Promoting your site!(tips)

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Hi ,

So you’ve built your website…. now what? I wish I could say that it is now time to sit back and let your website do its thing, but guess what… this is just the beginning.

People have to be able to find your site. Hey, an A&R rep may be surfing the web right now for a band like yours. For an example of a website success story, check out "Technology Helps Bands Hit It Big" in the Seattle Times. http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/artsentertainment/2001923053_techbands10.html

Now, there are 3 ways that someone could potentially find you band site:

1) they know your address and type it in
2) they find you in a search engine like Google
3) they click on a link to your site on another webpage

Lets go over each one, and see how you can maximize your chances of people finding you.

KNOWING YOUR ADDRESS
This step is easy. Once you are happy with your site, make sure people know about it! Put the address on every single thing with your name on it. Your bio, flyers, posters, your CDs. If you are being mentioned in a local paper, be sure to give them your web address too.
SEARCH ENGINES
It can be real easy or really, really tough to get your band to come up at the top in search engines. It depends on one factor: your name. If you have a name that isn’t a normal english word (like "Weezer") it will be much easier to find your band in a search engine. On the other hand, if you have a common word or phrase as a name (i.e "the Cars") it will be much tougher.

There are 5 things you can do to maximize your chances of getting in the search engines.

1- put your name in the page title.
Search engines place a big value on the "title" of your web page. You can change the title your in your control panel by clicking "change website design and options" and then clicking "change website title and meta tags".
2- put your name in the site text.
The next thing is to make sure you mention your band name in the text of your pages. Remember, text means words in a text box, not images! Search engines can’t read images so they don’t count. One easy way to do this is to make a text box at the top of your front page with a one line summary of your band (i.e: Welcome to the home page for Rubberman! We’re a alt rock band from Montreal…)
3- Add "Meta Tags"
Meta Tags are hidden texts that are built into the code of your web page. Once apon a time, search engines would rely on Meta Tags to get information about the contents of a website. Because many people "abused" the meta tag system, search engines don’t use them as much as they used to. It never hurts to add them though. You can add meta tag descriptions and keywords from the "change website title and meta tags" page. An example of a meta tag description would be "Metallica are the fore fathers of heavy metal music: top of the heavy metal charts". An example of meta tag keywords would be "Metallica, heavy metal, Master of puppets, One, Summer Sanitarium tour, James Hetfield, Lars Ulrich".
4- Add your URL to the search engines
Search engines such as Yahoo! and Google allow you to submit your bands URL (web address) to their search engine for free. You’ll find a link to do this at the bottom of the search page. Placement is not instant or guaranteed, but you have nothing to lose by trying.
5- Get linked!
In addition to the above steps, newer search engines like Google base your ranking on how many sites link to yours. The idea is that if people are linking to you a lot, it must mean that your site is important. This is how a band like "Cake" who has a very common name can still be at the top of search results. Getting linked up is important anyway, so lets discuss it further….

LINKSLinks are probably the most important way that peopleLinks are probably the most important way that people can learn about your band website. There are tons of online band lists for you to submit your URL to. If you have an active e-team, they can help you out here because there are so many. Some examples of band list sites include,

http://www.garageband.com
http://www.talentmatch.com
http://www.coffeestain.com
http://www.hotbands.com
http://www.indie-music.com
http://www.taxi.com
http://www.bandradio.com
http://www.indiegrrl.com
http://www.musicmakersdirectory.com

Don’t forget to also look into regional music scene sites. For example, if you’re in Boston there is http://www.bostonbands.com. Most states and even smaller cities have sites devoted to their local scene. Make sure you’re listed in yours!

There are forums dedicated to independent bands and other music related subjects that you can post your site on. Get members of your band and e-teams to hit these; and talk about your band. Most boards and forums are regional, so you’ll have to do some searching to find them. Here’s a head start on your search:

http://www.musicianforums.com
http://www.big-board.com
http://forums.tabcrawler.com
http://www.gigfinder.com
http://www.bandlink.net/forum/default.asp

Finally, trade links with other bands in your area. With Bandzoogle you can easily create a links page. Start off by linking to them, then ask them if they’ll do the same in return. By linking up bands in your local scene, everyone wins.

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