Myspace Strategy

For a new artist, myspace.com seems like a wide open space for music marketing. It can be, but often times, artists simply do not understand how to utilize its full value. Simply getting as many friends as you can or plays of your music does not convert to CD or merchandise sales. It doesn’t even get you friends, if anything it might get you an acquaintance, but really it does nothing for you more than give you bragging rights to your immediate friends and family. The problem with this is your media friends and family have either already bought your merchandise or CDs or expect you to give it to them for free.

To properly use myspace.com as a music marketing tool you have to understand the basic principle of making friends. Just like in the off-line world, myspace.com is about becoming friends with people that have similar interests as you. In the real world you can’t simply pass by someone on the street, nod a hello, and continue on your journey and be able to call that person a friend. You must stop, take time, meet that person, exchange contact information, and then follow through by contacting them and continually build that relationship into a friendship. Myspace.com is no different.

What does gaining 40,000 new friends in a week that may not like to listen to your genre of music do for you? It does not gain you additional sales of your merchandise. It does not get you more shows booked. It does not get your name in the press any faster. But what it can do is lead to a lot of nonsense or negative comments on your page. The biggest problem with getting non-specific friends is that you are wasting your time. It is much better to gain 10 targeted friends that like your genre of music than it is to gain 40,000 friends that don’t.

You have to be social on myspace.com. You have to take the time to get to know your fans, interact with your fans, and become a part of your fans social network circle of friends by taking an active role in their interests. To new artists this may seem like it takes way too much of your precious time, but once you get started taking an active role in your potential fans lives you will soon see that they take an active role in your music. This means they will share your music with their friends, talking passionately about you, your music, and what you have to offer. This is gold! Word-of-mouth advertising is the most valuable commodity in music marketing you could ever have and the best part is it costs you nothing.

The next time you’re on myspace.com trying to build your fan base, try the following music marketing strategy and see how fast you gain new fans that by your CDs, merchandise, and attend your live shows:

1. Instead of looking for new friends visit each of the friends you already have. When you’re on their profile take the time to get to know them. Find something that sparks your creativity or makes you want to leave them a comment about it. Now take the time to actually leave a comment. It may be a funny picture, a video they have featured on the profile, or a blog post that you found something interesting in, it does not have to music related it just has to be something that will help you spark your friendship.

2. In addition to leave in a comment send that friend a personal e-mail. You might simply say who you are, what your music is like, and that you are just trying to reach out to friends and introduce yourself start building a better relationship. Believe it or not, being straightforward and honest with potential fans will build a lasting trust between the two of you that will convert to sales.

3. Most people that search for friends on myspace only find a friend to never visit their profile. This is something you’ve got to realize. Just because you asked someone to be your friend does not mean they actually took the time to go to your myspace profile to accept your friendship. Many times they will blindly accept your friendship and think in the back of their mind they will visit you later when I have more time. Most likely you have done this yourself. This means that of all the friends you already have it is most likely that more than 50% of them have never even visited you on myspace.com. As you are commenting on friends profiles and sending personal e-mails give them a reason to visit your page. This could be a new song, a new video or a new blog post you have left, it doesn’t have to be anything huge or earth shattering, it just has to be something that will get them to go to your profile.

4. Start a spreadsheet and list all of your my space friends. Create five or six columns to the right of each friend. Now, when you visit each friend document the date and time you checked out their profile. Utilizing this spreadsheet on a weekly basis will allow you to visit each of your friends at least one time a week for as long as you have them as a friend. Through consistent communication, even if they don’t communicate back with you, you are building a trust that will eventually lead to that friend taking an interest in your music were dropping you as a friend altogether. Getting dropped as a friend is not a bad thing. It’s simply weeds out those friends that may not be into your genre of music.

5. As friends start to e-mail you back make sure you return an e-mail to them on the same day they e-mail you. Don’t wait a couple days, weeks, or months to reply. The myspace crowd is definitely an instant gratification community.

6. Create a blog or better yet, a video blog, and post it to your my space profile regularly. A good starting point is a minimum of three posts a week. This does not just have to be about what shows you have coming up, when your CDs can be released, or telling your potential fans and friends about how to buy your CD. Friends want to know about your personal life. Studies have shown that a balance of 60% band or artist or record label news, mixed with 20% personal information, and 20% off the wall random posts will get you the highest percentage of friends reading your blog as soon as you post it.

Conclusion

Myspace.com can get you a lot of true fans that are into your genre of music. You have to work it, taking time to build lasting relationships with your friends, before you will see good results. If you approach myspace.com just like you would a friendship in the real world you will see that the amount of CDs and merchandise you sell drastically improves.

Find out how this strategy can be used while planning a complete music marketing campaign!

Peace,

Jai
“Love the Music in Yourself, Not Yourself in the Music!”
©2009 Jai Hutcherson. All Rights Reserved.    

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