In earlier blogs I mentioned about some of the tools that we provide and also that are available elsewhere online for artists to use to promote their music and ministry.  Sadly only 1 reply from an artist commenting on the ideas.  Yet I constantly receive emails and communication from artists asking why some artists are always in the charts and achieve thousands of plays, while others struggle.

The answer is simple:

1) They promote well and 2)  they are good and have something people want to listen to.

Now, here's the really interesting part.  You don't necessarily need point 2 to gain a lot of attention on the net, but equally, you could be the greatest artist and musician in the world, yet if you don't promote, relatively few people will hear you.   Its a fact of life, but, man, come on, be honest, isn't it so annoying when someone who doesn't have 1/10th of the talent you have in your little toe, achieve much more exposure and plays than you do?  Of course it is.

MARKETING is VITAL - and if you think it sounds crude to mix this in the Christian music scene, then I believe you miss the full message of the great commission that the Lord left with us.

Simply placing your songs on the net, is not 'going into all the world'.  That's a little like putting a notice in your front window and just because everyone in your home town could potentially see it if they walked past your house, doesn't mean that they will.

Interestingly, the one artist who made a comment on some of the marketing posts I made in earlier blogs, is one of the artists who has struck me recently as being active in the area of promotion.  Matt McChlery. 

Matt is now doing Matt McChlery TV.  He sits down in front of a video camera once a month and sings a new song, provides chord charts and words, and uploads the video to youtube and myCB.  Way to go Matt for being pro-active in this.

Go to Matt's myCB mini-site and the very first thing you will see in his biography is an invitation to join his mailing list and a link to his main site.  Its not tagged on at the end, as an afterthought.  No sir, its right there at the start.  What does this say?   Well, it says he's interested in hearing from you as a fan and he wants to communicate.  For me, as a music fan, it makes me interested in this artist who is actually wanting to interact and 'give'.  I'm intrigued and so read on for more and will almost certainly listen to his music.  Its then up to me to decide whether he fits point 2 above or not.  The thing is, I'm here because of point 1.  He promotes!!!!

Look at the artists on the site who achieve the big plays.  Are they the best?  Do they fit into point 2?   I'll leave that for you to decide, but one thing I can assure you of, is that they are all active in marketing.  Without being active on point 1,.........well you get the point by now!!

Sadly I see very few CD giveaways, promotion offers for discounted or mp3 downloads, yet all of these are available to each full subscribing artist on the myCB site to use to cause a buzz around their ministry and music.

We're about to see 100+ new artists come onto the site for the month of March 08.  A wealth of new music and talent.  It will be interesting to see who grabs the attention of the visitors on the site.   Where will you figure in the promotion stakes?

Hi Folks,
With the launch of the new revamped site late last year, I removed the old forums, which were popular, but were plagued by spammers - which sadly led to it's demise.

It's been obvious from both the blog content, the growth of the site and the number of new fans and artists joining, that the forums have been missed.

So, I'm working to bring the forums back online, more moderators to help me, and enhanced security features to try and see if I can stop the serious amount of spamming that was taking place on the old forum. (see the new menu item across the top of each page....COMMUNITY FORUMS)

Only artists and registered fans will be able to post on the forums.

In the meantime, I'm afraid, no-one will be able to make any forum posts yet. Please bear with me as I work on this. It will be opened to you all once it has been fully tested and all security patches are in place.

Simon

P.S. I'm also hoping that your login to myCB will also work as your login to the forum as well, and when new artists/fans sign up to myCB, they will also have an account on the forum instantly as well.

WATCH THIS SPACE!!

Hi everyone,
This newsletter is going out to both artists on the site AND all member/fans.   We have some REALLY exciting news to share and it can affect ALL of you and we want all of you to get involved.

Since last May 2006, we've been having interesting talks with R Music TV about providing artists/bands from the site for their TV shows.  One of the most exciting parts of this for me (as founder of myCB) is how much of an affinity I believe the vision of myCB has with the vision and outreach of the good folks at R Music TV.

They very much see what they do as outreach AND ministry to their growing audiences through satellite broadcasting from around the world.  'Evangelism through music' being a major part of that.

So, with 2007 already presenting its new challenges to us at myCB, I am delighted to announce that invited myCB artists will shortly be appearing on R Music TV while we (myCB) will be continuing our search for new talent coming through the Christian music scene.

MEMBER/FANS

What role do you have as a member/fan?
Simple......make sure you listen to your favorite artist/band regularly.  Sign up as FANS on their myCB site. Tell your friends about what's happening on the myCB site and the more prominence your artist/band has, the more chance that they will come to our attention and will be noticed and then possibly invited to appear on R Music TV.

