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2) Discover what motivates your fans

Now that you have a clearer idea of who your fans are, you have to reach out and touch them. But the only way to reach them effectively is to understand their real reasons for spending time and money on you.

The hitch: Most music marketers concentrate on themselves and the features of their product or service. For instance, recording studios, which I am a owner of one, we are notorious for promoting lists of recording equipment and the credentials of engineers. That’s not a crime, but the real reasons many studio clients spend money is to get the good feeling of hearing a major label-quality recording of their music (because of the equipment) and getting respect for being so closely connected to the music industry (due to the engineer’s resume). While the studio literature and sales pitch should be stressing the clients’ feelings of accomplishment and respect, they instead spit out a list of mechanical features. The trick is to push a consumer’s hot buttons the deeper reasons he or she spends time and hard-earned money on a given product or service. Paul and Sarah Edwards, authors of the book Getting Business to Come to You, remind us that all potential buyers are tuned into radio station WII-FM, which stands for “What’s In It For Me?”  the essential question that every person asks when confronted with a time or money decision. “Clients want to know that what you provide will meet their needs,” the authors write. “Can you save your customers money, time or effort? Can you increase their ability to compete? Can you make them look good to others? Can you give them peace of mind? Put yourself in the customer’s shoes.”

Bottom line: Determine the real motivating feeling the key benefit that people experience when they spend time and money on you. Does your music make them feel good? If so, in what way? Does it give them a recreational escape from their worries? Does it allow them to hang onto something they’re afraid of losing, such as youth, sex appeal or an outlet for their frustrations? Ask your fans more questions, make more observations, do your homework, and use your head. Discovering the key motivations that draw your fans to you will help you discover your road to success in the music business.

Affirm your commitment to step 2:
“Just knowing who my fans are is not enough. I now do whatever it takes to uncover the personal and emotional benefits that motivate people to spend time and money on my music. Discovering these hot buttons allows me to more effectively market the music I have to offer.”

3) Create and use a Brand Identity Statement (BIS)

Think of your band or music business as the pins on a map. Now visualize that the people of the world are spread out across a giant wall filled with thousands of maps. Each map represents a specific demographic group. For instance, one might be teenagers who like hip hop music while another symbolizes adults who enjoy the blues. Other maps might include fans of folk, bluegrass, acid jazz, punk, R&B, and so on.

Key: When you market your music, it’s your job to place the pins directly on the map that represent your ideal fans. You do this by sending targeted messages to the newspapers, magazines, radio stations, web sites, blogs, podcasts, and e-zines used by potential fans. That’s the whole point of all this soul-searching research. Once you know who you’re ideal fans are, you can determine what forms of media they patronize. Then send focused messages through those channels. But what kind of messages do you send? Most people who market independent music make one of two mistakes. They either:

1) Place their pins randomly all over the wall and accomplish little or nothing,
or …
2) Aim their pins at the proper maps, but the message is so weak, the pin doesn’t stick to any of them

The solution: Create a Brand Identity Statement (BIS) about your music. A BIS is a simple but powerful sentence of no more than 15 words (10 words or less is even better) that describes the specific vision of your songs, image, band or record label. If you could take every feature and beneficial aspect associated with your music and run them through a grinder, only to be left with the pure, concentrated essence of you and your music … that would be your BIS. You should craft your BIS to include a benefit statement to your fans. Two well known BISs from the traditional business world are Domino’s “Fresh, hot pizza delivered to your door in 30 minutes or less, guaranteed” (13 words) and M&M’s “Melts in your mouth, not in your hands” (eight words). The BIS I use to promote my Ralph Sutton’s music production blog web site is “Ralph Sutton’s Music Production Blog, the World’s #1 Indie Music Advocate” (11 words)

Examples: Here are a few possible Brand Identity Statements for bands:

• “Old-school funk for people who like to dance”

• “Green Day meets 50 cent at a rodeo”

• “Erotic hip hop grooves for sensuous souls”

Other BISs might include the following:

• A recording studio could use “High-quality demos for bands on a budget.”

• A solo artist targeting bar owners might use “Riveting acoustic folk music to help you sell more beer.”

• A small ticket agency’s BIS could be “Convenient access to the great shows the big promoters miss.”

You can use your Brand Identity Statement in two ways. One is internal; the other external.

• Internal – Having a BIS keeps you focused on your marketing message. Therefore, every time you write a news release, set up a photo session, do a radio interview, or design an album cover, you make certain your vision stays focused on your core identity. You wouldn’t want your album cover to convey humor while the faces in your band photo look grim and serious. Also, using a BIS keeps your marketing message tight and consistent. You don’t want to send out a news release about your band’s new online resource for ska fans, then do a radio interview and end up talking only about the night you met Jay Z. By constantly referring to your BIS, you make sure the messages you send stay focused on the most potent aspects of your music.

• External – You can also use your BIS as a public slogan that appears on all of your web pages, fliers, news releases, banners, posters, T-shirts, stickers, and more. That way, whenever people hear your name, they will be reminded of your musical identity and what’s in it for them.

Here are some real-life examples of Brand Identity Statements in use:

• Canada’s Helios Design and Communications uses “Hard-hitting design, done right the first time.”

