Promotions
During the years that I spent writing about the indie music scene I learned a great deal about the challenges that independent media artists face in "getting the word out". For the last year I have been researching the best, most affordable ways for indie artists to promote their products. While it is true that the web has done a great deal in regard to making it possible to sell your products in the same "store" as major labels/studios at a competitive price and even made it easier to build a fan base through social networking there are still many challenges when it comes to making your products stand out from the crowd. By utilizing the resources that I provide many of these challenges can be overcome.
Ideally the services are meant to be used together in conjunction with each other. While I believe that this approach will give the best result it is possible to use them individually or in whatever combination you want. If you look at the model used by major labels in promoting and marketing their products you find that it can be broken down into 3 basic components; Press Releases, Media/Talk Show Appearances and Advertising. Our service is built around these three key elements.
Advertising
The one tool that the major labels rely on most heavily to make people aware of their products is good old fashioned advertising. We can advertise your newly released CD or DVD across the web in various formats.
Basic text: Limited usefulness for media projects but has the advantage of coming up on google search pages in relation to search engine queries.
Graphic: Very effective in drawing potential new fans to your website. Appears on content related websites and blogs. Good tool to build your social network as well as to make bloggers/podcasters aware of you. That in addition to it's intended function as a sales tool.
Click to play video: Rapidly gaining popularity. Appears on content related blogs and websites. Viewers can preview up to 45 seconds of your film or song/music video before making the decision to visit your site. Advantage is that they can preview your material without leaving the site they are already visiting. In addition you only pay for clicks that take viewers to your site NOT the number of views your ad gets.
Pre-Roll Video: Up to 30 seconds of your movie trailer or music video plays before web videos on sites like youtube. In order to watch the video that they are playing viewers must sit through your ad. It compares to movie preview trailers in a theater and is very cheap right now because it is grossly underutilized. This ad form is also geared to click-throughs and not views in terms of what you pay for.
Mobile Devices: Text ads on mobile devices can be a fantastic way to introduce people to your film or music. These ads appear when using aps such as Pandora and are perfect to promote your media, especially if it is available on iTunes or other sites which can be accessed from a web enabled phone. Included with these ads is a small mobile enabled website where people can watch your youtube videos, follow you on social networks and purchase your music/film on sites like Amazon, iTunes, etc.
Specialized: Additional services are Television ads and targeted marketing campaigns for tours and film screenings. Targeted ads are run on the web so that they appear to users that are located in the town(s) you will be appearing in around the time you will be there. They announce your appearance date and the venue name with a link to ticket sales. Television ads can be surprisingly affordable today and if it seems as though they could be useful to your particular project we will be happy to provide a quote.
Press Releases
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There is a vast media machine out there just waiting to learn about you and your project. Information fuels the machine and everyone from bloggers and podcasters to newspapers, magazines and radio/TV stations are always on the lookout for fresh, newsworthy content. Our job is to put together a professional press release which ideally includes a text story and pertinent web links as well as audio, video and photo elements so that your media audience has all the tools they need at hand to produce a story about you.
There are several levels of distribution available for your press release. The most basic goes primarily to a web based media audience of 300,000 while the premier package goes to every midsize to large print, radio and TV outlet in the country as well as being distributed on the AP newswire.
It is surprisingly affordable and something that every film or music CD release should utilize as the foundation of their promotional effort.
Video Show and Interview
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Would any of the many talk shows on TV exist if they didn't serve as a promotional tool for the film/music industries? Probably not. Yet indie artists seem to by and large overlook this marketing tool as it exists on the web. There are tens of thousands of "radio" and video podcasts out there. Each of them has their own audience and for the most part all are looking for new, original content.
I created The Indie Media show as an example of what is possible. The show features film trailers and music videos along with two way video interviews with filmmakers and bands. The show distributes to every major video site on the web as well as to TV through Roku, Boxee and other devices and to mobile devices too. The show sees thousands of views each week and is a great promotional tool. You can embed the show in your own website and use it in your press release.
Both the advertising and press releases services described above can bring you opportunities to appaer on podcasts or to have your music played on them. The first level of press release distribution goes primarily to web based media such as bloggers and podcasts.