YOU can literally make this happen for YOUR favorite artist/band.   So get involved now.

*Remember, we randomly give away CD's each and every month to fans who provide the best song reviews on the site.  You must have a pic and an good profile to win though.  ;-)

More details will follow in due course about which myCB artists/bands are appearing on the shows and when/how you can catch them on your TV.  Imagine seeing YOUR favourite band, and knowing that YOU played some part in making it happen for them.

ARTISTS/BANDS

What can you do to be part of this?

Well, obviously spread the word about your myCB site.  We'll also be in touch directly with ALL artists in due course to outline how you can make a TV appearance happen for you.

However, please view this as a WIN WIN for all artists on the myCB site.  In this affiliation, the myCB site is going to be promoted to R Music TV audiences across the world on air regularly.  So, our audience figures will increase even further than they have to date.

What's more, the friendship between the myCB and R Music TV should be ongoing, so the effort you put into promoting your myCB site will not just help you once-off, but will increase the site and YOUR exposure for the long term. 

We will shortly be placing a dedicated R Music TV page on the myCB site.

*Please don't contact R Music TV directly.  All bookings will be done through myCB staff.

R Music TV - Sky Channel 370

Finally, we praise God for your prayers and dedicated ongoing support and for the doors which are being opened.  Your faithfulness to the vision of myCB is a honor to watch and enjoy. 

What an awesome God we serve!

Blessings to you all,

Simon

At 11.46pm on Dec 30th 2006, Callum Simon Richardson made his debut appearance.  Weighing in at 11 lbs and 6 ozs and equipped with a large pair of hands with long fingers (for keyboards and piano I reckon) the latest addition to the ChristianBands family was born.

Royanne and I are so proud.  This New Years night has been a VERY special one for us as the 3 of us brought in the new year together in a hospital room.  (This was a day, and something that Royanne and I thought we would never see....long story).  Yet God is good.  Very Good.

We want to give a VERY special thanks to all of the staff at the Midwifery Led Unit at Craigavon Hospital.  Special thanks to a very special lady, midwife and friend, Roberta Jess, who came in specially to be with Royanne and I through the birth.  She was awesome - a real Godsend and an angel to us.  Words can't express our gratitude to you Roberta.  Water births are amazing folks.  (Just for those who are in the position now or in the future and are considering which way to go).

Thanks also to every one of you on myCB, artists, members, music fans and supporters of the vision of this site, for all of your heartfelt love, wishes and prayers for us at this time.

I'll post a pic soon.  Once I get mum and baby back home tomorrow (New Years Day).

If you have been experiencing a slowness to the site and connectivity issues recently we apologise.

The issue has now been addressed.

It is a combination of site growth and demand on the servers plus DOS attacks from hackers, and spammers.  (Keeps our tech team rather busy).

An extra 2GB of RAM is being pulled on to the myCB servers as I write to further improve things and bring them back to the normal and high standard you have enjoyed over the past 2 years. Thanks for your patience with us.

This code can be placed onto any website, including personal sites, myspace etc (and you can even make the code available for your fans to add it to their site to support you).

We envisage this is going to send our bandwidth bills through the roof, but we are doing it to help each artist promote themselves more widely -  all we ask in return is that you keep the small 'Powered By myChristianBands.com' link at the bottom.

As normal, casual listeners to the player on other sites will hear 30 second samples of all of your uploaded songs to myCB.  To hear full versions, they simply need to register on the site and be logged in.

This year we have teamed up with U105's Sunday morning 'Sunrise' program with DJ Julian Martin (aka Juls), to bring you the Christmas Charts.

How it Works
The charts will run each week from Thursday to Thursday and the song at the top of the Christmas charts (most plays) each week, will be featured on the front page of the site for the following week and will receive airplay on the U105 radio show that Sunday morning.  (Song no 2 will be used in week 2 if the same song is no 1 2 weeks running etc). 

At the end of 3 weeks, the 3 top songs will be placed onto a public vote (not charts) on the site and it will be left for the public to vote for their favorite from the 3 songs to find the Christmas no 1.

The winning song will be aired on Christmas Eve on the show and will be featured on the front page of the site over the Christmas and New Year period.

ARTISTS
If you haven't uploaded your Christmas song yet, do it as soon as possible.  We refresh the charts each week on a Thursday so everyone has an equal chance each week.

You may wish to spread the word to your existing fanbase to ask them to vote for you.