• H&B catalog of Jazz CDs claims to be “A mail order service for people who know jazz.”

• Chicago’s Smart Studios promotes itself with “Great sounds. Cool people. Killer studio.”

• The band Buck O Nine describes its music as “Rock-steady ska-core from southern California.”

Find your own BIS. Then use it to stay focused and hammer home your primary marketing message to the masses.

Affirm your commitment to step 3:
“I will never again ‘wing it’ when it comes to marketing my music. I now use a powerful Brand Identity Statement to promote my music. I use my BIS to develop a consistent, needle-sharp vision and focused public image of my unique niche in the world of music.”

4) Focus on the benefits your music delivers

Now it’s time to connect with the music fans whose lives you are about to touch and improve. But first we’re going to dissect the way you communicate with these fans. We’ll start by using the information you gathered about who your fans are and why they spend time and money on you. Then you’ll use those details as you pursue various means of communicating your message, including:

• News releases sent to the media

• Your brochure, letterhead and business card

• Your promo package and photos

• Web pages

• Blogs

• Podcasts

• Music video clips

• E-mail messages

• Voice mail

• Posters

• Radio interviews

• Album cover artwork

• Paid ads

• Direct mail pieces

Bottom line: As you create the marketing materials listed above, you must keep one thing foremost in mind: the needs of your fans! In other words, stop talking so much about yourself, your needs and your qualifications. Start talking about what matters most: The benefits fans get when they support your music. “The objective here is plain,” says marketing expert Jeffrey Lant. “It is not merely to tell what you’ve got it’s to motivate a human being to take immediate action so you can move to the next stage of the marketing process.” Lant has self published more than 10 business books and has sold a ton of them using the same tactics he preaches about in them. In his book No More Cold Calls, Lant advises, “You must list every feature of your service, transform every one into a benefit, then make sure the benefit is as specific and enticing as possible.” Let’s see how this works in the real world. As an example, I’ll use the way I’ve marketed my spoken-word audio books. I’ll list each feature first, then its corresponding benefit.

Feature: Sixty minutes in length.

Benefit: Jammed packed with a full hour of career-boosting details you can start using the same day you order.

Feature: Available only in audio format.

Benefit: Soak up these useful success secrets at your convenience: while you drive, jog, ride a bike, or clean the house. Audio books make learning easy.

Feature: It’s an MP3 download.

Benefit: Why wait? Start putting these ideas to use immediately. Get instant access as soon as your order is approved online.

Get the idea? You must learn to do the same thing when describing your music.

Affirm your commitment to step 4:
“No more bland résumé listings for me! I now take every feature related to myself and my music and transform them into benefits that my clearly defined audience of potential fans finds irresistible.”

5) Stop talking so much about yourself

I know it seems like we’ve beaten this premise to death. But just in case it hasn’t sunk in, let’s drive it home one more time: Make certain your words – whether in person or on the phone, by e-mail or on your web site, in ads or on post cards – focus on the benefits to your fans. Time and time again I explained this essential concept to the business owners who advertised in my other music newsletter. And, sure enough, when they turned in the wording for their ads, they were filled with “I can do this, we’ve done that, I, me, mine … blah, blah, blah!”

Reality: Human beings gravitate toward talking and thinking about themselves. And for a good reason. For millions of years, members of our species had to think about their own needs to survive. In the caveman days, if you weren’t consumed with self-preservation, you’d be consumed by any number of wild predators, not to
mention being done in by members of rival tribes. There’s a long-standing tradition of human self-indulgence. So you’re not going to wipe out millions of years of conditioning in a couple of days. But you can use your advanced, reasoning brain to resist these primitive urges when it comes to marketing your music-related pursuits. Also, realize that you can use this knowledge of human nature to your advantage. When you approach potential fans through your live shows, web site, business cards, press kits and so on, who will these fans be focusing on? Don’t kid yourself and think it’s you. Knowing this, give fans what they want and make sure your marketing message hits them squarely on the head with what’s in it for them. Lead off with the number one benefit fans get from you, followed by the number two benefit and so on. Pile the motivating reasons they should care about you one on top of the other until even the most thickheaded of humans can figure it out.

A more specific example: Let’s say you were put in charge of marketing a new electric drill for carpenters. How would you go about it? Most people would start listing features: the manufacturer, mechanical specs, and material the drill is made of … all focusing on – you guessed it – the drill. But what do people really want when they buy a drill?

A hole.

They also want a hole that can be created quickly, easily and economically. It really doesn’t matter if the hole gets there because of a drill, a toaster, a pair of socks, or a monk – as long as the appropriate hole is conveniently creating in the appropriate place. In other words, sell the hole, not the drill. Then, and only then, use your features to show how your drill can meet the customer’s specific needs.

Affirm your commitment to step 5:
“It isn’t all about me. I resist the human urge to talk about myself and will, instead, focus on what my fans are most interested in: what’s in it for them!”

There you have it: The first five steps to more effective music marketing. Now affirm your commitment to these principles and get busy thinking, observing, asking questions, researching your ideal fans, creating a BIS, and focusing on the benefits you offer. A world of notoriety and profit awaits you. Take Care and I will Post again next week.