When most people think about marketing and branding, they usually associate it with advertising. Obviously, advertising/promotion is a very important marketing tool. If people don’t know you exist, how are they going to book you for their events? However, there are many other ways to get your name out there besides spending a huge amount of money on advertising.
Here are a few tips on how to promote your DJ brand.
1. Produce Your Own Music
There are a couple of reasons why this is important:
a) Your name and brand can reach a lot further when you produce your own music instead of "only" being a DJ
b) Most people assume that if you are a good producer, then you are a good DJ. It might not be necessarily true, but that's how people see it.
c) Your music, unlike you, is omnipresent. You can upload a song on Soundcloud and have people from all over the world listening to it.
We know that it can be very hard to start producing your own music. It takes time, patience, and focus, however, the benefits you get from making some great tracks are unbelievable. To help you accelerate your learning curve on music production, we created Odesi Music Composition Software. You can learn more about it here.
2. Host Your Own Events
One of the things most DJs complain about is: "Nightclub owners don’t give me a chance to play at their venue”. But, think about that for a second. If they don’t give you that dream opportunity to play at their club, for whatever reason that might be, how can you make sure that you still get some gigs? Of course, you could try other places. But, an even better idea is to host your own events.
First, it will give you a better sense of everything that goes into creating/planning an event. It’s not as easy as you think. Furthermore, it will put you in a similar position as the NightClub owner that didn’t book you. It will give you some insight to why he made that decision in the first place. Finally, hosting your own events will promote your name as a DJ and give you more credibility as people will take you more seriously if the event is successful.
3. Have A Great PressKit
Once you’ve got some experience under your belt, you might find that you need to assemble a press kit. This is an informational package that provides club owners, booking agents, publicists and journalists with the materials they need to promote or write about you. Read more about how to create a great press kit here.
4. Innovate
History shows that the first brand into the brain, on the average, gets twice the long-term market share of the #2 brand and again twice as much as the #3 brand. So, think about some ways that you can differentiate yourself. Be the first one to do it, and stick to that message. Let me give you an example, Kygo mixed some genres together and created Tropical House. You may argue that he didn’t actually "created" it, but in the public’s mind, Tropical House is highly associated with Kygo, the same way that Dubstep is associated with Skrillex. You don’t actually have to create a completely new genre to innovate. There are many other things that you can do, but this is for a later post ;)
5. Get Out Of Your Bedroom
Human beings, by nature, love to make connections. There is no more effective way to connect with people in the music industry than actually being out there socializing with them. Deadmau5 mentioned in his MasterClass that this was one of the main reasons he discovered Skrillex and how he was discovered as well. Skrillex actually went to deadmau5’s concert and gave him a pen-drive with his music on it. Had Skrillex just send him an email with a Soundcloud link, he would’ve probably not even open it. In the Digital Era, don’t forget to make those face-to-face connections. Go out to your local clubs. Meet other DJs. Meet people in the crowd. Get your name out there. Real-world personal connections are always worth more than cold submissions.
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