Michael Brandvold Marketing – Music Marketing

Twice in one week I heard from two different people involved with booking bands about the importance of your website and social presence. Sometimes I feel like all I do is repeat myself when I say your official website needs to be core to everything you do and it must be current and look professional and… engage with your fans on your social networks. Well this article is going to repeat those statements again.

I was at SF Musictech and listening to Nic Adler from the world famous Roxy nightclub in Hollywood talk about the importance of social media. He stated many of the things I have been talking about for sometime, but he ended the presentation with a statement I found really important…

When a agent or artist contacts the club about booking a show the first thing he does is get his team online and look at the band’s online world. If the band has no fans on Facebook or Twitter, no engagement, they will often pass on booking the band. There you go, right from the mouth of the horse… your online world is going to play a very important part in your ability to get booked.

Then later that same week while recording a Music Biz Weekly podcast with special guest Bruce Houghton from Hypebot, Music Think Tank and the booking agency Skyline Music, Bruce mentioned a story on how they were on the phone with a client about booking a band. While on the phone the client went to the band’s website and immediately noticed how out of date it was. He then said if the band doesn’t care about their website why should he care about booking them. Again right from the mouth of the horse… if your website is not current and up to date you very well could lose business.

You don’t have to update your website everyday, but try for once a week. Please make sure the last update is not from two years ago. That tells anyone visiting your website that your band is dead. Who wants to do business with a band that appears to be over

Talk to your fans everyday! Post something to engage with them, answer their comments and questions. Respond and retweet their tweets. Get active! People you hope to do business with are looking at these things.

Seriously, your career will depend on it!