I remember trying to design one of those flash pro-looking Twitter backgrounds where you list all your social media profiles in a box in the top left hand corner. You know, like all those MLM ‘gurus’ have. I gave up.

But it did bring attention to a couple of things for me. I noticed that not all my social media profiles are blessed with URLs that fit in with my ‘social profile’ (or, branding if you like) and my Facebook URL is particularly unruly. (As is everyone elses!)

So I took five minutes to login to my website management software and using the sub domain feature added a couple of new subdomains under buzzsonic.com. Then I pointed them to my social profiles. So……

www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=528551668 becomes www.facebook.buzzsonic.com and my Linkedin profile goes from www.linkedin.com/in/fusiarski to: www.linkedin.buzzsonic.com  And so on. Typing in the shorter name takes you directly to the long one.

What you need. 1.Your own domain name 2. A webhosting account 3. A few minutes.

Its all done using a simple trick using sub-domains and URL re-directs.

When you get a webhosting account you’ll get an online control panel that goes along with it to admin things like file uploads, email accounts, database stuff, installs and other geeky stuff. I think the two most popular web control panels are probably Plesk and CPanel. If you use Plesk you probably hate CPanel and visa versa. Its kinda like the Mac vs PC thing but even more nerdy!

But anyway. CPanel is my weapon of choice. There are several other control panels you may use but they all kind of do the same thing. So these steps should be similar on any software.

To set-up a sub domain login to your control panel (and there’s a live demo of CPanel here if you want to check it out) and head for the subdomain area.  First thing to do is to head for the sub-domain admin area. Its a simple task of adding your subdomain of choice.

So for example I added facebook.buzzsonic.com. Then added my lengthy default Facebook URL. So. What happens is simply that you (or anyone from now on!) types in your new shiny short Facebook and off it goes to the crappy URL that Facebook gives you!

Just follow the process for any URL you want to point to. I’ve actually seen people use one of those URL shortening services to hide their long Facebook URL. This looks way better.

Related Reading

URL Redirection (Wikipedia)
A Bloggers Guide to Branding With Social Media (ProBlogger)
100 Personal Branding Tactics Using Social Media (ChrisBrogan.com)

Now I’ve used the word ‘music industry’ here to encompass anything connected to digital music stuff, music 2.0, social media, whatever you want to call it. Truth is, the keyword today is convergence.

But if you’re struggling to come to terms with new terminology, new technology and new services I did a comprehensive scan of resources you can print out on PDF that’ll really set you up with an information boost if you’re playing catch up and haven’t got the time to dig around.

There’s some fantastic resources out there and some inspirational writers like Seth Godin, Andrew Dubber, Gerd Leonhard, Derek Sivers and even digital distributors Tunecore all offer some brilliant insight and the best news is its all out there for you to grab free as a bird. And legal too!

Promotion

Music Industry Survival Guide. This compact guide from digital distributor Tunecore crams a lot into its 30 pages covering college radio promotion, iTunes promotion, street marketing, music discovery, mp3 blogs and press and media tips. Some people actually charge for this stuff. There’s seven PDF guides from Tunecore including a vinyl 101 for bands/artists wanting to press up vinyl records.

Their other guides cover mastering, publishing, copyright and mixing.

Mastering The Music Website Cycle.  EasyB.com make e-commerce software for artists to sell music direct from their own websites. The handy 36 page guide goes into some detail on how to make and manage a successful music download website. They draw up a checklist of plans for structure, content and design. Again, some great pointers for many who may find the task a little daunting.

The Leading Question-Voice Of The Fans. This survey undertaken by UK digital music industry company Musically was aired at Midem this January. 1300 music fans were questioned across the USA, UK and France.

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Being in a band, your time is very important. If you are an indie musician your day-to-day can possibly consist of a day job or school, then you need to make time for songwriting, recording, Myspace-ing, Tweeting, booking shows, editing video and fending off e-mails and other online networks. Knowing that your time is important, it is easy to brush off the fans, especially the ones that you do not see everyday, week, month, year or even, ever. That does not mean that they are not important.

Now more than even your fans are vital to your success. They are the ones that dictate your income. You NEED to keep them happy. There is no excuse, no communication gaps or barriers stopping you from developing relationships with every fan that wants one.

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I’ve been using Twitter ‘seriously’ (I’m not sure how you measure that) for a few months now but I was a slow starter as I previously mentioned here.

I think at first the problem for me is that it just seemed like it was going to be another web 2.0 novelty that’d I’d quickly tire of and abandon after a while. I did abandon my Twitter profile leaving myself hanging with less than ten followers and half a dozen posts.

