IOTM Blog
Posted: Nov 19, 2024
Category: Fans
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**Guest post written by Scott Aumann, originally featured on The Legit Musician blog.
"Have you ever felt like you wanted to find a way to steal all the fans of that band that is doing better than you? Well, you can. The best part is that you aren’t really stealing them and you won’t get arrested. Find out which bands are similar to you. Their fans can be your fans. If they like that other band then why can’t they be your fan as well?"
View Full ArticlePosted: Nov 12, 2024
Category: The Musician Business
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**Guest post written by Bruce Houghton, Founder and Editor of Hypebot, a Senior Advisor at Bandsintown, President of the Skyline Artists Agency, and a Berklee College Of Music professor, originally featured on Hypebot.com.
"Overall concert attendance grew 20% last year, but smaller independent live music venues are closing at unprecedented rates. Music industry commentator’s Bob Lefsetz has the solution: “Let clubs close.""
View Full ArticlePosted: Nov 5, 2024
Category: Touring
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**Guest post by Musician Indie Coalition, Business-Based Artist Development Experts who help DIY Musicians develop, launch and scale their music careers.
"Embarking on a tour is something every musician dreams of. It's a chance to travel, connect with fans, showcase your talent in new cities and build momentum for your music career...the whole process of booking a tour requires careful planning, organization and strategic decision-making. A missed flight, a canceled show or simple typo on the tour schedule can cause total chaos and put you at risk of losing a ton of money. So whether you're a solo artist or part of a band, here are my step-by-step recommendations to help you navigate the process of booking your first tour and setting yourself up for success."
Posted: Oct 29, 2024
Category: Online Presence
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With a free user account, you not only get an artist profile and the ability to interact with the user generated sections of the site (members portal, show/band availabilities, and classifieds), but you can also add additional media to the official venue listings to further enhance the communities knowledge of the venues in the directory. This can be accomplished in two ways...
Posted: Oct 23, 2024
Category: Licensing
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**Guest post originally featured in the Symphonic Distribution Blog.
"You may think landing a sync placement in a show is just a matter of sending your music to a music supervisor, getting picked, and getting paid. If only it were that easy! In reality, the life cycle of a sync license can be a very lengthy and complex process. In this post, Symphonic’s own Head of Sync, Jon Mizrachi, breaks it down and gives you a behind the scenes look to help you get a better idea of how it all works. Here’s the rundown..."
View Full ArticlePosted: Oct 15, 2024
Category: Promotion
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**Guest post written by Tilly Simon of SubmitHub, a great tool for gaining more coverage for your music.
"The core of SubmitHub is submitting your music directly to curators. Here are some quick tips to help you get the most out of your submissions and increase your chances of success..."
View Full ArticlePosted: Oct 9, 2024
Category: Music Streaming
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**Guest post written by Lisa Occhino for Bandzoogle.com.
"Although DIY artists are finally starting to earn more royalties from music streaming services, it’s still quite rare to make a living off of that income. But does that mean that distributing your music is pointless? Far from it. Major platforms like Spotify, Apple Music, Amazon Music, and Pandora offer free artist dashboards to track and analyze how your songs are performing. They also provide you with invaluable data that can help you understand who your audience is, where to tour, how to most effectively spend your marketing dollars, and much more. So how do you leverage all this data to grow your streams, and also benefit the other areas of your music career?"
View Full ArticlePosted: Oct 2, 2024
Category: The Musician Business
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**Guest post written by Scott Aumann, originally featured on The Legit Musician blog.
"Show posters are still one of the best ways to promote your band and a live show. I know most of the venues that I played at still used show posters for every show. Some venues even required that you send posters. These are a low-cost option for promotion and still can work great if done correctly. Don’t just write some stuff on a sheet of paper with a sharpie. Put some thought into your show posters and they will pay off with larger crowds and more engaged fans. I’m going to teach you how to make the most kick-ass show poster ever!"
