes make is trying to cover all grounds at once on a limited budget. Except you have major label money behind you, getting your music on all Nigerian Stations and getting airplay everyday is next to impossible. So what do you do? You plan! Maybe I’m getting ahead of myself here. Before I tell you how you can get on radio on a limited budget, I should clearly reveal the state of the Nigerian radio music scene (for those of you who haven’t met that brick wall yet). Radio campaigns are very expensive and the price depends on the size of the region you intend to cover (South-West Nigeria, Lagos only, or National) and of course, who you’ve hired to handle your promotion. If you’re an emerging artiste doing your own promotion, be prepared to be ignored and get your CDs tossed in the garbage. A station manager or librarian gets upwards of 20 to 100 CDs per day. They receive drops and press packs from major labels and minor labels too. And coupled with the number of crappy music submissions they have to deal with on a daily basis, there’s really no time and motivation to check out your nameless submission; unless you come with the backing of one of the big label names.

How Things “Supposedly” Work In The Average Nigerian Radio Station I have been privileged to work as a broadcaster in several radio stations in Nigeria (in fact, I still work in one) and the usual and official way songs make it into the library is this: When a single gets released, the label rep, artiste manager, or artiste himself submits his press kit which includes a copy of the promo CD, and a well written bio addressed to the music department/library depending on the organization. On receiving the package, the CD is auditioned by the librarian and if it is up to the station’s standard and passes broadcast guidelines, it is accepted into the library and included on the station’s music schedule. Another way it works is if a song is released online and it goes viral or released via club DJ’s and it becomes a club favorite, the radio station’s music department can get the song and schedule it for airplay on their own. However, all these are ideal situations. In the real world of Nigerian music promotion, things work very differently!

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How Things Really Work! OK! Let’s get into the real world now. Getting a song “added” to a station’s playlist to get a certain number of plays per week involves a rather byzantine process that brings in various parties, called independent promoters. These “promoters” are first paid by the label. It’s important to note that the money the promoters receive isn’t necessarily compensation paid directly to them for getting presenters to get a song played. Rather, they work more like an intermediary to pass the label’s money to the presenters and librarians. In the case of the independent artiste who is financing his own career, he is usually left at the mercy of the radio presenters and librarians, who are at liberty to set whatever price they see fit. Other times, some of these “independent promoters” or “publicists” are contracted by the artistes, who believe they have all the necessary contacts on radio. Unfortunately, more often than not, these “contacts” are non-existent or casual acquaintances with no real connections or even “someone who knows someone, who knows someone”.

So what can you do? If you do not have the finances to hire a consultant or embark on a major radio promotion campaign, you can take advantage of the following tips. While it will not make you an overnight national radio sensation, it will set you on the right path and will likely open doors to bigger things.

Become An Avid Radio Listener: Yep! If you plan to have your music on radio, you have to know what station plays what, what programs play what kind of music, who the DJs and presenters are, and what kind of music they like. Lagos alone has over 27 radio stations and they don’t all play the same genre of music. So you have to do your homework. Listen and find out which ones play your genre. Some stations have specific shows that play specific genres; find that out too. This helps you to fine tune your efforts (for example, if you do hard-core rap, it will be quite stupid to try and submit your music at Inspiration FM, a known family-value oriented station). Be Proactive Use your social networking for something more than retweeting nudes and engaging in tweet-fights. Follow radio presenters, DJ’s and if the radio shows you listen to have social media accounts or groups online, follow and join those groups. Contribute meaningfully

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and become a regular participant on the show. That way, you will eventually get noticed by the presenter(s) and you can then present your case. You have to be careful here though; I am not asking you to begin to badger and harass radio people on Twitter and Facebook, demanding that they listen to your music and download your link. That’s the quickest way to get blocked. Use your initiative here.

Internet Promotion The reason why I wrote about promoting on the internet is because it’s the smart thing to do before you think of getting radio airplay. A successful internet promotion will make you easily noticeable by radio librarians, DJs and presenters. Believe it or not, 98% of radio people spend a lot of time on the internet and music is one of the key reasons why they are there. If your internet presence is properly handled, there is a good chance of your name or your music being recognized by the presenter/producer of the radio show you are interested in. Once you have that covered, it is time to recruit your friends.

Recruit Your Friends And Online Fans Ask them to call the station’s hotline, emails, or tweet at them to suggest your song. You should also take note of radio stations that have special music shows dedicated to playing new artistes. Most of those shows keep music on, based on how often the songs are requested. Take advantage of that.

Make Relevant Music: There are songs that make their way to radio with very minimal radio promotion effort because the content is relevant at a particular period. Write for the times. Major football tournaments, Christmas, and Weddings are themes that easily make it to radio, especially when they are done well. Radio presenters will always need specific songs that address specific situations at certain times. A song with a political theme can also work (but you have to be careful not to overdo it. Otherwise, that same song might get you on the NTBB list).

Go the way of the “Old rugged cross”. Lol! In other words, the old regular way of putting together a press kit (I will explain in other chapters what that is) and submitting it to the station. If you have really great material, you just might be the one guy out of a hundred whose music actually makes it through to the station’s library. Finally, on the matter of limited budget radio promos (for now), make sure that your CD is

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professionally recorded and mastered. Your CD will have plenty of competition as it is. Why put yourself at a disadvantage by settling for below-standard sound quality? Make sure your CD is professionally packaged. If your music is professionally recorded and presented, it shows that you’re serious about your craft. Don’t be too eager with emails or phone calls. Remember that radio personalities are receiving submissions continually, and your CD may sit for a while before it’s reviewed for potential airplay. Don’t continue to pester the music presenter. It won’t increase your chances of anything except perhaps having future submissions duly ignored. Every time you get played on the radio, add it to the news page of your website/blog to let everyone know. Also, take the time to add a link to the station in question. Showing this kind of respect and gratitude can only help you in the future. And before rushing to waste your time, you need to ensure that the song you want to put on air deserves to be on air! Have several industry professionals listen to it and critique it. Your hommies most likely won’t tell you the truth, so sample the opinions of trusted professionals first

Internet Radio Is An Option Too! Internet radio involves streaming media and presenting listeners with a continuous stream of audio that typically cannot be paused or replayed, much like traditional radio. The good thing about internet radio stations is that they are accessible from anywhere in the world by anyone with good internet connection. So your music actually has the potential to reach a global audience. You can also find online radios that play your specific genre. And yes, we do have some internet radio stations that play Nigerian music (GidiLounge, Dudu Radio, PraiseWorld radio, for example).

