In order to successfully promote your band’s music and get new shows, you’ve got to stick out from the plethora of other bands that are vying for your fans attention. Here are some things you can do to make sure that your band’s unique, giving it a huge advantage over your competition.
1. Your band’s genre description. The one thing you can always be sure of is that people are going to ask you what your band sounds like. It’s a pretty typical query when you tell someone that you’re in a band. If you simply say “rock,” or “jazz”, that’s not going to light any fires. Many of them won’t care whether they ever hear your band or not. Come up with a cool genre description that you can be sure nobody has ever heard before, and make sure your band knows to relay it when that inevitable question comes up. If you say you play “lights out space country,” you’ve got a much better chance of getting their attention, and once you get their attention, your music can win them over.
2. Your band’s album. You need a cool story or gimmick for your album to sell a ton of copies. Theme albums are especially interesting, and they’re easy to describe to potential fans. All of these songs are about apples,” or “this is the musical story of a girl becoming a butterfly” definitely catches your attention. If you’re not into theme albums, though, you can still make your CD look cool by using an odd, eye-catching cover, or offering non-CD versions of your album. Remember, if your CD’s just your songs with your band’s name written in black on the front, it’s not going to sell a whole lot of copies unless you’re the Beatles, and you’re not (at least not yet).
3. Your band’s merchandise presentation. Again, you’ve got to get people’s attention. Don’t just set up your CDs and shirts, make a whole display case with lights and gimmicks to attract peoples’ attention. Be unique. Be different. And yes, be gimmicky. It’s OK to use cheap tricks to get people to look at your album–when they buy it, they’ll see your substantial stuff.
4. Your band’s live show presentation. Every band gets up, plays, and gets down. To be unique and get more fans, have your band be different. Wear white shirts with a word spelled out over your whole band, make the drumhead look like a barfing tarantula, or cover your guitar in lights. Do something that gets people to look at you. That’s the idea.
5. Your band’s website. A unique website’s also important. Games, videos, anything that you don’t see on other bands’ websites.
Remember, by being unique, you’re being noticed. Do you have any tips about making your band unique, or do you have any stories about how you accomplished this much-coveted feat? Post in our comments section below.