MEMBERS/FANS
Make sure you listen to the charts and keep coming back each day to play your favorite song.  One play each day per song from each member is counted. 

THE SERIOUS BIT
The integrity of everything we do is vital to us at myChristianBands.  So please do not spam the site by repeatedly playing the same song.  Your vote won't count any more than once per day AND you will probably find yourself blocked from viewing the site.  Please act responsibly.

Have fun!!!

So, you've started writing blogs, and are finding ways to encourage music fans to sign up to your RSS feed on your site.  They now get automatic updates each time you upload a new song, enter a blog etc etc......so you're off to a great start.

Marketing (as that is in reality what ministry that reaches out to a new audience is) should be seen as having 2 tasks.

• Attracting new people to become fans/subscribers to your site.
• Keeping the existing subscribers updated with new and relevant information.

Each time you do something, make sure it fulfills one or both of the above.

OK, so now we're going to look at a third and foruth feature of the myChristianBands site that you can use to attract fans to listen to your music.

3)   YOUR PROFILE DETAILS ARE KEY
It's surprising how many artists list their location as Algeria or Alabama.  OK, so you might come from there, but I've a funny feeling most of you live in other places on the globe.  Yet this is typical of what a lot of artists have written in their profile section.  OK, so maybe not written, but if you haven't taken a couple of minutes to actually complete your profile properly, the default location will show up and this is usually Alabama or Africa etc.

So when people visit the site and want to find artists from their locale, you don't appear.  Opportunity to be heard, lost.

Go to the ARTISTS page on the site, and at the top left you will see an artists search facility.  You can be found by name, your members, and location.  So it is vital that you take time to make sure your location etc is correct.

Just below that is a box called 'Influences'.  The reason this exists is for music fans to find artists on the site who have a similar style to particular artists that they like.  So, if you have been influenced by Dire Straits, Bob Dylan, Amy Grant, Third Day, U2 etc, make sure you put their names into the 'influenced by' section.  If you don't, once again, opportunity to be heard, lost.

Your profile is vital in helping you secure visitors to your site and therefore potential new fans/subscribers to your music.

4)  YOUR BIRTHDAY (and being online)
OK, so it's not good manners to ask a lady her age, but at myCB we do ask everyone their date of birth.  It's not to be nosey, but is our way to remind everyone on the myCB community to say Happy Birthday to you.

As I'm writing this, Lara Osborne (a fantastic female artist on the site) has her name on the front page of the site as it is her birthday today.  Happy Birthday Lara.

So, while we try to give exposure to all artists as evenly as possible, there is the possibility now for everyone to have their name appear on the front page of the site at least once a year. 

Why not make a trip to the site regularly, just to see if it's someone's birthday and take the time to wish them a Happy Birthday......and make sure of course that you have your own birthday inserted into your own profile.

As a sub-note to that, each time you are logged in to the site, your name is on the front page of the site (unless you have opted to hide it of course) and we can tell you without any shadow of doubt, artists that are logged in come to the attention of the other visitors on the site and see their song plays and stats rise as a consequence.  So the more often you visit the site, the more often you will be seen.

WHAT'S COMING NEXT IN PART 3?
We're going to look at giving you the ability to place some code or a banner on your site which will allow your own website and myspace visitors to vote for you, review and rate you on myChristianBands.  Make sure you subscribe to the RSS of this blog to ensure you don't miss it.

There are many top quality artists who rely on 'word of mouth' and the notion of peppering their music all over websites who simply never achieve a tenth of the audience they are capable of reaching.  Thinking 'outside of the box' will reap you rewards, IF you are prepared to put in as much time promoting yourself as you do in crafting your sound the studio.

For many, self promotion is the only way forward today. While for other artistes, they have promoters and record labels who take on that role. However, a growing number of artists are preferring the 'independent' route. Whichever of the above categories you fall into, this series of marketing suggestions, will help you to gain a bigger audience and achieve more with your music than you ever thought possible.

The great news is, as a member of myChristianBands.com, everything we suggest is available for you to use.  You can do them all.

In this blog, we're going to look at two, with more to follow in the coming weeks.

1. THE myCB SITE
A little over 21 months ago, from a standing start, this site was launched.  The most recent figures I could find from anyone with any credibilty even daring to make an estimation was 3 years ago - but according to a study by Inktomi and NEC, at the end of 2003 there were over 2 billion websites on the internet.  Some put that figure as high as 5 billion now, and some even as high as 10 billion.  Irrespective of which is closer, its a lotta websites and the growth is exponential daily.