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Chapter 2

Social Media For Low Budget Music Promotion Social media has transformed the world, the way we interact, access information and share experiences. This has altered preconceived notions on how to reach fans, sell and promote music and how the industry operates in the ‘New World’.

B

y now, it’s an understatement to say that this is the social media generation. Previously unknown persons become famous overnight with just 140 characters and a photo. Breaking into the music industry has never been so “easy”, skipping previously held in awe hurdles. I do know that quite a number of you emerging artistes reading this book have accounts on a minimum of three social media networking sites. But using social media for music promotion goes beyond maintaining an account. There’s an art and a discipline to it. And that’s what I hope you learn by the time you’re done with this.

you. I don’t need to define what social media is to you, but I do have to tell you that before embarking on a promotion spree on social media, you have to draw a plan and consider what platforms work best for you. In this handbook, I will share some of the commonly used ones that you can creatively use to draw attention to your music, and tell you how you can make them work, however, you still have to think creatively and come up with your own ideas too.

Social media has changed the way we do business, the way we talk to each other and they way we entertain ourselves. Social media has revolutionized the entertainment industry and It has also changed how music fans relate with artistes and the music they make. So if you are an artist promoting your music on the Internet and you’re not already plugged into a social media outlet or two, you run a very high risk of becoming disconnected with what’s going on around

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TWITTER Twitter seems to be the new cool. Everybody and their grandmother is on twitter. It’s the big buzz word just about everywhere you look. Politicians, corporate organizations, churches, and everybody with something to say to the public has jumped on the Twitter bandwagon. Unfortunately, most emerging artistes have no idea how to ‚use’ it or they don’t understand how it can be a great tool to track their music buzz, and help promote their career. Using twitter goes beyond tweeting links to your music, asking questions and hash tagging to create a trend. Now while having twitter followers can boost your music promotion efforts, obsessing over building the number of followers you have will have you wasting the time you should have been using to do more productive stuff.

“...obsessing over building the number of followers you have will have you wasting the time you should have been using to do more productive stuff.”

So how do I make people follow me on twitter?

First, you do not “make” people follow you. People follow you because they either know you, know about you, have met you, heard you, read about you, was referred to follow you, or have seen the engaging and interesting content that you share. The key to gaining Twitter followers is to provide visitors to your profile with something interesting enough to convert them to fans. Sharing offensive material and using bad language is not going to help you either. (I will talk about Twitter ethics later).

Customize Your Twitter Profile When a new artiste tweets at me, the first place I check him out is his Twitter profile. A blank, regular profile makes you look like you’re not “there” yet. Your profile page should be recognizable to you. Your background image, header image & avatar should be designed to represent who you are. If you can’t design them yourself, get someone to design for you. And

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please, no one wants to see that shirtless bathroom selfie, thank you. Note that it’s not productive to spend all your time on Twitter, so apps like hoot-suite and tweet-deck will come in handy here. You can schedule your tweets and monitor your feeds.

know when one of your colleagues does something cool - it all helps. Some of my best business contacts and very good friendships developed from Twitter. All it takes is a very good open attitude and a willingness to connect. The idea is to seek out people who are relevant to your career and build conversations.

What’s Your Twitter Username? You might not realize this, but what you call yourself and the description in your bio determines how seriously would-be fans will take you. Chose your username wisely; I recommend using your real name or stage name because you need to maintain a consistent identity online so you can be easily found. Your bio should also be clear, fully descriptive of who you are and what you do. It should also be short and to the point – no one wants to be bombarded with a clash of things to read when trying to figure out if you’re interesting enough to follow, and if you have a website or a blog, include the link it in the space provided for it (if you don’t have one, a link to your SoundCloud or ReverbNation page will do). A contact detail is also a good idea. Remember that real Twitter promotion is all about building connections and relationships. The great thing about Twitter is the way it connects you to other people who are trying to accomplish the same thing as you. Reach out to them. See how you can help each other. Tweet each other’s shows, link to each other’s sites, let your followers

For example, if you make music similar to Bez, what you need to do is to search for conversations relating to Bez and see the results. This will bring up all the people recently talking about him. Then start talking to those people. Let them know you’re into Bez too and for those that respond and seem interested, mention that you make similar music, which they may want to check out. You most likely will get some attention drawn to you and your music. I must warn you to go about this intelligently though. Be friendly and contribute intelligently to the discussion. Don’t be argumentative and do not be rude. Do not mention your music immediately you start talking, and do not tweet your link if they do not ask for it, because people usually put up barriers against you once they feel you’re trying to promote to them on initial contact. After a conversation of two or three tweets, they’ll be much more inclined to listen to you if they think you’re a cool person. You should also follow them after their first reply too. This will increase the chances they’ll follow

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you back and see your music related updates. You only have 140 characters to get your point across on Twitter. Learn how to be brief. But at the same time, BE YOU. Tweet like you speak (or maybe not). Talk about things that matter to YOU. Your best asset is authenticity. Please DO NOT SPAM. A million notices of your new single/video or upcoming event is quite unnecessary. When you DM random people unsolicited information, you get un-followed or blocked. Please learn moderation.

FACEBOOK STATISTICS Total number of monthly active Facebook users Total number of mobile Facebook users Increase in Facebook users from 2012 to 2013 Total number of minutes spent on Facebook each month Percent of all Facebook users who log on in any given day Average time spent on Facebook per visit

DATA 1,310,000,000 680,000,000 22 % 640,000,000 48 % 18 minutes

FACEBOOK PLATFORM STATISTICS Average number of apps installed on Facebook each day

20 million

Total number of apps and websites integrated with Facebook

7 million

EVERY 20 MINUTES ON FACEBOOK Links shared Friends requested Messages sent

1 million 2 million 3 million

Source: www.statisticbrain.com

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Eighty percent of the people you know have a Facebook account. More than half of those people are very active users of that account. You should take advantage of that.

