Setting Up Your Myspace Site For Maximum Promotion!

The Basics: Setting up your Myspace account for optimum promotion!!

Bob Baker shares a very insightful article on how to set up your Myspace music account for optimal exposure and promotion. I couldn't have said it better myself!

If you don’t have a MySpace music page yet, go to www.myspace.com. Then click the Music section link, then look for the Artist Signup link.

Warning: You don’t want to register with a general account because it won’t give you all the goodies of an Artist account. So make sure you’re signing up as an Artist.

Fine-Tuning Your MySpace Home Page for Maximum Punch

I won’t walk you through every detail, because it’s all spelled out for you on the site, but here are home essential notes on what to do with your profile page:

IMPORTANT: Even if you’ve been on MySpace for a while and think you know all these basic details, I encourage you to look over the following tips anyway. Make sure you are making the most of every MySpace feature.

Editing Your Profile

Click the Edit Profile link and you have four options:

1. Upcoming Shows

This is obviously where you post all of your upcoming gigs. Be sure to supply complete details — everything a fan would need to know to attend.

2. Band Details

This is a crucial section that deserves extra attention in the following areas:
Headline — This little section is often poorly used by many artists. Use it to clearly describe your style of music. If you have a descriptive motto, such as “electronica for lovers,” put it in this Headline section. Don’t waste this prime real estate!

Bio — Here’s where you put a brief story of who you are, what you play, and why people should care. Remember, you can use HTML in these sections, so I recommend you include live links to specific pages on your main (non-MySpace) web site. Invite people to check out your additional song samples, sign up on your mailing list, view pictures from your
latest tour — and include direct links to these pages within this Bio text.
Members — Include interesting info on the members of your band or, if you’re a solo act, the members of your support team (co-writer, producer, manager, etc). Have short (or at least clear and easy to read) information. Not many people are going to sit through a whole page of something like a band bio if it's too long or hard to read.

Influences and Sounds Like — These two sections are also essential to targeting the right fans on MySpace. Complete this statement: “I would love to connect with people who are fans of …” List as many well-know n acts as are appropriate. Then list those names in
these two boxes. These sections do come up in search results, so make them count!

Website — Obviously, put the link to your main artist home page — preferably YourName.com. You do have one, right? As you’ll see in the artist survey coming up, the most successful acts do NOT use MySpace as their primary web site.

Record Label and Label Type — This is simply where you list the name of your label (whether you’re signed to one or started one yourself) and the type of label. If you’re unsigned, be sure to proudly display “indie.”

Extra note on the Headline section (mentioned on the previous page): Some successful acts use this area to announce their latest CD releases. Here are some examples:

• Nickelback proclaimed “FAR AWAY — THE NEW SINGLE — IN STORES NOW!”

• The Veronicas similarly typed in “The Secret Life of ... In Stores Now!”

• And Shiny Toy Guns announced “album now available — www.shinytoyguns.com.” (Nice touch putting their web site here.)

3. Basic Info

What you type in the Band Name section will show prominently at the top of your home page. You
can put the name of your band, your solo artist name, the name of your company, whatever is
most fitting. Also fill in the sections for city, state, country and zip code.

4. Listing Info

This is where you set your MySpace URL, as in www.myspace.com/yourname and your genre categories. Be accurate with the genre selections so the right people can find you!

Selecting and Uploading Your Photos

Click the Upload / Change Photos link. There you can select up to 12 photos to include in your photo section, which people can view when they click the View more pics link on your profile page. Be sure to select your best, most-striking photo as your “default” picture, which is the one
that displays on your profile page and along with all the comments you leave on others’ pages.

Important: Spend a few bucks (or twist the arm of a photographer pal) and get good photos.

As indie musician John Pippus says, “I can’t stress enough the importance of getting professional quality band pics. I paid a friend of a friend $100 and he shot a roll in his studio, and it makes such a difference to the image I want to portray. Cheesy digital photos, shot with a flash, just scream amateur!”

Note that MySpace users can also rate each other’s photos.

Tweaking Your Account and Profile Settings

In the Account Settings section is a list of options to look over. One is the e-mail address at which you receive MySpace notifications. Make sure it’s an address you check regularly. Another one to note is Profile Settings. There you can determine whether people can post HTML messages. Allowing HTML can lead to a lot of big, slow-loading files on your profile page. So you
might consider clicking the boxes here to keep things lean and mean.

Considering More MySpace Settings

The Edit Comments section allows you to delete unwanted entries others have left in your Comments box. Also check out the Manage Calendar and Manage Address Book links for more options.

Spicing Up Your Page’s Look & Feel

MySpace allows users to customize the entire look of their profile page — including the layout, fonts and colors. Unfortunately, too many artists take advantage of this feature with horrific results.

My best advice: Keep your page layout lean and clean. Clashing colors, annoying background images, and hard-to-read typefaces will not endear you to fans. Spicing it up is one thing; making people seasick is another.

Effective tactics: Get creative and think of ways you can make your profile more enticing — and more likely to “capture” MySpace surfers who are potential fans. Here are two ideas you might consider:

• The band Hawthorne Heights included a clickable image with the text

“Discover the Secret of ‘If Only You Were Lonely.’” The link led to a PDF file that explained the messages hidden within the clever CD sleeve design of its latest release. Any time you can tease people with a “secret,” they’re more likely to learn more.

• Many smart artists embed a mailing list signup form right into their MySpace profile. But don’t just ask for an e-mail address. Offer to give fans special access to your subscriber only music goodies package … if only they fill out the form and hit Submit.

For more page design tips, MySpace has a forum dedicated to customizing profiles at

http://forum.myspace.com/

Note: You’ll have to log in to access this forum.

Derek Punsalan posted a popular Squidoo lens on How to Create a Custom MySpace Overlay at www.squidoo.com/myspace_div_overlay/

Other MySpace layout tools can be found at MySpace Toolbox (www.myspacetoolbox.com) and MySpace Support (www.myspacesupport.com).

Promoting Your Web Address

Countless artists are now hyping their MySpace web page to fans. And that’s great. You want your people to know you have a presence on the ever-popular mega-site. But remember what happened to MP3.com? Thousands of bands did the same thing during that site’s heyday. Once it went under,
every MP3.com artist web address was suddenly lost.

Don’t make that mistake here. I’m sure MySpace won’t go anywhere soon. But we live in an era of unprecedented change. Stuff happens. So be prepared.

Your best bet: Register your own artist domain name. If you have a regular web site apart from MySpace (and you should), list both addresses, as in:

www.MyBand.com

www.myspace.com/myband

That way, if one goes down, all your promo material has an alternate address where fans can find you. And if both sites stay around forever, you have provided two great ways to hunt you down. If MySpace is your only web presence, cough up the 9 bucks a year to register a domain name,
and simply have it redirect to your MySpace page. If the big site ever flounders, you can just point
your domain somewhere else — and never lose touch with your fans.

“Now that MySpace is here, you don’t need a label to be heard ... The
world is all about energy. If you can generate energy, it will
ultimately translate into money.”