New RSS Feed, Please Update

We have been on a posting storm in the last few days, unveiled a new site and a new free members area.

If you haven't checked it out you should.

We have also moved our RSS Feed and I am seeing some people not getting the new posts. You can grab the new Feed by pasting this into your reader:

http://feeds2.feedburner.com/Gen-yRockStars

Here are some of the posts you may have missed:

• Digital Sales Talk with Musicadium
• Brand Your Band Like a Personal Brand
• Bandcamp Turn 1.0 and Still Kicks Ass
• Showflake - A Music Advertising Platform
• Reverbnation Recession Relief

I apologize to those that are getting this twice and also to those that have missed out on the content. I hope you continue to enjoy Gen-Y Rock Stars and join our free community.

We are also gearing up to launch our pro memberships in April, so be sure to either join the mailing list or get the RSS feed to stay updated on that sweet development.

Till next time Rock Stars...

-Greg Rollett

Gen-Y Rock Stars Tool Kit

There are so many tools, sites, gadgets and things to do online to promote and market your music. This is evident by our last report, 100 Social Media Resources for Musicians. That barely broke the tip of the iceberg and over 1,000 people downloaded it so far. Sweet.

What happened after that was there were a large group of musicians who were lost. There was too much. We got emails from bands all over the world wanting to know what sites to concentrate on. The answer is more difficult than saying, uh Myspace or Facebook or some other hot site. The real answer is that you need to be where your fans are. That's what it comes down to. With that said, there are sites that are leap years above the competition in terms of raw traffic, participation and conversation that you need to be paying attention to. There are also some gadgets and lifestyle management things that are better suited for the musician lifestyle than others.

Knowing this, we have created a quick Tool Kit for the Gen-Y Rock Star that we think you are going to like. It's free and is in a printer friendly PDF so you can really check off the things that you have done and see what things you need to hurry up and accomplish.

All you need to do to get the Tool Kit is put your e-mail in the form below and we will send you the link immediately. It's as simple as that. If you already opted into the Gen-Y Rock Stars newsletter for the 100 Resources, then a link should have already been sent to you!

As usual, we hope that this little sheet will help you get on a consistent road to pushing your products and music, make advocates of your fans and get you on the road, producing content and playing shows to the people who love you. Enjoy and please send any feedback over.

Thanks

Greg

Dormant But Not Asleep

I am working on something big. Real big. A nice new launch, site, atmosphere, focus and fresh start to Gen-Y Rock Stars is just the beginning. We kicked things off with a bang with the 100 Social Media Resources Report and the response has been phenomenal. Over 1,000 signups, 100's of emails and great inspiration to keep going and tons of new sites and ideas popping up daily (go check out AudioLife right now for your merch!).

So what's with the lapse in posting, updates and something more?

I hear this everyday from musicians and industry folk. It is something that has been bothering me and today is the day to make something happen, right? So what happened in the last few months?

Well, our agency has taken off and so has consulting and music coaching. I have put in many hours to figure out what makes a successful artist in this iPod and download generation. The answer is simply: you are now a marketer first. A brand. A story that people want to eat up, then talk about, tweet, embed, IM, poke and comment on. That is the key to the new success in the music business.

Those thinking that you have a great song, will get discovered and life will be cars, clothes and tour buses are living in the 90's or some era when traditional advertising, marketing and big music business worked. Sorry.

The bands we have been working with are now touring in a down economy, selling downloads of songs that are available for free, making videos supported by advertising, getting sponsorships from Fortune 500 brands and creating what Seth Godin has called a Tribe. Getting people to care about you AND the music.

They subscribe to your brand. They receive your RSS Feeds. Subscribe to your video blog on YouTube. Get your Tweets send to their phone so they know your every move. Track your tour on Loopt or Brightkite. Tag you in their photos on Flirck. So on and so on.

Over the next few days look for the dust to come up here. We are switching to Wordpress, adding some new products, shooting out a new logo, dropping some new free reports, videos and testimonials and beginning the transformation to from bedroom musicians to Gen-Y Rock Stars.

Cheers.