Have an Official Fan Page. You should separate your personal Facebook profile page from your music fan page. If you really want to promote your music successfully on Facebook, your personal profile page alone will not give you the results that you need. An official music fan page gives you a professional outlook and branding. Of course, you can still use your personal profile to post about your music, but your official music fan page should be the main destination for people looking for your music on Facebook. Make sure your page is updated with current information. There are several sections on the page for information; “About”, “Basic Info” and “Contact Info”. I cannot overemphasize how important it is, to have the right details out there. Several times, I have had to look up some new artistes on Facebook because I needed information, and I have had to leave disappointed. You need to realize that all your efforts to get your music heard will amount to nothing if those who hear it cannot locate you or connect with you because you don’t have concrete details out. The “About” and “Basic Info” sections are there for you to write a clear and concise description of yourself, your music, your influences and any other description that communicates who you are. Make sure you have names, emails and phone numbers in the sections for your press, booking and management contacts. Even if you are self-managed, you need to include this contact info. Do not assume that everyone who is interested in working with you will contact you using Facebook only. Make other options available.

Photos Play A Big Role On Facebook. Having pictures or imagery on your music page brings your fan page to life. It shows you are real. And images are stronger and easier to remember, (Remember that saying that a picture is worth a thousand words?) Research shows that Facebook posts with pictures generate more engagement than the ones that come with attached links or plain text. Having a specific picture or image will make you recognizable online. If someone is looking for you, that person will be sure he/she’s found the right page if your photos are there. Use the cover photo feature to the best advantage. This banner image is the first thing a visitor to your page notices, and it has to be attractive as well as fully represent the brand you are trying to build. I suggest that for this cover photo, a professional photo should be used or a good graphic

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design that has your name and/or logo on it. Trust me; you need to make it as professional looking and as impressive as it can be. Photos of you in the studio, playing gigs, recording, rehearsing, hanging out with entertainment industry people, etc also adds credibility to your page. Remember, you have an image to maintain here, so no crazy memes that has nothing to do with your music and offensive photos. Ok? Show your personality but be professional about it and if you limit the subject matter generally to music-related activities, you’ll be fine. Use Music Apps and manage them well. Because this is not a full social media and music textbook, I will not be able to list and explain all the available Facebook music apps. However, you should know that Facebook supports a lot of apps that you can use to promote your music. Some of the online music sharing platforms integrate beautifully with Facebook (ReverbNation for example, has a Band Profile feature that allows you to pull fans across both platforms). There are also apps that allow you to create mailing lists, sell your music and so on. To get a better hang of how you can use apps, check out the fan pages of successful artistes and see how apps are used to boost music promotion on their pages and take note of what particular apps are used and get right on it.

Manage Your Content. Good Content management on Facebook is what most artistes have not been able to fully grasp. Actually, that is why a lot of people like me got into professional Social Media content management (for those who just can’t do it!). In putting out content on your music page, you can easily go from not enough to too much and too direct without even realizing it. Like in all areas of life, balance is the key here. This is how you do it; you should post new status updates a couple times per day or every other day. There should always be a “purpose” to the update. Each one should include a link to one of your videos, songs, web-store pages, an e-mail list sign-up, your blog/website, your event calendar, websites of venues you will be playing at, etc. Put in some personal thoughts, an interesting/deep quote, something unrelated to promoting music, just to break it up a bit, but be careful not to turn your music page into another personal page. People want to see interesting content and if your post is not interesting or relating strongly to your music, you will eventually be ignored. Do not repeat the same content multiple times. In other words, don’t post about the same song three of four times in the same week. This is called message saturation and you will lose the interest of your visitors. Keep your content fresh by rotating it every few weeks.

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If you are at a loss for something new, don’t sweat it. It’s good to be quiet once in a while. Nobody likes the people who talk needlessly without anything new to say anyway. Finally on Facebook matters, just like all other social media platforms, remember that engagement is the most important thing and not obsessing over fans and likes. And the more you engage, the more your network of fans increase. Remember to link your Facebook music page to your Twitter and have widgets on your blog/website as well.

INSTA what? I’m sure you thought Instagram was all for sharing photos of your latest kicks and showing all the girls that you got to “chill” with when you saw Don Jazzy at the club (lol). “Can I really promote my music on Instagram?” you ask. Yes you can. For those of you who don’t know what Instagram is, it is a picture-based social network. It is an app for your iPhone or Android device that allows you to add effects to pictures you have taken to make it look nicer. It’s kinda like Twitter but instead of sending out tweets, you upload your pictures and have people like them and follow you. Oh! For windows phone users like me, there are several apps available that link to your Instagram account. So, no worries there. Why should you bother to promote your music through Instagram? You should have figured it out by now. Your fans love pictures. The quote “a picture is worth a thousand words” applies here. Fans love seeing pictures of you and what you’re up to, where you’re going, who you’re seeing, what you’re wearing, and everything related to you. Instagram gives you the platform to give them exactly what they want. By now, we have already established that for effective social media music promotion, putting out constant quality content is essential. Music fans love seeing new things (this doesn’t mean a new post every hour though). Instagram comes as a break from the norm and the online entertainment media has come to rely on Instagram as a constant source of content/information. Do you know that there’s something called an “Instagram celeb” now? It means somebody whose photos and

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Instavideos are so popular, they have certain influence and followership. Interesting! Right?

So how do you make this work? Your first assignment is to get your first followers. One of the biggest factors on how to promote your music with Instagram is the amount of followers you have. After all, you need people to see what you share, right? Since you are already present on Facebook and Twitter, simply tell your fans to follow you. It’s the easiest thing to do.

