How to Grab Attention of Press, Bloggers, and Influencers

Posted by Eric Hebert on Sep 3, 2009 in Label 2.0 Updates | Comments

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If you’re a musician trying to get the word out about your work, there’s no doubt you spend a lot of time emailing bloggers and PR firms to get people to check you out. This is probably a very tedious process for most, and one that never sees any real results.

Usually, the reason behind not seeing results is because you probably don’t know how to communicate properly with those who you are trying to get to listen to you. It’s not always your fault – learning how to get people to open an email is a talent I have spent years honing.

For most, though, email communication is usually done wrong out of sheer laziness.

As someone who’s carved quite a niche in the music biz, I get bombarded with emails and phone calls every single day from artists all over the world. And I’d say about 90% of those emails go straight in the trash can.

Because I see and understand both sides of the equation, I’m going to share with you some tips on how you can get better results when trying to contact people in the industry.

Reaching out to bloggers is a great strategy to getting your music, videos, and more, in front of people. One of the things I try to teach artists all the time is to compile a list of music blogs that cater to an audience that might write a post about them.

Now, just because a blog might be a perfect fit for your music, doesn’t mean that the blog owner is going to give two shits about you. The goal is to create a personal email that proves you’ve actually visited said blog and to give the blogger a reason to consider you for a post.

So, if you want to reach out to that blogger, send them a personal email introducing yourself, and mention that you found the blog, followed by something specific that stood out; a little brown-nosing here will do you a lot of good.

Then mention that you are a musician and describe your sound in an easy way – comparing yourself to 3-4 well known bands is the best way. Don’t give the blogger some BS about how you’re creating some brand new sound or are some artsy-fartsy experimental band with over-the-top adjectives describing your sound. Bloggers get this crap every day and it doesn’t motivate them one bit.

Lastly, provide something that will entice the blogger to give you a shot – and I HIGHLY RECOMMEND creating a bio/press release that features information about your band/music, a video if possible, and a direct link to download an mp3.

The deal-sealer here is to format that press article in raw HTML, and attach it as a .txt document. Embed and format the post with pictures. If your using ReverbNation, you can easy copy the download link and include it in the article.

This way, if the blogger does read your email, and sees you’ve attached something they can easily copy and paste into their blogs CMS, they’ll be very much inclined to do so. Creating a blog post takes time and many bloggers don’t make a dime off doing it. If you can provide them with something they know their audience will enjoy, and it only takes them a few minutes to post, it’s a safe bet you’ll see some great results.

Here is an example of a FANTASTIC blog post to give you an idea of what I’m talking about:

With a new album due this summer with long-time collaborator DJ Zeph, 2009 is proving to be another great year for Bay Area MC Azeem.

Last year’s critically acclaimed album “Air Cartoons” is still gaining attention, recently being the most popular video for the single “Open ‘Em Up” in BET’s “Ya Heard” music video contest.

You may have heard of Azeem as part of the band Telefunken, a live instrument/hip-hp mash up during the early 90′s. He then broke through as a solo artists after testing his lyrics at an open mic, going by the name The Invisble Man, taking first place in a competition with 50 others.

This led to touring with Lollapalooza, sharing stages with George Clinton, A Tribe Called Quest, and The Beastie Boys—to name a few.

Following this was a chain of events which landed Azeem a PBS special with Washington Square Films, two published books, and a ranking spot as second best performance poet in the nation.

In ’97, Azeem was hired by Bay Area artist, Michael Franti, to assist him in composing songs for the second Spearhead album. This lead to two years of world travel where he was a writer and performer with the band. After his third tour, Azeem resigned to further his career.

2000 saw the release of his first solo EP Garage Opera (Heratik) as well as a track on Afro-Mystik’s Future Tropic album. Azeem followed up with the full-length album Craft Classic (Stray). The albums’ single “Rubber Glue” earned the #1 spot on the CMJ radio rap chart.

In early 2004 Azeem was the front man for Mayhemystics (Wide Hive) a mixture of live music and spiritually charged lyrics, which has been nominated for a California Music Award. At the same time he released a second Album (for the year) with Bomb Hip Hop entitled Show Business.

In 2005 Azeem Joined up with the band Colossus (OM records) for the album entitled ” West Oaktown ” He was featured on the single From the Lab.

2007 OM HipHop Released the album RISE UP by DJ Zeph and Azeem and the hit single Play the Drum which Topped the charts in Europe and Australia . This led to touring Australia with Talib Kweli, along with numerous shows in the US and Canada . Azeem also wrote, directed and starred in a the highly acclaimed one man play Rude Boy, where Azeem plays a young man from Jamaica who ends up in working as a janitor a cardboard box factory in America.

Then in 2008 Azeem’s “Play The Drum” was featured on the HBO hit series “Entourage”, along with having several tracks placed in an Adidas ad campaign.

In 2008 Azeem returned, with a third full-length that’s equal parts grit and fun. Air Cartoons Over the course of 14 tracks, the Oakland-based MC covers drops references to the Oklahoma City bombings, the Bush Administration, and his issues with the hyphy movement, but still manages to have fun by throwing in some humor and several shout outs to the Bay Area. Meat Beat Manifesto, DNAE Beats, and Bassnectar make appearances for production duties, and the horn-drenched “Latin Revenge” is a refreshing spin on contemporary hip-hop.

Download the single “Open’Em Up” now for free, and head over to mcazeem.com to grab even more free tracks spanning Azeem’s career.