Promoting yourself online

Promoting yourself online

How to get ahead on the web

It's no secret that the web is a potent tool in the field of promotion and marketing. Musicians across the world have been quick to take advantage of this power to promote their work and deliver information to potential audiences. But the web is a new and continually developing medium; we are constantly learning how to manipulate its power, and if you want to stay ahead of the game online, you should be doing so too.

What the web isn't

The history of new technologies is littered with examples of early exponents trying to apply the principles of a preceding technology to the new one. The classic example is television. It took many years for the makers of television news programmes to realise that they didn't have to stay in a studio pointing a camera at one person reading the news - they could go out into the world and shoot pictures of real-life events, and report from the scene. Seems obvious now, but it wasn't at the time.

People often fall into the same trap with the web. They carry over existing principles and attitudes from a medium like the printed page on to their website, and although some are applicable, many are not. In fact, these assumptions can inhibit the potential power of a website, as they fail to take advantage of the inherent benefits of the web as a publishing medium. But what are those benefits?

Why blogging works

Blogs (short for weblogs) are the biggest phenomenon to hit online marketing since the web itself. Within business, particularly in the US, they are becoming ubiquitous as an informal way to establish a company or individual's reputation or brand. They allow news and industry analysis to get out quickly to customers and present an open, welcoming face for companies that are often seen as closed and secretive.

The key is that blogging takes advantage of all the benefits the web provides. Blogs are kept up-to-date, and regularly updated content has a fairly striking side-effect on the web: it generates traffic, page-views, community, and buzz. It builds you an audience without you even playing a note, or stepping on to a concert platform.

Musicians pride themselves on their communication with audiences during their performances, yet outside the concert hall there is little or no communication between musicians and the community that provides them with work. No wonder outsiders often perceive classical music as closed, stuffy, old-fashioned and boring. If the only communication between artists and their audiences happens inside the concert hall, how do you attract individuals from outside that circle to give it a go?

Some techy tips

Regularly updated content doesn't just create a buzz amongst humans. Computers and software love it too - and I'm talking about search engines such as Google and Yahoo! Want to get high rankings in the search engines? Then the trick is to provide relevant, interesting, useful, topically rich content on a regular basis. Take my friend Matt - the No 1 Matt in the world, according to Google (go on, try it). Who do you think it is? The actor Matt Damon? Matt Dillon? Matt Groening? Nope - it's just Matt, a lowly software engineer, but also a daily blogger.

More than just a brochure

Image and branding are an important part of any musician's publicity toolkit. This is more true of today's classical music business than at any other time, and a website should reflect the image, brand, or market position you want to associate yourself with.

Image and brand can be conveyed by much more than some professional-looking photos and a stylish logo. Your personality, opinions, and industry insight all contribute towards your professional image, and the more you are seen to have an open, honest and insightful approach, the more people you will attract to turn up and listen to you perform.

The web can offer so much more opportunity than a printed brochure can, so make sure that you understand where those opportunities lie and take advantage of them.

Andy Hume is the founder of web design agency Artist Logs, which designs and builds websites for musicians and other artists

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