Invites Another way to get followers is to invite people. When you first sign up for Instagram, it gives you an option of inviting people from other social networks. You can also follow them if they have Instagram accounts. It’s most likely that they will follow back too. You should also link your Instagram to other social networks. The great thing about Instagram is that if you upload something through it, it automatically gets posted on other social media networks you have linked it to. This means more people will be seeing your updates without you having to manually post it separately.

Insta-video Insta-video is Instagram’s 15-second video recording feature that allows you to give the world a behind-the-scenes peek at your creative life. With insta-video, you can talk to your followers, create funny short videos to promote a new song (remember Mavin’s Dorobucci?). You can share snippets of a new recording and so much more. There’s a lot to say about social media but I have deliberately limited it to these three for the purpose of this handbook because I believe with these three examples, you will have a fairly good idea of how the others work and you will be able to navigate your way around them. Finally, don’t attempt too much. It can be tempting to create an account on every hot, new social platform, but it’s not always the best thing for your brand. Take a deep breath and really evaluate the social network to see if it can provide value for you as an artiste or it will only be a time wasting effort. As much as fans need to see you, they don’t need to see too much of you either. Spreading yourself too thin across social networks will wear you and your brand image ragged.

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Chapter 3

Thinking Outside The Box The Music Industry is a marketplace littered with success stories of people who did things differently, who thought outside the box and asked the question what if? Be creative, explore options and create something amazing THAT WILL SELL.

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This is surely not the first time you’ve heard this. For those of us in the creative business, mentors, teachers, and critics will continually demand that we should “think outside the box”. The question is, what exactly does it mean to you? Generally, thinking outside the box is a metaphor that means to think differently, unconventionally, or from a new perspective. As an emerging artiste, learning to apply this to your music promotion will determine if you will move forward or keep struggling to play catch-up.

Keys To Thinking Differently The inability to think differently and creatively in this business will result in stunted growth or no growth at all. You have to realize that you are in a competitive environment and dealing with an audience that is constantly seeking something new and different. So if you want a different result, you will have to play by a different set of rules. Recognize that you have been uniquely gifted; concentrate on enhancing that gift. If you can play an instrument, you should leverage on that and find out how to use that to the best advantage. For example, if you play an acoustic guitar, have you ever considered hooking up an open show in the mall? You can set it up with your friends, get permission from the mall administrators and get a spot at the mall on a Saturday evening to sing and play your guitar while your friends hand out small fliers with links to your music online or your promo CDs. People who think outside the box do not sit around and complain. They use whatever situation they find themselves and work that situation into something that can benefit them You have to get rid of all your excuses for failure. If you want something really bad, you will find all means possible to get it. The Nigerian music industry will give you a million reasons why an unknown artiste with little or no money cannot get heard. You have to decide if you want to use that as an excuse or a reason to be more determined. Let loose your creativity and get rid of distractions. When you get distracted by comparing what you do to what others are doing, you will be stunting the growth of your creativity.

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You cannot run forward while looking sideways. Open your eyes for opportunities. So many people wait in the wings, tapping their foot and waiting for an opportunity. Opportunities are a matter of perception. They do not walk up to you and say ‘hello’. You have to keep your eyes open for when opportunities will show up. Check out some “out-of-the-box” ideas that can help you.

Host An Online Show Everyone knows that the more gigs you get invited to play at, the more promotion opportunities you will have. For most new artistes without management and PR money, getting gigs might prove really difficult. If you are in this position and have handled your internet and social media presence properly, then an online show is the next best thing. It’s actually quite easy to set up. All you need is good internet and a computer with a video camera hooked up (I’m assuming here that you’re confident and skilled enough to play live right?). There’s an article on how to set up an online show on the #DearArtiste™ website. You should check it out to get a full grasp of how it works.

Do Great Covers Cover songs give you an opportunity to see where you are musically and also allows avid music listeners to enjoy the songs they love all over again with a different feel to it. A good cover wins you new fans and sometimes, gets you noticed faster than if you had released one of your own original compositions. Remember how the Nigerian music industry got introduced to Banky W? He came in with the cover of Rihanna’s umbrella and not just because he covered that particular song, it was because he did it creatively and added a Nigerian twist to it. Nobody was doing that at that time, so he got a jackpot! Don’t forget that when you cover a hot song, the online space is the best place for it to get noticed because as fans search for the real song, they will come across your cover and if your art is attractive enough, they might be interested in listening. To make this work for you, you have to learn how to tag your music properly online so it can come up easily in search results. Radio DJs also respond well to really good covers. So it can actually open doors for you if you can manage to get a radio DJ to listen to your cover (Networking! Remember?). What this shows is that doing a cover song very well helps you build on an existing and successful platform created by an already successful song.

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Become A Regular At Open Mic Events And Karaoke Nights. Too many artistes pass up this amazing opportunity to show up, win fans, network and simply perform! Several bars, restaurants and lounges in Lagos, for example, have incorporated open mic music performances and karaoke at least one day of the week into their program and all you need to do as a new artiste is show up, buy yourself a drink and indicate a desire to perform. Do you know you can turn this into an informal regular gig by inviting your friends to come with you, do a little social media hype and hit the bar together, while they cheer you up as you perform, take photos and videos and put them on your blog/website? All these add up to your appeal online and you never know who you could meet at these events. Personally, I have scouted open mic shows for new artistes to feature on my radio show several times and I know so many music and entertainment industry people hang out at such places. So why stay home when you can get the opportunity of a lifetime for just the price of a couple of drinks?

Print Business Cards Business cards are not exclusive to corporate employers and employees or business owners for that matter. The fact is; you ARE a business owner. Your music is your business. And like every smart businessman, you know that everyone you meet is a potential client or customer. So a business card helps you network easily and smoothly. Not everyone you meet will be interested in taking your phone number and following you on Twitter. Exchanging business cards show that you take yourself seriously and if you “accidentally” meet an exec at an event, trust me; your card will say so many things you probably will not have the opportunity or time to say. This is a short chapter because I believe that nobody can teach you how to think outside the box. We can guide and point you in a certain direction, but ultimately, you will have to come up with your own creative thoughts that can help you. My last word on this subject is, be ready to take risks. You will never get things done and stand out when you are controlled by fear. The difference between the successful one and the unsuccessful one is that the successful one thinks outside the box, and sees how he can use his current situation as a leverage to get to where he wants to be.

