Marketing/Self Promotion on a budget?

[mjr]

Hello fellow musicians,

I'm trying to take the self-promotional, self-marketing route. I have an idea for a website (I'm a web developer by day). I also have about 8 songs I'm working on recording at home. I have a friend who is doing my CD artwork for free (all he wants is credit for the artwork).

Any ideas or suggestions to get the CD's mass produced (100+ would probably be a good start) and get some ideas for marketing and/or promotion on a tight budget would be very helpful.

[stonepiano]

do you want to market promote yourself for live shows or for simply selling your cd?

I'll answer based on your response...

stone

[mjr]

Both, but to start, I would just like to sell the CD, and maybe do the promo/marketing for live shows after I see how the CD sales are going.

[stonepiano]

To sell cds, I would take a look at what the Smartapple guy does.

He draws people to his site by being linked on others sites.

http://www.smartapplerocks.com/

I know I was astounded by the number of places that give him a link and, hell, I got there fairly randomly. He basically posts to a lot of free artist sites and waits for the listeners to come pouring in. It don't cost anything to him from what I can tell but it's a lot of legwork.
Getting the word out from home is a lot harder than when you're playing gigs and have a merchandise table. Getting gigs is a different type of marketing, however.


stone

[David Hooper]

Originally posted by mjr
Any ideas or suggestions to get the CD's mass produced (100+ would probably be a good start) and get some ideas for marketing and/or promotion on a tight budget would be very helpful.

Go ahead and go for a run of 1000. It's not much more and you'll have a lot to give away if you can't sell them. Disc Makers has a deal where you'll get the replication and the artwork done for only $990.

If you want to do your own packaging, you can get discs on a spindle for about $490 per 1000.

--
$100,000/year in the Music Business (Without a Record Label)

Only $19 from www.musicbizbooks.com and Kathode Ray Music!

[mjr]

After all this is in place (CDs, web site, copyrights, etc.) should I, or should I not send the CD to record labels and/or local radio stations, and how effective, if at all, would it be?

[stonepiano]

getting a record deal is like finding a girlfriend or getting a job.

You only get offered the good ones when you don't need them. When YOU are in demand.
If you do get offered one when you do need one, you're probably getting a raw deal.

Making the CD, posting a website and preparing a live set are all imperatives. I'd put aside the record label idea for now.
If the disc comes out well, I'd look into small promotions company who will help you put together a press kit for radio distribution and to help organize a local tour. Here's an example of my one sheet for reference.
http://rtpband.com/onesheet.pdf

Once a good promotions comany has a press kit for you, then you start getting spins from local radio and get some people to your shows. People at your shows buy your cds if you play well. You make lots of $$$... Then, when you have the support of the yokels and are raking in the dough, the A&R people find you...

hope i helped.
stone

[David Hooper]

Originally posted by mjr
After all this is in place (CDs, web site, copyrights, etc.) should I, or should I not send the CD to record labels and/or local radio stations, and how effective, if at all, would it be?

Radio is good as long as you are playing in the area. I would start to develop the relationships now, so they will be there when you need them.

If you're selling records, people will come to you.

[PhilMckracken]

If you know any local DJs, try giving them copies and asking them to play the record. It certainly can't hurt.