Not for the first time, I was wrong. There are just so many tech and music people ‘twittering’ it kind of reminds you of all the Google euphoria when the search engine was so ubiquitous that ‘to Google’ became a verb.

What helped me a lot was seeking out the help of a bunch of people that did ‘get it’ by searching Google (as always). I thought I’d gather together a bunch of the best online blog posts and articles that I found in my research.

How To Use Twitter For Music Promotion (About.com) Twitter.

About.com Music Careers writer Heather McDonald is always very concise in her writing, unlike me. Once signing up for Twitter Heather recommends, “looking for fellow music types. Music fans, journalists, artists, labels, etc – these are the people you want to follow you.” She continues.

“Twitter can be a great way to not only keep fans informed about your news but it can also make them feel closer to the whole process when you tweet about things you’re working on as you’re doing them. The trick is not to go too far and overload people.”

(more…)

Very difficult to be totally definitive on this one but the following list is a bunch of websites we consider to be essential bookmarks for music artists, bands, band managers and indie labels alike. Whether you’re just releasing your first digital EP and want it selling on iTunes or if you want to build up your ‘musicbiz’ network and don’t know where to start, these sites will help to get you up and running.

Digital Distribution

Tunecore – I use Tunecore to distribute Buzzsonic Records tracks to iTunes worldwide and AmazonMP3.There’s a signup fee of around $25 and then an annual fee of about $20 for maintenance. Adds up to peanuts for a worthwhile service that takes no percentage from your downloads which means you see something like 70c out of every 99c download straight into your own pocket. They also duplicate and shrink wrap short run CDs too.

Snocap – Founded by ex-Napster wunderkid Shawn Fanning, Snocap was supposed to be the first major legal P2P service in its formative years but licensing problems with the majors put paid to that. A change of business plan means that now Snocap powers thousands of MySpace artist music stores, using their store widget that you can paste into your MySpace profile and anywhere else online. Artists see something like 60c from a 99c download, though you can set your own price.

CD Baby – CD Baby and its founder Derek Sivers have an impeccably solid reputation with artists and its up there with Tunecore as the ones to go to. CD Baby’s digital deal has them take 9% of your revenue, though they distribute to a much wider array of download stores than Tunecore. Those short run CDs you got done at Tunecore? CD Baby will sell them via their much vaunted CD distribution channel.

Indistr.com – Another promising looking outlet is Indistr.com. Artists keep 75% of download revenue and get paid the same day of the sale via Paypal.

Music Biz Resources

Music Business Resources For Students - UK based college lecturer Daz Smith’s comprehensive website is packed to the rafters with tips and links on networking, manufacturing, record companies, promotion and diy record labels. Useful for bands and DJ’s hoping to make their next move, students of popular music and music technology and anyone else wanting to get involved.

Luke Hits – LA based Luke Hits specializes in placing unsigned bands music onto TV shows and film soundtracks by circulating compilation CDs with his contacts that he painstakingly picks from the bags of submissions he gets. He promises to listen to everything he’s sent. There’s no upfront fees, just a slice of whatever deal he sets up.

Hit Quarters – Database of A and R guys, record companies, songwriters and publishers. Useful if you are a songwriter trying to place a song. $15 annual fee sounds like a deal for the information here.

Moses Avalon – Moses Avalon is the author of three crucial books, ‘Confessions of a Record Producer’, ‘Secrets of Negotiating a Record Contract’ and ‘Million Dollar Mistakes’ which are required reading for all industry wannabes (and never has beens). His website has a bunch of useful artist friendly articles and advice.

Bemuso.com - Another astonishing labor of love from UK based Rob Cumberland. A very detailed and exhaustive collection of articles and links for artists going the DiY route. The site covers self distribution, publishing, do it yourself record labels and how the music biz works from a UK perspective.

Rap Coalition Intelligence Program – Astonishing site packed to the rafters with information, case histories and every fine detail you need to strike out on your own. Starting your own label, business basics, worksheets, writing a music business plan, start up checklist and every angle in between.

Music Tank – A business development network for the UK music industry, owned and operated by the University of Westminster. Run a unique programme of think tanks, conferences and events.

BBC 1Xtra – Great resource from BBC Radio 1 with tips on demos, music industry how to’s, studio and DIY tips. Radio 1 is the most popular national radio station in the UK and the possibility of getting your music heard on national radio isn’t impossible. The Homegrown section of the site pick two unsigned artists/bands a week and play them on the air to a potential audience of millions.