Making Low-Budget YouTube Videos A lot of music consumers are moving away from buying music to streaming online and illegal uploading and downloading is every industry business man’s new nightmare. As far as music

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videos are concerned, Music TV patronage is at an all time low. Take into cognizance the fact that the average indie artiste in Nigeria can barely afford to shoot a professional “industry standard” music video, AND the cost of promoting the video itself is almost overwhelming. Nigerian Television (terrestrial TV) hardly creates space for music videos, and the cable music channels are too few to accommodate the number of music videos Nigerian artistes churn out regularly. For an average upcoming independent artiste to get regular airplay for his video on those channels, he will need a “fat pocket”, friends in the right places, and maybe his mother’s left eye. (ust kidding about the eye! Lol). That’s where YouTube is the new cool. YouTube puts everyone on the same level. Not only is YouTube THE most popular online tool for music discovery, it has also become THE preferred platform for listening to music and watching music videos amongst the younger demographic (18-). The fact that it is user-friendly and has an easy social integration with Facebook, Twitter, and other social media platforms, gives it that advantage. The fact that it is convenient (Smart- phone apps) and any and everybody can view content on it is also a major plus. As an independent artiste, YouTube can be the most powerful tool you have to promote your music career. Remember Justin Bieber? His career probably would not have picked up without YouTube. The easy sharing and embedding, views counter, comments section, etc. gives your fans an opportunity to easily share and recommend your music to other listeners.

So what are the practical ways to promote music on YouTube? Get A Channel And Brand Your Channel Just like you did with your social media accounts, you created a profile and branded it yours. The same logic applies here. Getting a YouTube channel is easy. Just open a Gmail account and take it from there. Like I said earlier, you have to keep your identity consistent on all your accounts so that you can be easily recognizable.

Upload Interesting Content Contrary to popular belief, you do not have to wait until you have an official music video before you have content for YouTube. Record your creative process. Share videos of you rehearsing, recording or just free-styling with your friends and fellow artistes. Most of you have really good smart phones. It’s time to put those phones to work and record great

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moments in your journey to fame. You can have a weekly series, sharing something fun and unique that your social media followers and friends will look forward to seeing. Encourage visitors to subscribe to your channel. Feel free to let your creativity loose here.

Tag Your Videos Properly This will increase the visibility of your video. The more visible the video, the more likely it will be shared. You should also make the most of the YouTube categories, placing your content in the most relevant places. This again, will help make sure the right people see your videos. So tag your videos with any and everything that is relevant. Use slangs too where it is needed. It will make your video easier to find.

Be Consistent In Your Updates An obvious, active presence encourages viewers to keep coming back. If your fans can be assured of always seeing something fresh and interesting on your channel, be rest assured that you’ve won them over.

So what is a “Viral Video” and how does it work? A day hardly passes on social media without me seeing one upcoming artiste or another, pitching links to one “viral video” or another. Unfortunately, what the typical Nigerian emerging artiste calls a “Viral video” is nothing more than a low-budget piece of crap shot by an amateur and uploaded on YouTube without the ambition of making it to TV.

So What Exactly Is A “Viral Video”? For a lot of people, it might be hard to define, but we recognize it when we see it. It is when a new video suddenly pops up and spreads like wildfire. All at once it seems to be everywhere, on Facebook, Twitter, friends are sharing it on BBM, it makes trending topic on every social networking platform, and it’s a hit on YouTube. This phenomenon is called ‘virality’, i.e. the unusually fast circulation of content via the internet. A “Viral Video” has unique qualities that generate hype and that hype is what forms the bedrock of its ‘Virality’.

So What Makes A Video Go Viral? 1. CREATIVITY: Creativity is an essential ingredient in a viral video. It’s what attracts. It’s the creativity that keeps people talking and sharing. In an era where almost all ideas have been recycled and very few people refuse to think outside the box, a really creative and inspired video will always catch people’s attention. (remember Olori Oko video by the gospel group

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“Infinity”?) 2. COMEDY: Humor always appeals to people. Think about “Oga at the Top”. That’s a classic example of how people are willing to laugh and share the joke. When your music video has genuine humor and is creatively expressed, you’re on your way to becoming viral. (remember PSY and Gangnam Style?) 3. EMOTION: You can try appealing to different emotions, for example the feeling of being united, a sense of home, or the strong emotions evoked during a thrilling football game. Making an emotional video is actually quite challenging and risky because if you can’t touch people on a deep level, you will end up having a flat, pretentious looking video. An example of an emotional viral video is the “Coca-Cola Happiness Machine” videos. Those videos appeal to everyone and you couldn’t watch anyone of them without smiling and relating to the experiences. 4. DANCE: You can always create your own special dance step, give it a cool sounding name and make a song/video with it (Think Azonto and Harlem Shake). If it’s well made and properly hyped, it becomes a trend and when a trend like this emerges, there are always a vast number of copycats who jump on the bandwagon in order to try and get attention. (Remember what happened to “Azonto”). 5. SEX APPEAL: Yep! I said the word. Good ol’ sex. It always sells. But be careful. I’m not asking you to make a porn video and before you use sex appeal as an element to create a viral video, you better make sure it’s creative, tasteful, and agrees with your brand. Lastly you must recognize that YouTube is music’s second largest search engine. So, have that fact in mind as you upload content, tag and share.

