How many Bulletin Posts are too many?

MySpace musicians, in all their gleeful enthusiasm, are sometimes so eager to get the word out that they'll post bulletin after bulletin, hoping someone will take notice. Sometimes they use their bulletin posts not for promoting themselves, but for other causes they believe in.

This does indeed get them noticed, but for all the wrong reasons. Every MySpacer has a short bulletin window that appears in their home control panel. When any one "friend" sucks up all or most of that real estate with incessant posting, it becomes irritating. More than 3 posts a day and you are officially obnoxious. Even if you're posting about world peace.

Being a pushy poster is one of the fastest ways to get yourself kicked off your friends' lists. Too many posts coupled with posts-about-nothing and/or misleading headlines, and you become irrelvant. People just start ignoring you. They figure you've tricked them too many times into clicking on your bulletin headlines, only to find you posted something lame.

So, make your bulletin posts count. Use them for news and interesting tidbits, as a way to communicate with fans and find out what's happening with them. Otherwise, you may find you are turning "off" your fans instead of turning them on to your music.

"Cooler Online" Best New MySpace-Related Music Video!

The award for Best Music Video Depicting Spot-On Online Behavior goes to Brad Paisley's "Cooler Online." How many people have you met in person from MySpace, online dating, Craigslist, the list goes on and on, that are NOTHING like they described on their profile?! Luckily, bands are pretty accurate cuz it's mostly about the music (and maybe some hot imaging/styling too).

How many celebrities can you pick out?

MySpace for Musicians Featured in Advisor/Source Newspapers

The newest issue of The Advisor and Source Newspapers, which covers Macomb County, just outside of Detroit, has featured MySpace for Musicians and local author Fran Vincent (me ) on the front page! You can check out the story here.

I'm really happy with the story and placement. I do want to correct a few things though.... Although the article incorrectly says I didn't have to do much research on MySpace, I can tell you I spent months uncovering aspect of MS and putting together this comprehensive guide to all things MySpace and music marketing! Also want to make sure locals know I don't teach music courses at Macomb Community College (which means music performance/instruction on the academic side). I teach music industry classes in MCC's Center for Continuing Education (CCE). Music industry courses are unique to CCE in the Macomb College community and are non-credit, non-academic courses. You can sign up for the next one, "Promoting Your Music Online," which starts July 17 by visiting www.macomb.edu/cce.

Thanks again for all your support!

Barnes and Noble In-Store Promotion

MySpace for Musicians will be included in a nationwide Barnes and Noble promotion starting June 30th! Wooohooo! I'm really thrilled about this. They are doing a promo of books about social networking and MFM is going to be one of the books featured on an end-cap or on one of those special tables you see in the front of the stores. This is going to be in major markets only, which means definitely in the big coastal cities. For those of you not in a major market, I encourage you to call your local BN and ask if they are carrying the book, and if not to special order it for you. Otherwise, you can pick it up at Amazon.com.

New Site Coming Soon!

It's in the works, complete with sample chapters and other goodies =).

Call MySpace and Facebook Peeps with One Click

So I heard that click-to-call ccube.com users can embed their ccube.com icons on their MySpace and Facebook profiles. If you have a ccube.com account and I have a ccube.com account then I can call you and you can call me by just clicking our ccube.com icons. It's free for up to 60 minutes of talk time. In terms of music marketing, you could use this as a promotional tool whereby you, the artist, are available for click-and-chats with fans on a certain day and time and only to peeps on your friends list. You can easily restrict this to "friends only" by posting a bulletin to friends with your ccube.com ID, or if you want to be really exclusive, make your profile private during your promotional call time, with your headline noting "We're having a private chat. Only Friends Allowed. Add us!" First 10 callers win t-shirts. Use Total Recorder to record some of the conversations and post them on your profile. Promote before-hand through blogs/bulletins, and a notice on your page etc.

Of course the question is, if you've got a computer mic and a set of speakers, why not just use Skype or AIM's voice call function? They're both free and you can talk as long as you like (for Skype-in country at least). You might not need ccube.com after all. Heh.

MySpace Chief Marketing Officer to Keynote Miami Ad:Tech

Miami Ad:Tech, an Interactive Marketing Conference targeted toward the burgeoning Hispanic and international Latin markets announced that MySpace Senior VP of Marketing and Content Shawn Gold will interviewed by CNN anchor Alberto Padilla as part of the conference's keynote presentation. Gold will discuss the marvel of social networking, the launch of MySpace Espanol, and what the service has in store for the U.S. Hispanic and Latin American markets.