Bob Baker's The Buzz Factor

Promoting and selling music on the Internet is a tricky thing. Some people swear by it because it works wonders, while others swear out of frustration because they don't see any results or sales. In a recent post on his Diary of a Music Marketing Mad Man blog, Dylan Benjamin makes some great points.

Here's an excerpt:

There's a myth in the independent music community that you can't sell your music online, that people don't buy CDs anymore, that there's no money to be made. I hear this a lot. I think a lot of artists become jaded after they go through all that work to put together a snazzy web site to promote a CD release, only to find that sales are weak.

The web sites I refer to usually have a lot of ego-stroking photos of the band, extensive bios, and a bunch of information about the guy who produced the album and how many Grammys that person won back in the '80s. I also tend to see additional info that no one outside the band really gives a shit about.

A lack of internet sales isn't a result of using an ineffective medium for advertising. The internet is actually your MOST effective medium for advertising in terms of cost and enablement ... If you use it correctly.

Benjamin then writes about the need to stress "emotional fulfillment" -- or fan benefits, which are the real reasons people buy music. He continues ...

Can you apply this method to your own music? Yes. Your music delivers SOME kind of emotional benefit to people, whether it's love, hate, energy, depression, spirituality, confusion, relaxation, aggression, whatever.

The music you produce is a slice of your own emotional inner self and the messages you use to market the experience of OWNERSHIP is transmitted to the listener's emotional receptors. In order to SELL, you need to crank up the frequency at which you communicate the BENEFITS of owning your music and the emotional experience that it delivers.

Bravo to the Music Marketing Mad Man! I've been preaching this sermon for decades. It's NOT about the CD or the band or the gig. It's all about what fans get and the emotional response your music creates within them. Sell the benefit and you'll sell a lot more CDs online!