How Long Will YouTube Be Available? This is a necessary question in recent times, in view of the recent announcement by YouTube to “remove” videos uploaded by independent artistes. As expected, this announcement generated a lot of negative reactions and speculations across the music industry all over the world. A YouTube executive, who granted an interview with the Financial Times said the company will start blocking videos from record labels that refuse to sign licensing deals for its forthcoming premium service, YouTube Music Pass. (Maybe this would have already happened by the time you’re reading this book) The reason for doing this, is because Google

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is making efforts to build a new music video streaming service called YouTube Music Pass. The service is expected to operate like already established services such as Spotify, Appleowned Beats Music, and the recently announced Amazon Prime Music. These services allow users to listen to an unlimited amount of music for a monthly subscription fee. Google has already signed deals with the three major record label conglomerates (Sony, Warner, Universal), as well as a number of independent labels. But the majority of independent labels are refusing to sign the agreement over what they refer to as “unfair terms”. Other music industry experts are claiming what the new decision means is that monetization will be shut down from videos that contain music that has not been submitted to YouTube’s music streaming service. In other words, independents that don’t sign up on the new streaming service will not be allowed to monetize their videos. This seems to reflect in the official statement from YouTube, which reads: “Our goal is to continue making YouTube an amazing music experience, both as a global platform for fans and artists to connect, and as a revenue source for the music industry. We’re adding subscription-based features for music on YouTube with this in mind — to bring our music partners new revenue streams in addition to the hundreds of millions of dollars YouTube already generates for them each year. We are excited that hundreds of major and independent labels are already partnering with us.”

So How Will This Affect Me? The fact is that, the new music streaming service by YouTube is going ahead, even though these controversies might mean it’s probably going to take a while. It however doesn’t hurt to be armed and ready. Another option you can explore is to have a VEVO account. VEVO is a video hosting service owned and operated jointly by Universal Music Group, Google, Sony Music Entertainment and Abu Dhabi Media. VEVO operates differently though, and as an independent artiste, you need to subscribe to a distribution service to get your music on it. Think of it more along the lines of getting content on iTunes, rather than YouTube. There are digital distribution services available online, and for a minimal yearly fee, they will set up the VEVO account and add the videos. The advantage here is that VEVO and YouTube are linked, so all of your video content will be searchable through YouTube.

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Chapter 4

Learning To Be Your Own Publicist Nothing beats a big budget campaign, except maybe a bigger budget but ideas rule the world and tools make the wheel. While your bank balance may not be big enough to do some things, understand that the effectiveness of a campaign is not built on money alone.

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efore you start learning how to be your own publicist, you should know who a publicist is, and what he/she does. First, you must know that a music publicist is a communications professional who handles public and media relations on behalf of an artiste. A music publicist usually works with an artiste manager, even though in the less than stellar Nigerian music industry structure, an artiste manager sometimes takes on the role of a publicist as well. It’s the publicist’s job to arrange and supervise interviews, write and supervise the publishing of press releases, and oversee all communications material that is distributed to the public on the artiste’s behalf. I must add here that the traditional role of publicists is changing really fast because the emergence of social media has made it easy for artistes to reach out to their audience and even the media directly without having anyone pen and send an ‘official’ press release. However, this does not stop an emerging artiste from learning the basic tools of the trade because social media or not, there are some basic practices that cannot be kicked to the curb.

So How Do You Go About Being Your Own Publicist? Publicists are usually hired based on their experience and the strength of their contacts. Since you cannot afford one, you will have to open your mind to learn on the job and network aggressively to have good and useful contacts. You also have to realize that there’s a difference between the online publicist and traditional publicist. Online publicists specialize in dealing with online media (music websites, blogs, online radio, TV and newspapers) while traditional publicists deal with traditional media. Online publicists sometimes also take on the role of social media managers and help an artiste manage his social media relationship with his fans. You will have to learn how to do all these yourself. Don’t be alarmed. it’s intensive, but not impossible. One of the first things to do is to create a database of music industry contacts. So everywhere you go, keep an eye out and be ready to meet someone new. (You can see why that business card is important now, right?)

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Secondly, learn how to write your own press releases. I really cannot over emphasize this. And that’s why I will take some time to explain in short detail, how it is done. Check out the following sample guide to writing a press release. This sample shows both physical set up (notice the dateline, headline and other tips) and ideas for content and content placement. In addition to following this outline and structure, consider checking out some actual press releases for ideas, too.

PRESS RELEASE FORMAT GUIDE FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: (Insert Subject/Headline here) News from: (Insert Your Organization) Date line: (day the release goes out) Contact: (full name of a follow-up person), (phone), (email) Headline: (Centered) One Descriptive Line in Title Case Subhead: (Centered) Title Case, More Descriptive but Still One Line ([City where the news takes place in brackets])- In one or two sentences, write the main news or point of your press release. These can be longer sentences, but there should never be more than three in this paragraph. You’ll not be able to fit all your details in here, and that’s ok. The second paragraph is where you should feed to every press outlet and reporter: the who, what, when, where and why of your event, announcement or roll out. This is what they’re looking for when they read your release. Between this and the paragraph above, the reporter should now know everything they would need for a small “blip” piece. Of course, you want more exposure than that, so you provide more detail below. This paragraph is your details paragraph. It is here that you give background, stories, history, information, or stats. This is where you paint a picture and bring in all the other “stuff” you want people to know about your announcement. This last sentence or two focuses on the future. If you’re planning or working on an album for example, this is where to talk about it. Simply wrap up by looking ahead in some way. This is a very short paragraph, sometimes only a sentence! Finally, to sign off, if the letterhead you’re using doesn’t have footer, you can add your

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website and social media channels as your footer. I suggest you practice writing mock press releases and have a music industry person look them over and make corrections until you get it right. Now that you have learnt how to write a press release, you also need to understand that there’s a technique to submitting them.

Know Who You’re Sending Your Music Press Releases To And Why Too many artistes send out email blasts of their music to whoever they can, hoping “someone” important will hear their music and make them famous. That strategy is a bad idea. Sending out a bunch of CDs or mp3 attachments with a generic message because it’s easier for you to do isn’t going to help you much. You need to speak to the person you’re sending your music to specifically in order to get their attention and let them know what you want. It will make it much easier for them to help you with what you need. Only having a link to your music just isn’t good enough. Have a target and find out what they want before blasting them with your music submissions. Most of those emails get lost in the junk box anyway.