View Full ArticlePosted: Sep 24, 2024
Category: Online Presence
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Show availabilities are reserved for finding additional talent for shows that already exist...If you wish to announce your own availability, you can do that with a band availability...Lastly, classified listings are for everything else...all of these sections of the site are free!
Posted: Sep 18, 2024
Category: Music Streaming
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**Guest post by One Submit, a spotify promotion service.
"The situation brought by “Eight Mile Style” the co-publisher of 242 Eminem tracks, consisting of hits like "" Lose Yourself"" as well as "" The Real Slim Shady,"" was ruled in Spotify's favor regardless of the court acknowledging that Spotify did not have the appropriate permit for these tracks.
The judgment nonetheless did not just prefer Spotify; it additionally put the blame on Kobalt Music Group, which took care of the legal rights to the tracks. This situation highlights the complicated and frequently periphrastic nature of song legal rights administration in the electronic age, giving beneficial lessons for legal rights owners and the song market at large."
Posted: Sep 10, 2024
Category: Marketing
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**Guest post written by Modern Musician.
"If you're serious about making a full-time career out of your passion for music, you've likely invested countless hours, energy, and money into honing your craft. But the big question remains—how do you build a loyal fanbase, make a sustainable income, and keep your artistic identity intact in today’s saturated industry? The good news is, it’s possible to achieve all this without relying on luck or record labels."
View Full ArticlePosted: Sep 4, 2024
Category: Online Presence
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**Guest post originally featured in the Symphonic Distribution Blog.
"Spotify is a powerful tool for any artist interested in reaching a larger audience. One of the most effective ways to utilize the platform is to create a custom Spotify for Artists profile which will help you get verified, easily manage your profile, learn about your fanbase and more. In this post, we’ll break down some tips to help you make sure your profile is optimized and ready to go."
View Full ArticlePosted: Aug 28, 2024
Category: The Musician Business
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While the official venue listings on the site are administratively curated and controlled, we do still encourage community input as it relates to additions and updates to our venues directory.
Posted: Aug 20, 2024
Category: Promotion
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**Guest post by Musician Indie Coalition, Business-Based Artist Development Experts who help DIY Musicians develop, launch and scale their music careers.
"As an independent artist in the modern music industry, having a direct line of communication with your fans is absolutely paramount when promoting your music...Two of the most powerful channels at your disposal for marketing music are email marketing and social media marketing. Both are fantastic tools that allow you to connect directly with your audience, share updates, tour dates, promote new releases and sell products and tickets to live shows. So let’s discuss each..."
Posted: Aug 13, 2024
Category: Licensing
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**Guest post written by Caleb Murphy for Bandzoogle.com.
"In the sync licensing world, any little edge could help you succeed. Most importantly, you want it to be as easy as possible for sync licensing people to listen to and use your music in TV shows and movies. I’ve gotten several placements on TV shows and in indie films as an indie artist, so I want to share what I’ve learned first-hand and through research. I’m not an expert, but this article will be a good introduction to how to optimize your website for sync licensing. Hopefully, doing these things will increase your chances of getting placements."
View Full ArticlePosted: Aug 6, 2024
Category: The Musician Business
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**Guest post written by Scott Aumann, originally featured on The Legit Musician blog.
"Do you feel like you are up against all the other bands in your genre or region? Do you consider those bands your competition? If they win, do you lose? The secret is, we’re all in this together. That’s why fighting bands is a waste of your time."
View Full ArticlePosted: Jul 31, 2024
Category: Indie on the Move
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From your account dropdown menu in the top right hand corner of the site, there is an option for settings...but the "Manage Follow" button on that page can take you to the more advanced alert customizations...All of these preferences will help you to be as informed as possible about the opportunities on the site while limiting the unwanted/irrelevant alerts.
Posted: Jul 24, 2024
Category: Merch
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**Guest post written by James Hill, a veteran of the music industry. He has worked at Warner Reprise Records and then Interscope/ Geffen Records and now helps indie artists with branding and manufacturing through his company Unified Manufacturing, a CD/DVD, custom vinyl records and merch company in LA.
