A Lesson In Marketing From a Rock Band - Part IV
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We just played a great show not too long ago. I don’t feel that the show went well based on the number of mistakes we made or even the overall sound of the band. I feel that the show was great based on the turnout and overall attitude of the crowd.
I also feel that we accomplished more then just playing a good show by the amount of people we networked with. Like any small business, when we do business, I like to count relationships. I feel that we built a good number of relationships that night….. relationships with new fans (we added some names to our mailing list), relationships with a new club, relationships with some new bands.
In business we generally refer to relationship building as “networking”. If the connection is made on-line then we call it “social networking”. However you want to refer to it; building new relationships opens doors for future opportunities.
The New Fans - This one is obvious, if they signed up for our mailing list then they have given their consent for us to market to them in the future (marketing by consent is one of the most affective forms of marketing).
The Club - The club was happy with our turnout so they gave us the invite to come back… this gives us one more place to play our music (conduct our business). If we play there more then we can even build personal relationships with the people in the club and not the club as a whole…. this approach gives us even more leverage for “word of mouth” marketing and can help build our network.
The Bands - We played with two bands that we had never played with before. This helps us because when they have a future show they need to book, they are more apt to return the favor and give us a call. If the bands dig our music then they might even transition into the “Fans” section.
On-line we also build our network through “virtual relationships” - we write out blog, we twitter out tweets, we make the most of MySpace, and we reach out through facebook.
I feel that the social networking aspect only turns affective once the relationships has transitioned to “off-line” in our situation, but it is still good to have our network there….. and we don’t abuse that network, we only market when we have something that we think they would be interested in, and we try to activiley be social with them otherwise.
Build and treat your network with respect, and much like the verizon commercials… they will make sure you are covered.