Present Your Music Professionally If you’re sending an email to someone in an attempt to get them to listen to your music, treat it similar to how you would if you were sending someone your resume to get a job. Just because you’re an artiste doesn’t mean its okay for you to be unprofessional. Unprofessional or sloppy presentations won’t make you a cool artiste in the eyes of those who will potentially listen to your music. It’ll simply make you appear unprofessional or sloppy, which will give your music a lesser chance of getting heard. With this in mind, don’t leave email subjects or bodies blank. Don’t overuse exclamation points or other types of punctuation either. Use a proper salutation, body and closing. Simply saying “check out my music” isn’t good enough. And please for heaven’s sake, avoid clichés and phrases like “Hit Banger” or “Hot new jam”. Finally, if you’re not sure about how to proceed with submitting your music releases to someone, put yourself in the recipient’s shoes. If you were receiving dozens of music submissions each day, what would you want to see in someone’s presentation to make it stand out? What would make you want to develop a relationship with someone and listen

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to their music? When you start to think like the receiver of the music and not the submitter, approaching these submissions process rightly will become much more obvious to you. Hopefully the three ideas you were presented with here will get you to start thinking that way. Avoid the “cookie-cutter” approach. You need to customize your campaign objectives to your particular need. Sit down and draw out a plan based on your immediate publicity goals. Are you planning to release new music? A new video? Are you planning to promote your YouTube channel? Or are you playing a gig somewhere and you want to promote it? There has to be a clear-cut, laid out plan for every publicity campaign you embark on. When you are engaged in online publicity, you should also realize that real success comes in working with the best 10-20 sites and making those placements count. Do not be in a hurry. You need to also realize that publicity, by itself, does not automatically make you a superstar. It goes way beyond that. Effective publicity happens when your name and your face is consistently visible to your audience, and it takes time to achieve this. You should keep in mind the fact that entertainment journalists, bloggers and press people in general are very ego-driven, can be inconsistent and even snobbish. So you have to learn to get and keep their attention. Make sure your press release is addressed specifically to who you’re sending it to. And for heaven’s sake, DO NOT SEND BULK FORWARDED MESSAGES! Asides the danger of your mail ending up in the spam box, it shows disrespect; if I notice that I am just one out of a gazillion recipients. Always research the music blogs, websites, magazines, newspapers, etc. Take time to read some of the reviews, articles and feature stories and take note of who wrote them. When you find a positive review for a song that is close to your genre, take note of who the writer is and when you are mailing your release, address it to that person. You can even search for that person on Facebook or Twitter and initiate contact. Who knows, you might be given some personal consideration. If you have had trouble getting a response from a DJ, blogger or media people, watch your attitude. Your manner of approach matters a lot and a pushy, overbearing attitude will not get you anywhere.

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What Is An Electronic Press Kit? EPKs are like digital resumes or CVs that promoters, media people and other individuals in the industry use to rate the seriousness and professional integrity of an artiste. A lot like crafting a sound job resume, there are key features within an EPK that determines if your press kit will be deleted or accepted. To avoid being deleted, the secret is to create an EPK that is simple and to the point. Here are some tips that will help you to create a good EPK.

1. The Bio

3. Professional Picture

The bio section of the EPK provides a brief write-up that includes some background information like hobbies, hometown, musical influences, etc. This information is used to explain to industry professionals who you really are. Make it truthful, make it fun and make it count. Please do not make this long and be careful not to bore your reader with other irrelevant details. If you are not good at writing, it won’t do you any harm to get someone to write for you. But make sure you seek several opinions before deciding on the write-up you want to use.

Try to get a professional photographer to shoot you and include 2-3 pictures in your EPK. An EPK without a photo is like a movie without a main character. Media people need to put a face to the music. And if you’re sending your EPK to the print media, the pictures are more than important.

2. Contact Information

4. The Song

One of the major reasons why most EPKs get rejected is because there is no way to contact the artiste. Make sure your kit includes these items: YOUR PHONE NUMBER, MANAGER’S NUMBER( IF U HAVE ONE), IM CONTACT, EMAIL ADDRESS, FACEBOOK, TWITTER, and any other relevant contact information.

“Let the music do the talking.” Make sure you upload your best material, preferably in mp3 format. Also know that, including the lyrics to the track also creates an added benefit to the listener. There you have it! With these basics, you should be able to put together a decent press kit and you should have a pretty good idea of how to get them out.

Tip: Including video and social media links are also worthwhile. Doing so can help to differentiate your EPK from others of similar quality. But make sure you test the links and be sure they’re working.

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Chapter 5

Other Matters To Consider Merely knowing how to promote your music doesn’t mean you can afford to be ignorant or careless about other things, below are a few things I believe every upcoming indie artiste should pay attention to in order to have a sustainable measure of success in the industry.

W

elcome to the final chapter of this handbook. I titled it other matters to consider because what I will talk about here does not really fit into one neat category, but they are so important that they cannot be ignored. What you are about to read here are things I believe every Nigerian music industry hopeful should take very seriously because how you handle them determines not just your success but your longevity in the industry. I had a conversation with a colleague at an industry event sometime ago and he said something quite striking. He said, “There’s a reason this enterprise is called show business. It’s a SHOW, but it’s also a BUSINESS”. He then went ahead to say that a lot of artistes concentrate on the show, rather than the business. I couldn’t agree more! Truth is I haven’t noticed many emerging artistes who actually take an active interest in the business side of music. The creative ones are obsessed with the art; they will rather write, perform and play their instruments non-stop if you allow them. Not that this is a bad thing. It’s just that leaving everything else for another person to handle can be very dangerous and can cost you your career. A lot of artistes really do not like getting bogged down with details and analysis and plenty of words and figures (that’s understandable because it’s a common trait with creative types. I am like that too!). This is why managers are hired to handle the paperwork. For those of you who can’t afford a manager, a publicist and a promotions consultant just yet (after all, these days, these folks don’t take charity cases), you will end up having to do it all yourself. So if you’re going to self-promote and self-manage, don’t you think it’s wise to learn how things are done? The bottom line is, if you want to get your music out to the public, and you do not have a working knowledge of the business, you will be at the mercy of other people who do. And while there are some good people in this industry, there are also charlatans and users. These are people whose primary interest is the money and who are not above exploiting you in

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order to get that money. Educating yourself about the music business won’t happen in a day; it’s an ongoing process. As I am writing to you about this, I am still learning and educating myself everyday! There is always something new to learn. The industry is moving forward and things change every day.

sound paranoid or anything, this industry is really full of wolves in sheep’s clothing. Be on the lookout; watch your back and be wary of high sounding words and outrageous promises. My dear artiste, there is no fun in ignorance. Save yourself future heartburn and learn what the industry is about.

