For about a year I was strictly promoting on Myspace, adding friends and networking with fellow musicians.  Our “Time” and “Lost In India” albums were on iTunes and we were seeking album sales. I felt limited with what I could do with Myspace, so I created a blog. If blogging is not part of your music campaign, then you should definitely try using the free platform, Blogger. If you can customize a Myspace page then you can easily manage your Blog.

Use the blog to discuss openly your music operation. The more you write about your album, band name or products, the easier people can find you. This is key. Sometimes people you meet won’t remember full web addresses to your music sites, but if you start ranking for your band name then they can find you quickly on a Google search. For instance, when our fans used to do searches for us on Google, fried chicken was the first result, not Fried Roots. Do a little writing and make sure your fans can find you.

If interested in making a little ad money on the side, consider using Adsense. Adsense is a little code added to your blog, where you display ads relevant to your article page. Its free to sign up and you could earn some money while promoting your articles. The key here is to build your “music pipeline”. Have revenue coming in from different sources and make your blog work for you. Your are selling music and creating ad revenue streams.

Finally, use your blog to network with other underground rappers. Fried Roots falls into this category. We use our blog as a way to meet other music bloggers and get some free promotion in return by helping each other out through writing.

Your blog can now become a great way for your fans or viewers to learn more about you. Have links to all your other social network profiles and let them know about your Myspace page, Twitter profile, or Digg username. Make your music and promotion viral. Let the writing begin.

You can currently find our music on iTunes, Amazonmp3, and Napster.  This is our way to digitally deliver our albums or singles to our fans.  However, with new emerging markets appearing through various social networks, product placement is important.  Which site or music package will intrigue fans to buy our music?

Music for mobile phones is a great example where this approach will work.  For our music fans out there we have created an instrumental album that you can download for your phone, and even created various ringtones available for free download.  The mobile phone market has emerged as a hot topic.

Music is now being packaged and distributed to fans on memory cards and usb flash drives creating the question, how popular will packaging your music on memory cards be? It’s going to be a great thing to watch and see how this market rises. As indie musicians, digital distribution should be good enough to connect to your fans, however its not too early to look at different ways to promote your music.  Major acts are going to use this also as a way of self promotion.  Innovative packaging or unique pricing creates intrigue for your audience and potential customers.

Music for mobile phones is a great way to market your new music and build your mailing list. We offer these free to better interact with our fanbase.  Our success relies on your interest and we appreciate all the sales we have received.  Feel free to download some free music for your mobile phone and drop by again to discover more new free music.

The “25nyne” image is our link to our free instrumental album available for download. Click the “Time’ image to download our ringtone from the hit single “Post Office Pimpin” by Lost Thought and Shifty J.

Hip Hop Marketing’s Best Friend

As a hip hop artist or producer, you must always remember your greatest asset is your creativity and how you implement that into your marketing.  Create free hip hop instrumentals to draw attention to your craft: cost equals zero but the value is priceless.

Hip Hop artists now must give incentives to fans to create a decent following.  With the number of hip hop acts that are out there, you must distinguish yourself from the rest.  There are many reasons why this is important.

Click on the album cover and get your free instrumentals

 
Free hip hop instrumentals can allow the fan to appreciate what sound you are going for, and you can let them judge what kind of sound you are putting out there.  I’ve found some people only liking the production, not necessarily the vocals.  You are giving yourself 2 chances for people to like your music.  And lets face it; there are a million emcees out there hungry for some instrumentals to freestyle over.

Mailing lists are also essential for keeping your fans informed.  Offer some of your free hip hop instrumentals in mailing campaigns to gain your fans trust, quality music for free.  This trust can turn a potential fan into a consumer if you treat them nice.

Tag your music correctly because it can become viral for you.  With music being swapped from Ipod to Ipod, you can create a free way to get your music out there working for you.

Fried Roots is currently working on the angle of being a digital label providing digital content to all outlets.  Our music is currently available for licensing, or purchasing through iTunes.  The foundation of our operation lies on the custom creation of hard hitting instrumentals and songs produced by Shifty J and Lost Thought.  

Our first step is to create a social networking system that will allow a variety of fans from all over the globe to find us.  As the web transitions from Web 2.0 to Web 2.5, our marketing is always being tested with keeping up with the hot trends.  If we can push albums and sell more units through a variety of networks, our exposure can become viral.  The key is keeping a consistent effort and letting your fans and visitors understand your company.

We will soon be adding some tips and new music coming out of the Fried Roots Lab.  The key to our success is you.  Let us know what you think and how an indie music label can spark new effective marketing tips with ease.

Download audio file (One Way St.mp3)

Our music marketing is increasing and really all you need is a little time and a plan.  From our standpoint, We use Myspace, and many social bookmarking sites to kick start our efforts.  The good thing to see here is that each network presents a different approach or opportunity.  For example, Myspace is a great way to build a fanbase and expose people from all over the world to your music.  To be successful you must genuinely interact with your fans and possibly network.  Social bookmarking sites allow us to write articles and publish them in Music sections for people interested in our niche, music news.  This now allows us to be detailed about our operation and let people really familiarize themselves with what Fried Roots represents.

