Aggressive Indie Music Promotion – Part I – Artist Domain Name

If you don’t have a domain name, don’t expect me to believe that you want are ready to be a music superstar.

If you are not willing to invest in the basic elements of promoting your music career but you are rejecting simple ideas of music promotion and success tactics, then it is likely that you are asking for more help than you are realistically prepared for… and that can be insulting to anyone of value who can help you get to the next level in your music career.

Why walk up to Donald Trump and ask for investing advice, if you have not already acquired a bank account?

Sure there are some people who will give you some watered down tips that they’ve choked up, vomited, and spat back out at you; but the people in the BIG league will laugh at you and slap you and your music right back down into the little corner from where it came. By not having a

And after all the hard work, after the long nights of burning the midnight oil, arguments with your girlfriend (yes – women have girlfriend’s too), it’s just ridiculous for me to believe that you aren’t going to go full-force after this goal.

But I’m going to tell you some things here that will change your life, just hang on.

Domain Name IS Music Promotion

Your domain name is your corporate headquarters, it is your hall pass, it’s your storefront, it’s the brain of your operations, it is real estate, it’s an extension of your home, it’s the guest bedroom, it is your sanctuary to effective music promotion. No makey sense?

As you can see in this image, your official website on the WEB is very important for so many reasons beyond “just for the hell of it.” Now I know the #1 objection with having a website is going to fall under one category.

Why Should I pay for a website to Promote My Music?

Fine. To put this plainly, if you don’t have an official website… you are pissing away free money and flushing it down a waterless toilet without even realizing it.

Myspace is FREE, but that does not mean that promoting your music career to the TOP will be free. That doesn’t mean that all your Internet directed promotional efforts can be successful without monetary investment. But oh I know what happened. I think I found it.

And I know you don’t want to do that. Hell every celebrity I see on TV isn’t rich enough to just throw away extra money. Even running up a $1500 bar tab is not the same as throwing free money away.

The gurus have been pushing these 20 minute made music promotion e-books for $39.95 (which proves how much money you can make with a website) for so long that musicians have got so used to everything FREE, that they don’t know how to spend money on themselves anymore.

So let’s do some brainwashing here.

You should be happy that you have to make an investment into promoting your music career, for the very reason that most artists are not going to be willing to pay the extra expense of maintaining an official website. This is what it is going to take to win. The image above proves that.

The domain name is crucial in order for you to understand what we do here at Music Industry School and what the Music Superstar Formula is all about but beyond that, you need to own web property if you plan to compete against the major artists who have more money to spend on a website than you do on your whole album recording.

This is not bad, it just means that we have to get you setup so that it is an advantage to you and not a disadvantage.

Let me break down the costs of owning a website. There are three fees you will have to concern yourself with and only (one) of them is optional.

1. Domain name — www.yoursite.com – is a $9.95 yearly fee – you can buy a domain name at www.godaddy.com
2. Web hosting – maybe $4.95 a month – MONTHLY fee you pay to keep your website up. The web host is where you store your files.
3. Web Design – can cost anywhere from $20 – to $1500 – is the design and look of your website. The artwork.

The difference between domain name and web hosting is simply the understanding that a domain name is the actual “address” of your website. Think of it as buying property. Now that you own the land, you need to build something on it. In order for you to build something on it – you pay a monthly fee to store your website files on a computer that is designed to display your website to the world.

A domain name will cost you $9.95 each year at most. (If you register at Godaddy) I recommend for you to reserve your domain name for at least two years but…

Most people I know are budget conscious so they will only register their domain name for a year at a time. But let me forewarn you that if you do this – it is possible that a year from now, someone else can come along and buy your domain name if you do not renew it. (AKA if your credit card is declined and you don’t pay the bill)

Which would be extremely bad if you spent a whole year making a decent website that earns a few bucks everyday from advertisers and sponsors. You just essentially gave someone else an easy opportunity to profit from your hard work. And believe me there are people out there who are “watching” and waiting for you to screw up and not pay your bill. They’ll even pre-register your domain name so if you do screw up, they don’t even have to be in front of the computer to “snap” it – because they’ve back-ordered your domain name 6 months before it expired

Word to the wise…

• Keep your domain records handy
• If you only pay one year – set at least 10 reminders 10 days BEFORE the year is up so you can successfully renew your domain name.
• Do not put off registering your domain name
• Grant someone else access to administer your domain name so they will get notifications too
• Remember that your domain name is like your ATM machine. Don’t mis-manage it. If you treat it right it only grows value as time goes on.

After You Have Your Official Music Website, you have a basic understanding of how to make MONEY on DEMAND!

Oh but let me explain

7 benefits of using your website for music marketing efforts

• You get to own a web property – your domain name could generate money in your sleep
• People can find you, even if they were intentionally looking for another artist [sounds sneaky - but we're here to win!]
• You get to use analytics programs to track the success or failure of your marketing campaigns – Can’t do this with Myspace.
• I’d probably repeat what I just said
• You can defend yourself on the Internet, if people begin to post negative comments.
• People will think highly of you if they see your Myspace page, an official website, and a fan site
• Who said you couldn’t create your own fan site ? And monetize it?

If you created a fan site and you are increasingly becoming more popular, you would need to post more “secretive” information on the fan site, than you did on the official site. This is going to give people more reason to go to the fan site and make it more legitimate in their eyes, plus you have the option of having sponsors or advertisers – with either ad networks or just by advertising other events or companies who may want to donate $100 or $200 per month or per week towards your efforts.

Be considerate of your audience though and do not appear to be so money hungry that you forget your fans are actually coming there for a reason. You want them to click on the ads so you make money, but you still want to respect them and their interests. Don’t advertise bowling balls to them, if they are usually tennis players. How do you know if they are tennis players or not?

Statistics and polls

We can list benefit after benefit after benefit. But that’s not necessarily the point of this blog post. The whole point is that you NEED a website, and your priority right now is to make sure that when people search for you – they can find you. On the first page – within the top 3 listings.

But how do you get your website to show up when people type in your artist name? Actually that is the whole point of the blog post. Well of course inside Music Industry School, I’ll show you how. Tune in to part II!

Download Derek Sivers FREE Music Promotion E-Book for some more savvy techniques and strategies.

It’s all inside of the Music Industry School mailing list. If you’re not on the mailing list, you should join now. Besides, it’s FREE!