-Greg

Twitter Leak Generates 14,000 Downloads

How would you like 14,000 downloads? Over the weekend Moe Arora, a music industry tastemaker, leaked a Lil Wayne and Mack Maine track, "Throw It Back," over the microblogging service. He also used another upcoming social music property to host the download - Soundcloud.

Here is the Tweet:

Here is the buzz from Twitter Search:

Great job Moe. He is going to be writing a more in depth analysis, but I wanted to get on here and note that if you create a great community, have genuine conversations and then create amazing content, it is not that hard to have your friends help you out. Just note that you need all 3!

(Update) Here is Moe's recap post. (Update)

-Greg Rollett

Getting Involved With Causes

A low cost way for Gen-Y Rock Stars to get exposure is through nonprofits. Nonprofits and causes look to leverage musicians, actors and celebrities to promote their cause and often times as the artist you can help promote yourself as the official songs in their videos, supply photos for their campaign or create new material with a message.

More and more nonprofits are looking into Social Media as a means of getting their message across to Gen-Y and younger volunteers and this means your music can be heard in YouTube clips, on Podcasts, with free downloads, on picture sharing sites and more. The exposure can be viral and help you get into the ears and on the playlists of people that truly care about a cause.

A recent campaign with Trojan condoms and MTV, Evolve One, Evolve All, put together work with the Aggrolites, All Time Low, Animo, Charlotte Sometimes, Cobra Starship, Everytime I Die, From First to Last, Gil Mantera, Madina Lake, Protest the Hero, Reel Big Fish, Shwayze, TAT, The Academy Is, The Bronx & The Randles and more to promote their latest campaign. The effects of the campaign were spread wide with the addition of this video playing widget:

Safe Sex | STI | Contraception | STD

This Evolve One, Evolve All campaign has even allowed fans and followers to contribute their own videos and allow for commenting from these advocates. This is a great audience to be seen in front of.

Steps to finding a nonprofit:

• As a band, see what causes would fit with your style of music and your beliefs. Come up with a general list, homlessness, rebuilding communities, the green movement, etc.
• Look for local organizations by looking at sites like Volunteer Match to find contact information, locations and ideas about what the organization.
• Set up Google Alerts for "Your City" + "Your Cause" to get up to the minute information on press releases and news regarding these companies and organization.
• Look to contact a marketing director or go after the executive director himself. Most nonprofits are looking for exposure and the price is right for them.
• Be sure to have a "What's in it for me" (WIIFM) and tell the nonprofit why you are a good partner.

Good luck and Happy Thanksgiving Rock Stars!

-Greg Rollett

Musicians Looking to Ning for Homebase

I see a new trend amongst artists looking to build a community around their music and have their fans play a major role in their development, and that of their content. The trend includes one of my 100 social media sites for musicians and goes well beyond your standard profile page.

Ning is a powerful platform with which anyone can create a social network about any topic. In your social network you can build it with any components that you think are necessary and that can include:

• Pages - static pages to tell fans bout your band, how to contact you or anything else you feel like sharing
• Videos - these can be uploaded directly into Ning or sent over with a YouTube embed code. If you upload directly, you can count plays and also embed those videos anywhere else on the net
• Photos - again these can be uploaded into the site directly or using the Flickr API (sounds harder than it is) you can import all your photos, tags and descriptions from the photo sharing heavyweight.
• Groups - manage your street teams with individual groups for different cities, regions, etc or have your fans create groups to share stories, pictures and discussions
• Profile pages - just like any other social network you can have your own pages. On these pages you can friend other people, trick out your page and interact with others.
• Blogs - Not that you aren't blogging already, but this is another platform for you to get the word out.
• Forum - get your fans talking about your shows, their fav tunes, other artists and off topic interests to keep them on the page. Be sure to interact with them for maximum efficiency.

On top of the standard features above, you are free to add any 3rd party coding into your pages. This gives you the power to add your Reverbnation Widgets, iLike or iMeem players, videos from Vimeo, Viddler or Kyte or anything else you can manage to fit on the page.