With all the talk of blogging and networking, you must always work on your music and keep up with current news.  We will keep you posted on different ways we market and please feel free to contact us for any possible networking ideas.

Music distribution for Fried Roots took different roads for us.  We setup our own store on our band website and then moved towards digital distribution services.  Fried Roots tested out digital distribution services such as Songcast and Tunecore because they would put our music with iTunes and other online retailers.  The logic seemed simple with us, we would use the major retailers to give our label a little more credibility, so our fans could find a quick preview of our music on iTunes, Rhapsody or Napster and feel secure in payment with these major stores.

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The main dilemma with distribution is that no matter where it is placed, you as an artist will still need to do major marketing to turn those albums into sales.  Hip Hop Distribution has a blog that discusses some of those marketing options.  

Fried Roots has learned that simplicity is the key to these problems.  Simplify your goals and plan attacks to promote.  Daily research is proving to be key in keeping up with new ways to sell and broaden your fanbase.  Stop by Hip Hop Distribution and give us some of your feedback.

1. “Time”: by Shifty J and Lost Thought: Produced by Fried Roots
2. “Lost in India”: by Lost Thought: Produced by Fried Roots
3. “inSPECtor”: by Spec: Produced by Fried Roots

The main goal for us as a label is promoting our music and finding as many possible avenues to sell our album. Lost Thought, Shifty J and Spec are currently in the studio building an instrumental catalog for any music licensing opportunities.

Our research now begins searching for clients such as film producers, music directors, advertising agencies, and cable networks all seeking quality music.

We currently have a couple of free instrumentals albums on our releases page to promote our attention to detail when it comes to a musical project. Our music is currently ranging from smooth hip hop, to ambient and minimally progressive music. Find your flavor.

Anyone seeking music at an affordable cost or for a barter opportunity, please feel free to contact us.

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RSS 2.0

Blogs allow a label to quickly build web visibility with a platform that allows critical feedback from visitors and a direct pipeline of information through RSS (Really Simple Syndication) feeds. Blogs allow important feedback through comments to posted articles, giving visitors a level of interaction with your label website. RSS feeds allow subscribers to automatically receive updated content from your website in the form of a summary or the full text when it is made available.

Wordpress 2.5

Wordpress 2.5, a popular open-source blog program and what this site is built on, is easy to use with some basic HTML knowledge and a lot of patience. Downloading and using plug-ins increase the ease of use and capabilities of Wordpress 2.5, the process is not too complicated, but you’ll be spending some time configuring and optimizing.

For those not wanting to spend too much time figuring it all out, you can also open an account on one of many blogging community sites like blogger.com or blogspot.com. Check out a couple of blogs that we run here at Fried Roots to get an idea of what it’s all about; friedroots.com/blog, hiphopdistribution.com/blog and worldsportsdaily.com/blog.

Why use a blog? Why Not! Millions and millions of people have access to the internet worldwide and people need somewhere to “surf” to on web. People want to feel close to the artists who make the music that is a part of their lives. Blogs allow fans and artists alike to share experiences and network with each other. It’s a means of delivering information about who you are and what you’re all about to people - worldwide.

Fried Roots Logo v.1

If you’re daring enough to design your own logo, keep in mind that logos work best when kept simple. Think about elementary combinations of letters and shapes that have visual appeal to you, use this as a basis to expand on your idea for a logo. Add the accents and flash after a basic design is formed so you don’t get confused.

Or you can try finding a freelance graphic designer. Price ranges with complexity but most usually charge by the hour with a minimum charge. You can find freelance graphic designers by posting ads on Craigslist or getafreelancer.com.

Don’t just roll with anything, remember, this logo represents your label, your business and your visual style.
]]> http://friedroots.com/blog/2008/04/get-a-logo/feed/ http://friedroots.com/blog/2008/04/share-music-on-the-internet-for-free/ http://friedroots.com/blog/2008/04/share-music-on-the-internet-for-free/#comments Thu, 10 Apr 2008 22:57:40 +0000 smac http://friedroots.com/blog/?p=22
Need somewhere on the internet that you can use to share your music and mixes with people? Check out muxtape.com. We have our muxtape up with a sampling of what’s crackin’ at Fried Roots. Check it out at friedroots.muxtape.com.

Muxtape is great new site that allows users to upload their own mp3s and create a playlist for people to check out over the internet. Muxtape even lets visitors subscribe to your muxtape through an RSS feed. This is a great tool for singers, songwriters and producers to connect people with a sample of their work.

Although you are limited to 12 tracks with a 10mb limit for each mp3, it’s easy to set up and visitors don’t have to search for you. Muxtape allows you to customize the web address. Ours is friedroots.muxtape.com.
Get yourname.muxtape.com today!