Music Industry Forums

Velvet Rope – Legendarily frank and very busy music industry forums, populated by bands, labels, artists and wannabes. Littered with news of music industry happenings and rumors, unsigned bands and hype.

Harmony Central – Great musician’s community with discussion forums, industry news, guitar tabs and user reviews on music gear. Its the forums that make this site an essential visit though.

Just Plain Folks – Another very busy, long running and active forum community, this one squarely aimed at songwriters and musician networking. The forums boast over 40,000 members.

Planet Shark – If you want to creep your way into LA’s Hollywood film and music business community this is a great place to keep your eye on with news on parties, movers and shakers events, industry shindigs, casting calls and industry jobs. There’s an A&R 411 section on the site too that’s worth bookmarking. If you live in LA that is!

Songwriter 101 – Another educational website and forum for songwriters with everything about the business side of the songwriter’s profession with information, education and advice from music pros and teachers.
Record of the Day – UK based subscription based music business news network but with a busy forum and UK music industry jobs board.

Recording.org – Professional recording studio forums bustling with over 30,000 members.
HomeRecording.com – And at the other end of the scale a forum for home recording enthusiasts discussing gear, techniques and the music industry in general.

Various Resources

Indie Music Bible – David Wimble’s Indie Bible is now into its 9th year and the 330 page book is crammed with thousands of contacts and articles on how to get your music on radio, where to get reviewed, where to sell music, where to upload it and 500 resources just on promoting your band.

Sister publication the Indie Venue Bible is a comprehensive directory of live music venues. It is in electronic (PDF) format and lists 26,000 venues and 2000 booking agents in the US and Canada.

The UK published tome the Unsigned Guide is an excellent companion to the Indie Bible and boasts 11,000+ contacts and over 800 pages brimming with every music contact you could ever think of.

Everyone already has a page on MySpace, like it or not its the number one destination site for networking bands and artists. But before MySpace there was Garageband. Now owned by iLike. Garageband has a neat community review process which works by encouraging bands to review other tracks in return for free webspace. Eclipsed now in terms of popularity compared to Bebo and MySpace but a great tool for getting real critical feedback.

Industry Bodies

For news on the business side of the industry the BPI (UK) and the RIAA (USA) are good for keeping your eye on the industries ruling bodies. The IFPI covers the rest of the world and in the UK the MCPS/PRS cover copyright issues whilst the ASCAP do the same in the USA. The independent music organizational bodies are the Association of Independent Music (AIM) in the UK and American Association of Independent Music (A2IM) in the USA.

Blogs and News

Mashable and Techcrunch are the two essential destinations for keeping up with daily news on new music and web 2.0 apps and developments and the blogs I fire up first in my RSS reader daily are the newsy Coolfer and Hypebot and the acerbic and essential Lefsetz Letter, written by industry veteran, Bob Lefsetz and filled with no holds barred finger pointing, analysis and comment.

Related Reading

New Music Strategies
Future of Music Coalition
Music Week
CMU Music Network
MP3 Newswire

I recently got hold of a copy of a promo video for one of my tracks from the mid 90s, the 99th Floor Elevators “Hooked”.

I was eager to get a copy of the video, which saw some MTV airtime in Europe, simply to use it as another online tool to promote my dance tracks which have recently been enjoying something of a revival in the UK with a series of new dance mixes.

Anyway, I posted the video on MySpaceTV, YouTube, Facebook and Last FM and it was interesting to see the difference in quality of the video stream and also the feedback reaction.

For a start most people associate online video sharing with YouTube, no ifs and buts about that one and that seems to be reflected in the amount of page views and feedback of my promo video, comparing the four services.

I’m pretty sure most people are still not fully aware that Facebook have branched out into MySpace territory with its Facebook Music spin-off and MySpaceTV has a while to go before it gets similar eyeballs to YouTube.

The difference is noticable (at least using this video as an example). The ‘Hooked’ – 99th Floor Elevators video so far has 2095 views on YouTube vs. 80 on MySpaceTV. The video was posted within twenty four hours on each service.

There does seem to be a noticeable quality difference though, with MySpaceTV winning quite easily with a noticeably superior quality stream compared to YouTube.

Though there is a settings change mentioned here to up the default YouTube stream quality. Facebook have a bigger pixel stream though on the downside there is no embed code like the other sites, just an email link to send the video link.

Related Links

Social Impact of YouTube (Wikipedia)
YouTube The King of Video Sharing? (Mashable.com)
List of Video Sharing Websites (Wikipedia)
New YouTube Developer Tools…..(Wired.com)