DID YOU KNOW?
According to Alexa (independent monitors), this site is in the top 800,000 most popular websites on the net. An astounding fact, considering we are a niche music site. Let me put that into some perspective for you.  1 million seconds = just over 11.5 days.   1 billion seconds = 31.7 years

1 billion rolls over the tongue, just as easily as 1 million, but the difference is vast.  So if you were to begin to view all of the websites in the world over 63 years, in their popularity order, you would view the myChristianBands website on day 8.

That achievement has come about by some very clever marketing techniques we've employed during our 21 months of existence.

What direct relevance has this to you, you may ask. Well, it's simple really. Our aim, is to reach the top 100,000 most popular websites, and for us to do that requires us to help you, and in return that, will help us all.  Each of the following options, will not only increase the number of people who are exposed to your music, but will also rocket this site up those web popularity charts bringing ever more traffic (people) under the message we have to spread.

HOW?
The newly re-launched site has lots of bells and whistles. They are there for your benefit to be used and utilised.  They are not just fancy gimmicks to lengthen our 'features' list.  The first tool I want to draw your attention to is RSS feeds.

2. RSS FEEDS
When you view your pages on the site, you will see the RSS icon on the right hand menu.

WHAT IS IT?
Well clicking on it doesn't give you very much of a clue. You see what looks like some generated html code on a page. But it is much more powerful than that.

ITS AN INSTANT COMMUNICATION TOOL
This article is a blog, and if you 'subscribe' to it via the RSS button to the right of the blog page (http://mychristianbands.com/bands/787/blog.php) as soon as we add to it or update it, your browser will check it automatically and will alert you to the new blog and will then display it to you in a special 'RSS' format.

HOW DO YOU SUBSCRIBE?
There are a large number of ways to receive an RSS Feed. The easiest and most popular way is to subscribe using your web browser.  You can also use an RSS Reader or an online News Service. The Microsoft MSN Alerts service also allows you to have updates delivered by Instant Messenger, or you can even have the feed delivered to your email inbox as a text-only message using RMail..  (You should do a search on the net for more information re RSS if you wish to learn more).

TRY IT OUT!
There's no better way to learn about it, than to actually try it out.  If you don't want to miss the next updates on this blog, simply subscribe to it.

(For Internet Explorer users, we would strongly encourage you to download a free browser package add-on which will enhance your browser incredibly and will build in RSS feed subscriptions to your browser  www.avantbrowser.com).  I've used it for a long time now and wouldn't be without it.

Once you begin to see RSS working, you will begin to appreciate the power of this in-built feature in the myCB site.

THE CHALLENGE
The challenge is then to begin to encourage your fans and casual visitors to the myCB site to subscribe to your RSS.  Update your own myCB site regularly.  This will put you at the forefront of the site and the more blogs you post, the more likely your blogs will be read and the more likely your profile will rise. (Not to mention the extra links to your myCB site that will be generated in google and other search engines etc).

HOW TO INCREASE YOUR SUBSCRIBER BASE
Consider giving away prizes to your blog subscribers.  ie, every now and then you could post a blog with news and which also promises the first 5 people to respond/comment to your blog a copy of your latest CD or a free mp3.  This will build your fan-base dramatically over time and the more active you are, the more successful you will be with it.

I guarantee, that the artists/bands who begin to employ this one feature and tactic will see their stats rise on the site AND their music will reach a wider audience.  It will take time, but it will happen.

If you have any suggestions/comments, please add them to help others.

WHAT'S NEXT?
The next blog will expose more ways for you to expose your music and increase your fan-base.  Make sure you subscribe to ensure you don't miss it.

All of the work involved in the re-launch of the site is, as far as we can tell at this stage, complete.

We know many of you are just getting to grips with the new layout, but we hope you are finding it much easier to navigate and much more user friendly.

Some things have gone. Many things are new.

If you do come across a blip, please do let us know and we'll check it out.

We want to welcome all of the new artists, AND give a BIG WELCOME now to 'ordinary members of the public', (well, non-artists to be precise), the music fans.  You can now participate fully in the site by creating your own profile, write your own blog, create your own podcast/radio station, save your favorite songs and videos in your control panel, add yourself as a fan to your fav artists, communicate with them through a private mailbox system, share your photo gallery pics with the world and much more.   PLUS, we are going to be giving away some great prizes to the most active fans on the site.  So, give your feedback to artists, rate their songs, and we may just surprise you.

Great competitions on the way as well.  (Only available to registered members).

INSTANT DIGITAL SALES DOWNLOADS FACILITIES ARE ON THEIR WAY - WATCH THIS SPACE!