Take advantage of all the available resources. In this modern day of information technology, there’s really no excuse not to educate yourself. I have said it over and over again; your iPhones and tablets are not fashion accessories. There’s a world of information. Use it to your best advantage!

PLAN NOT TO GO BROKE!

“Devote time to studying. Even if you spend an hour a day reading up on the business, you’ll be heading in the right direction”

You can even take online courses. You have free information at your finger tips. Don’t let it go to waste. Devote time to studying. Even if you spend an hour a day reading up on the business, you’ll be heading in the right direction. Talk to people in the industry. Some of the best advice you’ll get will come from people who have experience in the business. Talk to other artistes who have been there and done that. Find out what they have gone through, what lessons they have learnt, and you can also get contacts from these people. (Remember not to stalk them ok?) Don’t be too trusting. Not to

According to screaming blog headlines, Nigerian artistes are balling! Living large, acquiring mansions, state of the art luxury cars, Rolex watches, popping bottles, dating models and generally living large! Or are they? The average Nigerian upcoming artiste’s dream is to make that one hit, or

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“Blow” (using the slang we all use right?) Become an overnight radio, club success, perform at all the big concerts and sign major endorsement deals. In other words, their dream is to become rich and famous. Not to burst your bubble, you should begin to realize that not all famous “celebs” (especially in the Nigerian Entertainment business) are actually rich. At least not the way they show you on social media. A lot are actually living on borrowed money, in heavy debt and don’t be surprised you probably make more money than they do, while some are downright broke. That being said, let’s talk about how you can avoid getting into this sorry situation and stop yourself from living a lie like most industry “Big names” do.

Plan Ahead, Budget and Live Within Your Means Planning and budgeting are essential concepts when it comes to managing your personal finances. It’s all based on the notion of living within your means. As they say, ‘It’s Not What You Make, It’s What You Keep!’ Making a ton of money does not mean that you will remain financially successful. Just do a Google search for famous Hollywood bankruptcies or bankrupt musicians. You will get a list of names that rivals any guest list at a red carpet event. Same goes for their Nigerian counterparts. I’m sure you can name quite a few. Stars we all loved and admired while we were growing up are nowhere to be found right now. Their money problems were not primarily caused by an inability to make money. These artistes all made plenty of it, millions each year in their prime. Yet, they spent more than they earned and therefore ended up broke. Learning how to establish and keep reasonable budgets is the key to living within your means and getting financially ahead. The issue of living within your means cannot be overemphasized. If you cannot afford designer labels, then wear good, clean outfits that look good on you. If you can’t afford to pop bottles, don’t drink on credit. Who says you must party hard every weekend anyway? If you can’t afford to live on the Island, live where you can afford with dignity and self respect.

“Learning how to establish and keep reasonable budgets is the key to living within your means and getting financially ahead.”

The truth is most artistes often have highly fluctuating incomes. They can make a ton of money for a few months only to experience a dry spell and earn substantially less during the following months.

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Remember in the Nigerian music industry, the royalty system is practically nonexistent, album sales are at an all time low, and a few make anything from digital distribution (Ring back tunes, Spinlet, iTunes downloads, etc). For example, an artiste might go on a GLO tour and earn quite well. When the tour ends, the regular payments end as well. If you do not plan well, save and invest wisely, the money earned will disappear faster than smoke. You should also mind the company you keep. Friends and “hangers on” have a tendency of making you spend more than you have budgeted for. Watch out for those “friends” who always want to go with you to every event, always with you, happy to drink on your tab, happy to throw your name around, as long as it will guarantee club entrance, women and photo ops. People like that are usually the first to disappear when the gravy train packs up. And for all that’s worth, STAY OFF DRUGS! Need I say more on that? What I am saying is taking care of your personal finances requires some work, lots of discipline and a healthy dose of common sense.

Stay True To Yourself. Face The Fear You need to push through the fear. You’ll need to put fear aside and dive in to stay true to yourself and spread your message. Artistes who stayed true to themselves always did better than those that sold out. You can explore different artistic styles and try out new ideas, but the essence of who you really are must always be felt in whatever material you put out!

Be Passionate One thing I do know is that NOTHING beats true passion! Some ideas I thought were really lame have ended up being a success because of a crazy amount of passion on my part and on the part of everyone involved. Conversely, I’ve seen great ideas flop because the creator didn’t have enough passion behind the project. Check your passion level; if you’re not crazy about your art, perhaps an adjustment is needed.

“You can explore different artistic styles and try out new ideas, but the essence of who you really are must always be felt in whatever material you put out!”

Keep It Real It’s one thing to be true to yourself but what about keeping it real to the outside world? You’ll need to look deep and face that fear again, then be willing to keep it real. In today’s world, we

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long to connect with authenticity which usually means the non-perfect approach. No one’s life is all dandy and sugar perfect with roses on top! So whatever you do, make it REAL, RAW & RELEVANT.

Prepare For A Marathon, Not A Sprint Ivan Misner once said, “I’m a 20 year overnight success”. While it may appear that success is sped up in the information age of speed... guess what? It’s not. If you want to stay true to yourself and create good music, you’ll need to realize that it’s going to take time, dedication and commitment. You’ll have some bumps along the way and you can navigate them, you just need to stick with it.

Enjoy The Journey! Lastly, keeping your eye on the goal is great but what about today? What about the journey? Remember that all you have is today and while it’s great to have a goal, be sure to celebrate every time you take a step closer to your destination. Smile through the grind and bear in mind that it’s all a process. The journey to greatness itself is a great lesson. And believe me, if you don’t make that journey, you can’t learn those lessons anywhere else! Cheers!

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