-A question I see appearing time & time again on forums (as well as being asked this myself) is how many social networking sites should a band be on. There are dozens upon dozens (if not more) out there and being able to give them all proper attention is like having a full time job-or longer. How are you able to do the the things a musician is suppose to do-like practice / play your instrument ? Play gigs? Record music? If one isn’t careful, you’ll spend way more time online than doing what you’re suppose to do-but you can do both.

-Now, I fell into this trap initially myself w/ CAROLINE BLUE. CB has it’s own website, but every time I saw a new social networking site, I put CB on it. Within a year, CB was on over 20 social networking sites-and with each one I was updating blogs, show dates, pics, music, videos, etc. so I know the feeling of getting overwhelmed due to this. It’s not like I can hire someone to do this for me (believe me, if I could I would), so what do you do?

-Before I go on, some of you may be just blowing this off and saying “I have a Facebook fan page (or Reverbnation page,etc.)-that’s all I need.” To a degree, this works. IMO, you want to reach out to as many people as you can with your music-even if you’re just doing niche marketing. Also, I believe that you should at least have a presence on as many band sites as you can fit in. Not everyone just goes to Facebook for ex. CB has gained a lot of fans thru another site & thru that site, they found us on Facebook. This also helps in other ways-like establishing your band name as yours in case someone suddenly starts a band w/ the same name as yours (all those sites do show up in search engines).

-So how did I tackle this problem? I chose 6 sites (which includes your own website so it’s really 5) to be what I call the “primary sites.” These are the ones where the most interaction is. All the other sites are known as “secondary sites.” On those, the basics are all set up- bio, discography, etc. & some pics, music & videos. On each of those pages is a notice saying that for more updates, show dates & news, please visit the following sites-which then shows links to the primary sites. With the primary sites, I still do all the work as I was doing before.The secondary ones-all I have to do is reply to people who interact with them. And if there is more interaction on a secondary than a primary, the positions are switched. This way, you’re not stuck on your computer all day/week long doing updates. Keep rockin & see you next month!

FOURTH COAST ENTERTAINMENT MAGAZINE
FOURTH COAST ENTERTAINMENT MAGAZINE ON FACEBOOK