Every couple of years, the musical landscape undergoes seismic shifts. As the way people consume music changes, the way artists attempt to delivery it to them must adapt as well. Those transitions mean that marketing moves that once worked for disseminating material from new artists falls on the deaf ears of fans. Methods and means considered successful yesterday end up get ignored today because every artist has tapped into and bludgeoned the marketing strategies to the point of being ineffective. How do we know what we’re about to share is true? Well, we don’t know it’s 100% accurate. Call it our hypothesis built off countless hours sorting through the worst submissions ever crafted by man, trial and error from experience while consulting along with confirmation from a few artists willing to confirm they wasted a lot of money chasing their dream using the wrong means.
Problem #1: Setting release dates too far in advance So many things lead to the date never sticking anyway. The artwork’s late. The guest artist you were counting on didn’t mail in his verse. Your paycheck’s short and mastering can’t be completed on time. Whatever the case, the misfire only leads to a letdown and building mistrust with fans.
Problem #2: Printing an outrageous number of physical copies The overhead makes this almost illogical but even if you can get them dirt cheap are you really passing all of them out? Do you have the garage space to accommodate those extras Frisbees? Is a plastic slip-case with Kinko’s paper posing as artwork what we’re calling putting your best foot forward?
Problem #3: Paying for self-promotion Buying YouTube views, Twitter followers and Facebook likes is the new payola in 2012. Stop it. It’s transparent and it all comes crumbling down when you go to rock a show and only a small crowd turns up to support.
Problem #4: Paying to perform Any promoter that charges you to perform isn’t looking out for your best interests. The end.
Problem #5: Buying pre-packaged songs Remember a few years ago when T-Pain was selling songs that already had hooks and double-dipping on the process? Then every rapper in every major city had the same damn T-Pain song on his new mixtape. As fans we know when you actually collaborated with an artist and when you just bought a copy/paste job. If semi-famous rapper sells a beat that already has his verse on it you can bet he mailed it in and you’re paying for name recognition for an artist that doesn’t know who you are.
Problem #6: Paying For radio/DJ placements The radio isn’t what it used to be. While radio play is an important facet of your budding buzz, paying for a #1 spot at the local “Traffic Jam” isn’t the same sort of triumph that it was a decade ago. Now, more people are listening to iPods and music they find online so fewer ears are hearing your product. The same applies for placements with club DJs, especially if the record is mediocre. He’ll play the single…but only in your presence.
Problem #7: The weekly song release strategy “Wild Wednesday,” “Mp3 Monday,” and “Surprise Saturdays.” Just make them stop. Here’s a cold, hard fact: Crooked I was the be-all, end-all of the weekly freestyle drops. The man took the concept, pulverized it, poured lime on it and buried it next to Jimmy Hoffa. Quit searching for the magic chemistry that he created because nobody’s going to recreate it.
Problem #8: Stop paying for email blasts Not saying these don’t work but they seem to be the equivalent of shooting into a crowded club and ultimately ending up with collateral damage. They may hit something, but they’re ultimately just sloppy work. All that glitters is not gold and when an email blast service says they can “guarantee” they’ll get your song or video to “over 100K music industry professionals”…wait, just read that again.
Read more: http://smokingsection.uproxx.com/TSS/2012/10/outdated-marketing-strategies-for-rappers#ixzz28ZCqQuRS
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