Band Marketing Power

The drummer from the band Greenlander asked me if I could think of an easy way for his band to get gigs. I gave him the following response:

If Greenlander (or any band) wants to get more gigs quickly and easily, they can accomplish that by EXPANDING their Band.

What do I mean by that? Well, think of the word BAND. In this context, it means, “A group of people united together.” Greenlander is a BAND of people bound to each other for a unified goal of creating, performing, and making a living as a BAND. By EXPANDING their BAND, they can increase the amount of people that are always together helping each other accomplish their goal.

This is a proven and practiced method. Teams unite to achieve goals in sports and business all the time. A Band is a business, unless you only play for free or never play in a club or public place. If you want more, you are in business together. Think of the teammates that a business uses to win: representatives, technical people, marketers, sales people, assistants, and more. What kind of new Band members could you find useful? Not every Band member is ONSTAGE.

Greenlander can find a New Band Member that will be passionate about getting gigs for the Band. The drummer needs to be passionate about being onstage being a drummer, the guitarist – a guitarist on stage, the singer – a singer onstage, etc… The New member would be passionately focused on being the Greenlander Gig Booking Agent.

This new member of the “Band” wouldn’t be onstage performing. They would be offstage promoting, selling, and booking gigs for the “Band”.

There is someone around you that loves your Band, is passionate about music, is terrified of being onstage playing music, however would love to be part of the “Band”. And this person is passionate enough to learn how to excel at booking the Band for shows. They most likely already have networking talents, or sales skills. They would love to be the Band Star, in a different way. In a hidden behind the scenes way, however knowing confidently they are part of the Band and a very important part of the Band.

Think of how many people are a part of the creation of a movie… How many are happy to be On Camera? And how many are happy to be the ones who did the makeup, the sets, the costumes, the directing, the producing, the camera work, the cinematography plan, the food during scene shots, the truck driving for the movie making equipment, etc… All of these people are happy and proud to have worked on the movie to make it a success. These people are happy to have done the role they did especially knowing that their special talents or skills were used to make it happen. A Band Succeeding is no different. The movie production team is everyone who worked on the film. The Band is everyone who is part of the Band working to get it to the unified goal.

Some people worry and say, “Well I can’t pay for someone to give that kind of help.” Well, this New Band Member gets paid their share of the profits as the Band makes money, just as each Onstage Band Member does. If no one in the Band is making money right now, then ‘no one’ gets paid. If the Band is earning money, then the Band Members get paid what you have all agreed upon. This is the same as building a new startup business bootstrap-style (Undertaken or accomplished with minimal outside help).

The question now is… How many more members do you think your Band can benefit from having? Could you imagine seeing a Band perform that had a costumer, a lighting person, a personal sound man, a gig/show booking person, a business manager, an event planner, a publicist, a recording expert, an Artistic Director, etc… What kind of show would that “Band” be able to produce? What kind of show do you want to produce?

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Eric Christian Smith is a recognized authority on business and the entertainment industry. His web site, http://www.HowToBand.com, provides a wealth of informative articles and resources on everything you'll ever need to know about making money as an unsigned band or musician. His book, “How To Make BIG MONEY with Your BAND” is a great resource for increasing your cash flow. You can easily buy a copy of the book, available in Paperback or eBook form, online through http://www.howtoband.com (The book is also available through Amazon.com, Borders.com and other bookstores)

To learn more about Greenlander, visit MySpace URL: http://www.myspace.com/greenlandermusic