"The second half of the year [has just started]. You guys still have [a little less than] 6 months to release your merch line together with a music release, gig show, or a tour. If you’re having second thoughts on releasing them, then I urge you to go on with it. They’re a great promotional tour for whatever you have going on...Here are 22 custom merch band ideas to help you start planning." View Full Article
Posted: Jul 16, 2024
Category: Online Presence
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**Guest post originally featured in the Symphonic Distribution Blog.
"At this point, you should be well aware of the importance of metadata in the music industry. Not only does it help classify and identify your music among a sea of millions of others, but improper metadata could be the reason your music isn’t reaching as many fans as possible. How? Let’s break it down..."
View Full ArticlePosted: Jul 9, 2024
Category: Marketing
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**Guest post written by Mariami of Sungate Records.
"In an age where the internet and international communities are on display 24/7, independent artists have an enormous opportunity to invite a larger audience into their world. By sharing aspects of their culture—whether it's through food, clothing, lyrics, or images of their hometowns—artists can create a deeply personal and engaging narrative...Here are five ways our Sungate Records artists are tapping into their cultural individuality to build unique platforms online..."
View Full ArticlePosted: Jul 3, 2024
Category: Live Performance
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**Guest post written by Adam Percy for Bandzoogle.com.
"While they had a bit of a shaky start when they came out, QR codes have now become a popular tool for sharing content and for promoting pages or products online. The advantages of QR codes are that they’re very portable, they’re unique, and they can be used just about anywhere—they can be scanned with a smartphone camera to quickly get anyone to a specific page on the web...Here are five ways you can use QR codes to elevate your live shows..."
View Full ArticlePosted: Jun 26, 2024
Category: Music Festivals
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Unfortunately you cannot. This is for a couple of reasons: 1. Most music festivals and conferences just don't use email to book. 2. We want people to be knowledgeable about a festival or conference before doing their outreach. 3. There are plenty of times that a submission fee will be required along with your submission.
Posted: Jun 18, 2024
Category: Fans
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**Guest post written by Nick Braren, owner and operator of Upaya Sound. This was originally featured in the Upaya Sound blog.
"The ‘1000 True Fans’ concept, popularized by Kevin Kelly in 2008, suggests that an artist can make a comfortable living by cultivating a base of just 1000 dedicated supporters. These “True Fans” are individuals who are not only passionate about your music but are also willing to support you financially on an ongoing basis. They buy your music, attend your concerts, purchase merchandise, and spread the word about your work."
View Full ArticlePosted: Jun 11, 2024
Category: Songwriting
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**Guest post written by Bug Hunter, a "thoughtful, self-reflective pop" singer-songwriter out of Seattle.
"As a full-time song-writer, I have done my best to keep putting out new content often enough to keep my audience interested in my music while making sure everything about each song meets a SUPER high bar I’ve set for myself in terms of content and lyricism. I’ve averaged a new album every 1.5 years. But 40+ songs later, I found myself coming to the ends of my own experiences and imagination. I’ve covered fresh love, heart-break, sibling rivalry, and screen-peaking emails on airplanes. I’ve even ventured into ghostly neighbors, time-traveling toasters, and metaphorical bank robberies that may or may not be a stand-in for taking too many samples at Costco. I’ve covered all the usual bases."
View Full ArticlePosted: Jun 4, 2024
Category: Technology
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**Guest post by One Submit, a music promotion service.
"AI software can compose tunes, duplicate artists' voices with vocal synthesis, and even create music. Vocal deep fakes routinely take TikTok by storm, replicating the voices of artists like Taylor Swift, Post Malone and Olivia Rodrigo. Be that as it may, ever progressing AI programs can do more than just mirror performers - there are developing fears that they may start to replace musicians, producers and threaten an artist's career within the recording industry...Sony Music Group's letter to over 700 software designers reveals a fear that AI technology now encroaches on the value of human artistry and copyright possession within the music business."