Some examples of musicians using the platform for their homebase include:
Asher Roth - a hip-hopper from PA makig a big name for himself with his latest mixtape The Greenhouse Effect. He is using the Ning platform to post news updates, videos, get messages across to his hardcore fans and keep them interested in his movement through getting to know each other. Check out a sneak peek below or visit the site here.


Buckcherry - the rockers who brought you 'Crazy Bitch' are using Ning to get their fans to interact with them in a big way. Their Ning site has 113 user generated videos from their shows to backstage antics and everything else that goes on in their world. Those videos go along with the over 1,500 pics of the band that fans have posted. Take a look below.

(click image to enlarge)

So what's it cost?
Well, nothing to try out. Essentially it's a free platform. The catch is that a free account slaps a .ning.com to your domain and floods the site with Google Ads that you do not collect on. The fees to upgrade include:

• Custom domain = $4.95 / mo
• Remove the ads = $19.95 / mo
• Remove additional Ning promotional links = $7.95 / mo

My suggestion would be to try out the platform with a custom domain and see how you and your fans interact on the site. You do not need a million fans with profiles for the site to be successful. It may just be a place to organize all of your online content or your street teams into groups. It may be a place to interact with diehard fans and have awesome conversations. Or it can become the platform for you to build an amazing relationship with your fans. The possibilities are endless, but in the end Ning is just a tool, its up to you to promote it, produce great content and hold engaging conversations.

Any people out there have Ning sites for your band? Let us know about your experience.

-Greg Rollett

Britney Spears and her Twitter Team

Britney Spears is on Twitter, yes the Real Britney Spears. The comeback is on and it will be social medialized. A few weeks back Britney and her new team re-launched BritneySpears.com in a blog/magazine style and honestly, I give the girl her props. She has taken some heat from some Social Media superstars including TechCrunch and Gary Vaynerchuck, yet with all the circumstances, time constraints and events that have occurred in her life in the last 1-2 years, I think her team is doing a great job exploring Social Media.

Her Twitter Account
The domain is twitter.com/therealbritney and the Tweets range from announcements of new videos to pictures of Brit and the kids to Team Britney replying to social media and twitter heavyweights on how to best use the service.


My thoughts
After a rocky start, I think they get it. There is transparency when non-Britney posts a Twitter and when Brit herself decides to use her smart phone of choice, she leaves a line letting us know it is really her. I also like how she is using Twitter as a feature on her website. It is in the header and displays the latest update as shown below.

look at the little cloud in the corner (click image to enlarge)

Businesses using Twitter generally sue Twitter in the same manor. They send out links, press releases and news related to their company and occasionally jump into conversation with replies, questions and other posts. What most of these companies do not do is offer the transparency of who is Twittering.

Southwest Airlines has a corporate twitter account and they are doing it great. They are a part of the conversation with more replies than pushy company information, yet I don't know who from Southwest is talking to me. When The Real Britany sends out a message it is signed by the writer. I think this is an incredible step towards transparency from brands who wish to tweet from one account instead of having multiple accounts for Briteny's Manager, Britney's stylist, etc.

In a post on Chris Brogan's Blog on Monday featuring Brea Grant from Heroes, Brea's Social Media Leader, Laura Roeder steps in and mentions this when the topic of a Twit Team comes up:

it’s unreasonable to expect that Britney Spears (or other celebs) do everything herself. Brea doesn’t do the technical back end stuff, like manage WordPress and all the YouTube stuff. But Brea writes the content and everything. Laura says that it takes people to run the website and the social program, but as the support, not the “talent.”

I think that's a great point. Let the talent handle the content and let the team get that content online, looking good and get it into the hands of as many people as possible. When looking into getting into Twitter, it is important that you as an artist learn about the medium and really jump in, be personable and learn from doing. When your time gets too busy to manage you should look into your team, but still be a key player in the content creation. Remember that your fans are buying you and your music, your lyrics and your personality. If you are letting your team write your thoughts for you, you lose authenticity and the power you have over your audience.

What are your thoughts?

Here is a great post for musicians on and thinking about using Twitter by @CyberPR

-Greg Rollett
(Me on Twitter)