JPF Home Page Forums General Messages General Message Forum What has worked for you?

Hi Everyone,

In another thread we were discussing the pro's and con's of a marketing system, and niteshift contributed this little tid bit:

If you want to GET PAID for audio streams, then join Independant Artists . The sign up fee ( after joining ) is a once off $7.50 , and you'll make that back in 1 or 2 months. More, if your music is "popular".

Something I was not familiar with and I thought, wouldn't it be great if all of us contributed and shared just one piece of information on a marketing concept, or a money making concept, that we have found some success with, or that maybe we just feel was very helpful in getting our songs out there to the world wide listening audience.

I have always conformed to the philosophy that what ever you gave to help others would come back to you tenfold, but in order to get, you first had to be willing to give. I guess this thread will be a good test of that philosophy.

I will start out by sharing one of the things I did early in my quest that eventually allowed me to build a list of 390 Dj's, sell some CD's, and develop a couple hundred new fans. Those 390 DJ's will now accept an MP3 file from me for any songs I wish to release, and they assure me that when they get it, they will play it, and they do. To have the ability to get this kind of exposure is a priceless commodity.

There is a social networking platform of sorts called PalTalk.
you can find it at www.paltalk.com.

There are a number of ways you can interact there, some good, some bad, you make the choice. Once you get on there and get registered, when you sign in you will have an option to view all rooms, where you will see file folders for the different rooms available. If you click on the music rooms, you will find a list of the different genre's of music rooms available, I click on country music, and it reveals a list of 35 to 50 rooms. Some of them are listening only rooms, and some of them even let you play what ever music you want by raising your hand. This is a good way to get your music heard, and generate interest in yourself, and your music, and unlike Yahoo, there are no punters.

In the listening only rooms you will find generally 4 or 5 DJ's that play music in them. Get to know the DJ's, and eventually Pm them and see if they will accept a copy of your song, and maybe play it on their show. Spending times in these rooms and letting the people their get to know a little bit about you is pretty important.If the roomies like you, and the Dj's like you, they will more than likely favor playing your music. It can be somewhat of a popularity contest at times.

I know that many of you have heard that internet stations generally aren't as effective, or meaningful, and they are a waste of time when it comes to exposure. I couldn't disagree more. In this environment you will find that many of the internet stations are tied to AM/FM stations in the real world.
Some of the room owners actually own 3 or 4 real life stations as well as their internet project. Most of the Dj's have real life friends that are DJ's that work at local stations in their community, and they can be a big help in getting your music played on them if they feel it's worthy. One Dj that I met on their was from New Zealand, through another DJ's referral I had sent him 2 songs that I had released earlier, he liked them enough to ask me for more material from my current CD, which he guaranteed he would air on his 2 stations there. So I sent him a digital copy of the CD. Two week later he emailed me to say how much the folks there enjoyed my music, and he hoped I didn't mind that he had sent it out to about a 100 other DJ's and asked them to consider it for airplay as well. He wasn't joking, for the next two months I got emails from DJ's through out that area requesting any additional material I might have for them to play. It wasn't long and I had several hundred real live Dj's that wanted any new releases I put out,and they all were willing to accept an MP3 file to get it.

I really feel like this was a major step in the promotion and marketing of my music.

It doesn't cost you anything but time, and I think you'll find it pays real dividends in the end.

I hope that helps some of you.

Billy Darnell