How to Sell Music: Advertizing

Why do you need to advertize?

Now that you’ve got your business set up and ready to go, how are you going to get your business identity out there to the buying public? How do you plan to get customers? How are you going to keep them? If you have produced a CD, how will you get it to the people who will buy it? I don’t care what type of business you are in, it’s all about marketing and sales. If you aren’t selling, you aren’t making money.

To get your products or services out there, you need to consider three main strategies: advertising, marketing, and promotion. Once you have these strategies in place, you should move on to distribution.

A lot of people confuse advertising with marketing. Advertising is the description or presentation of a product or service to entice people to buy, support, or approve of it, while marketing is used to introduce products or services to the marketplace. In short, advertising is about telling folks that your product or service is available, while marketing is a much more detailed analysis of how your product or service is perceived in the marketplace. Thus, marketing is a much more long-term endeavor.

Figuring out what type of advertising to buy can be a daunting task. You want to get the most return for your advertising dollar, but in some cases you could just be throwing your money away.

Newsprint

This is a relatively inexpensive way to reach a broad market in a particular geographic area. Often referred to as “dailies” because they are printed every day, they are good for promoting specials or sales on goods or services for a specifi c time period. If you want to make a quick announcement or “splash,” consider advertising in the dailies. On the other hand, there are a lot of ads in every paper, and most people only read certain parts of the paper. Further, your ad will not have much effect after that day the paper is printed and distributed, as it is usually tossed into the trash.

Newsweeklies

Newsweeklies, such as local entertainment guides, are another form of newsprint. They basically offer the same advertising capability as dailies, except your ad has a seven-day shelf life. Also, newsweeklies typically attract or even focus on a younger demographic, so they’re much better suited to advertising entertainment-based goods and services.

Magazines

This type of the print media offers a broader reach and can target a more specific audience. Depending on the type of publication, magazines typically have a shelf life of one to six months. However, because magazines offer a broader reach, ad costs are higher than newsprint ad costs. Unless you have a great relationship with a particular magazine, or have pretty deep pockets, magazines may not be your fi rst choice. However, you can target your audience by advertising in trade magazines that may be better suited to promoting your company’s image or to giving you credibility in the short term. For example, you may want to advertise your record release with Rolling Stone, if you can afford it. Or if you are promoting your new recording studio, you may want to focus on a magazine that caters to people who use recording studios such as Recording magazine

Radio

Radio ads can target a particular region and demographic based upon the station’s listening audience, but people are often doing something else when they are listening to the radio. Therefore, they may not pay much attention to your ads. You may have to buy a lot of ads over a long period of time before your message sinks in. Also keep in mind that there are two types of radio advertising. The first type is generated by programmed airplay (such as when a song is added to a station’s pla­ylist). The other type is purchased airtime in the form of a commercial spot. Radio is arguably the number one medium for music sales. Buying advertising can be very expensive; it can also be the most effective way of generating sales.

Television

TV ads can get a lot of attention, but can be very expensive to make, and they cost a lot to run for a very long period of time. National television advertising is extremely costly, and even local advertising can be beyond the budgets of most businesses. However, you’ve probably seen a number of national, regional, or sometimes even local advertising campaigns for compilation CDs for certain artists, with an 1–800 number to call. “Have your credit card ready!” These types of campaigns must have some degree of success, or you would not see so many of them.

Billboards

Billboards are a good way to target an audience who’s traveling through that particular area, but they can be quite costly and tend to work only for certain products or services. They are best used for nearby restaurants and hotels. Of course, in Los Angeles, Nashville, New York, and other major cities, is it not uncommon to see major artists being promoted on billboards.

Bus stop and bench advertising

This type can also be considered. Yet, before you spend your money, you should think about how much traffic will be passing by the ad and how much attention anyone will actually pay to it. But it can work if you place such an ad in an area with a lot of venues where you’ll be playing. In fact, I know of some bands that put their name and logo on sheets, backdrops, or even flags, and place them wherever they can to garner more attention. Every little bit of advertising can help, so don’t be afraid to try.

Mail

Direct mail can be a good way to advertise certain products or services, but the print cost and postage can be too costly if the ads don’t bring in enough customers. Also, junk mail can sometimes offend people. They might even toss it in the trash without reading it.

E-mail advertising can be a very cost-effective way to reach a particular group of people with similar interests. However, you have to be very careful not to spam people, or it could have a negative effect.

Yellow Pages

The Yellow Pages may be the best type of advertising for local businesses. When someone is looking to buy a product, the Yellow Pages may be the first place they start. But these ads are very expensive, and must be purchased for a whole year and paid for by the month. A very small ad can end up costing thousands of dollars, and once it’s in print, you can’t make any changes.

Fliers

Fliers are tried and true and are always a great idea. They’re also relatively inexpensive, but you’ll need to do a good deal of work to get them out there. You can pass them out at your gigs to tell fans where your next show is, or paste them everywhere you can in high-traffi c areas. You can also put them on the cars of people you know are likely to come to your gigs, such as at bars and fraternity and sorority houses. However, you may have to check with the local government to make sure you don’t put up fl iers in places you shouldn’t.

Remembrance ads

Magnets can be printed with your logo and you can place them on your cars, vans, trailers, rental trucks, etc. They can have the name of your business or band, as well as your Web site address. As you drive around, people will see your magnet ads and it will increase awareness of your brand.

Remembrance advertising, or “swag,” is probably the most cost-effective and directly targeted advertising that you can buy. It is any item with your logo or other identifying information on it. This includes t-shirts, hats, coffee mugs, travel bags, coasters, beer cozies, and just about any other item that you can slap your logo on. The best thing is that in many cases, you can actually sell this type of advertising. The more products you sell, the more people will be exposed to your brand. That is definitely a win-win situation. Before you advertise in any medium, make sure that it will actually reach the customers you need to reach.

General advice on music advertizing

Always remember that repetition is the key to effective advertising, so placing an ad here and there won’t get you much business. Usually, consumers won’t notice an ad until they have seen it several times. So be persistent. Also, remember that advertising is only one small part of an overall marketing plan. Make sure to promote your business through public relations, direct mail, special events, promotions, trade shows, brochures, and as many other marketing strategies as you can implement with cost-effectiveness.

How to start selling your music?

All of these methods are very effective ways to advertise, but if you are still a local band, the best way to sell your records and merchandise is to get gigs. And to get gigs, you need a great promotional package, and you need to do a whole lot of cold calling. You have to get on the phone with various venues, bars, and clubs and be willing to listen to a lot of “no” before you hear a “yes.” Pick places that will be receptive to what your band has to offer, and you may be surprised what could happen. Remember, if you persist, you will succeed. Don’t get discouraged if you aren’t playing the best gigs right away. Continue to hone your act, pick the right songs, and play as much as you can. Also keep in mind that you may be able to help your prospects by getting others to work with you, such as a manager, booking agent, road manager, etc.