Thursday, April 29, 2010

How to get more fans at your bands next show

How to get more fans at your bands next show

Have you been playing gigs and not getting anymore fans to your shows? Have you been searching the internet for an answer and they all say the same things that don’t work? Yes, get a myspace page, get a facebook page, send out e-mails, and call your friends. Here is some other stuff that no one ever tells you about.

Music- You need to have a band that is playing at least tolerable music. The music does not have to be great but it shouldn’t annoy anyone. As long as you are not annoying the heck out of everyone; the music is secondary.

Invite your friends- If you have not been inviting your friends to your show… START NOW.

Go To Other Shows- This is the most important thing. You should be going to at least one show of other local acts every week. Introduce yourself to the band, bring a hand bill for your next show and give it to each member of the band (we’ll get into hand bills in a second). Getting fans is no more then getting friends. Start off with the bands. Most local bands go see other local bands. If you make it a point to go to other local shows, well, they will come to yours.

Hand Bills- For each show print up 100-200 handbills. You should be able to fit four on a regular piece of paper. Print them up at home! Really cheap. Or bring them to Kincos. Go to a website that offers free digital pictures (flickr.com) and use of of the public domain pictures. Download the picture to your computer and use it in your picture program. Then just place the text of you show on the bill; date, time, band name ETC.

Posters- Don’t go crazy with these. Three for each show are more then enough(make sure to put one at the club). Unless you are a known band already no one is going to see your poster and decide to go to your see your band.

Give away CDs- Wait, but you want to sell them. NO. NO you can’t. Give them away. If you spent 1000 bucks on a recording, then 1000 on printing CDs, Don’t give those away, sell those. However, you should print up 300 or more CDs with your home computer. You can get CDRs for very cheap today. For example when this article was written (4-28-2010) Staples has a spindle of 100 CDRs on sale for $14.98. So for 45 dollars you can have 300 CDs printed up. Now, these CDs are not fancy like factory created ones. You need to get creative. Decorate them with a sharpie or other ink. You will also need to put them in a case. NOT A JEWEL CASE. No no no, we are giving these CDs away. Take a piece of paper and cut it in half.. Now, fold it in half. This will be your CD sleeve. Put the CD inside it and staple the upper two corners. Blamo. You have a very cheap CD to give away. Make sure on this cover you have printed your band name web address and upcoming show. Go to a local show where a band is playing that sounds like yours. Go nuts and give away a bunch of free CDs.


How to hand out handbills and CDs-
NEVER just hand something to someone and walk away. You need to make a connection with them. If you don’t make a connection they will not care what you have to give them and you have just wasted your time. Talk to the person first. A good conversation starter “boy, this band is good” also, to make them at ease that you are not hitting on them (boy or girl) mention your significant other immediately some how in the conversation. Basically, you are trying to make a quick new friend that when you give them a CD they will not just toss it in the trash.

E-mail- Make sure you have an e-mail list. Follow this link for information on E-mail lists
http://boston-music.blogspot.com/2010/04/promote-your-band-with-e-mail.html
http://boston-music.blogspot.com/2010/04/promote-your-band-with-e-mail.html

No comments:

Subscribe to our Feed