I have had a page for my band on the web since August of 1997. I included the band page as part of my Blue Gary's Computers and Blues Site. The name of my band is The Righteous Groove. So you see I have just provided two links from this page that you would not have known about otherwise. This is just an example of web promotion. Of course there are many more sites with tons more stuff promoting zillions of bands on the web.
Why go through all this stuff anyway?
Good Question! There is a great article by Dan McAvinchy of Guitar Nine Records that describes a strategy for releasing that CD you spent all your money and time making. Part of the article talks about why it is a good idea to get your band on the internet.
We barely make enough for gas money!
Well, for sure you can't use the web if you have no computer. If you have a computer you still need an Internet Service Provider. However, if you can get that together, putting up a web presence is very in expensive. You can get free space with several different servers. In fact this site is located on a free service, Angelfire. They even have a way to build a page without having to know HTML. HTML is the type of computer language used on the web to build and manipulate the pages. Another free place is GeoCities - way cool! Free E-MAIL accounts.
Of course like anything, there is simple versions and complex versions. You can add sound to your site. You can provide cuts from your demo tapes, and you can take orders for your CD. The idea here is to get started and not try to do everything at once. Of course you can pay someone to build and maintain a site for you if you got the CA$H. One example of this is the Home Page For Unsigned Artists.
OK, I got the page now what?
I suppose the hardest and at the same time most interesting part of web site development is promoting your site. You got this site but you are not getting any feedback (like this one most times). Before submitting you site to the net, it is a good idea to make sure you have a counter and a guestbook. You can get a free guestbook at Lpage.com The guest book and the counter will help you keep track of the people that visit your site. You can submit your site address (URL) to the various search engines. If you do this make sure you have some keywords that will bring people to your site. There is a service called SUBMIT IT. They will announce your site for free.
I guess the last thing is use the web. There is so much information! By taking a little time and using your creative skills you can find out how-to do most anything.....
