Indie Marketing Power: The Resource Guide for Maximizing Your Music Marketing

by Peter Spellman

  • Published by MBS Business Media
    Publication date: 2006
    385 pages

Get the MARKETING power you need to make your mark in the new music economy. Seventeen chapters of resource-rich information and strategies to help you find and nurture your audience for maximum music sales. Here's a partial list of what's inside:

Indie Marketing Power is the most helpful book for musicians promoting their music that I have ever seen. I'm considering this not just essential reading, but REQUIRED reading for every musician I know!"
—Derek Sivers, president, CD Baby

Indie Marketing Power is divided into two parts: "Foundations" (chapters 1-5) and "Actions" (chapters 6-15). The first part provides:

  • An updated look at crucial trends impacting the music marketplace today and where the opportunities lie
  • A specially designed checklist for assessing your current marketing and promotional activities
  • A "bird's eye view" of how music product flows in the marketplace so you understand all the players' place in the process
  • Strategies for organizing & managing your music marketing program
  • Ways for identifying your own unique market niche with the opportunities that are out there for you
  • How to define exactly what you're selling
  • Discerning all the features and benefits of what you're providing
  • Smart ways for building your database of connections
  • Developing a branding and positioning statement for your product or service
  • Learn how to add value to anything you're selling
  • How to choose the right mix of marketing tools & tactics that fit with your unique personality, skills and values
  • Creating a smart and feasible marketing budget that will raise your profile without busting the bank
  • Discovering affinity partnerships to expand into new markets
  • Harnessing the power of the internet and ecommerce for extending the reach and market power of your business
  • Preparing your music for digital distribution & evaluating options
  • Inserting the right "metadata" onto your CD for effective digital monitoring
  • Choosing the best words for all your marketing communications
  • Tapping direct marketing tactics to target prospective customers

and PLENTY MORE.

If you only read one book this year, make it Indie Marketing Power: The Resource Guide for Maximizing Your Music Marketing. Every artist intent on divining his or her own path through the wilderness of independent music will benefit by this friendly, encouraging guide filled with entertaining anecdotes as author Peter Spellman demystifies the labyrinth word of marketing, media and more. Past, present and future: Spellman tracks the trends and delivers the truth.
—Dan Kimpel, Music Connection magazine

That's Part 1. The next part explores the markets themselves. Each music market is divided into "Context" (trends, stats & dynamics) and then "Approach" (strategies and action steps). See the Table of Contents below for the details on these.

Table of Contents

PLUS, you get:

  • Three Glossaries covering music business, general marketing, and online marketing terminology.
  • A full Sample Music Publicity Campaign (for a band)
  • A step-by-step guide for writing a full-spectrum marketing plan
  • A 30+ page RESOURCE GUIDE to help feed your ongoing music marketing efforts & research.
  • A full Index to help you explore the book in all its details.
Wow. Peter Spellman has outdone himself with Indie Marketing Power. To say it's an exhaustive guide to music marketing is an understatement. He covers it all -- promoting via the Internet, live shows, media, sponsorships, retail, licensing ... you name it, it's covered here in detail. A great music biz resource!
—Bob Baker, author of Guerrilla Music Marketing

Throughout the book you will also find various charts that spell out:

U.S. Entertainment Spending, the Flow of Product through the Music Industry, Different Levels of Music Touring Acts, Music Distribution Organizational Dynamics, the Top US Sponsoring Organizations & Businesses, Interactive Game Sales Stats, the Most/Least Risky Countries to Do Business With, the World's Fastest-Growing Music Markets, Radio Format Rankings, Top Music Merchandising Services Compared, The Song's Five Sources of Licensing Income, The Main Players in Music Licensing, Inlets & Outlets for Original Music, Parameters for Negotiating Music Licenses, Visualizing a Music Licensing Negotiation, Unique Publicity Opportunities, Media Option Pros & Cons, and MUCH MORE!

Read a sample chapter.

Other Books by Peter Spellman:

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