Indie Music Marketer .com

Your demo is your calling card to the music industry. A good demo could result in getting those special gigs on weekend nights or possibly sparking some interest from an A&R rep. A bad demo on the other hand may lead your band into gigging on weekdays in bad time slots were there usually is no audience in the club or worst yet rejection from many people in the music business. Whatever you are using your demo for there are some guide lines that can help you position your band in a favorable light. Likewise there are some things you should avoid at all costs which will label you as non-professional.

Put the best song first on your CD. May people in the music business are very busy and if the first song on your demo

doesnt catch them it is highly unlikely that they will listen to the rest of your CD.

Put no more than six songs on your demo no less than three. Again, industry people are busy and they will probably not listen to more than six songs.

Make sure to put your contact info on both the CD as well as your CD jacket. Your CD may get separated from the box and if you dont have your contact info on the CD the listener may not dig through the paperwork of all the other bands that have submitted CD's to find your info. Make it easy for them, have it in both places.

Make sure that the CD you are sending was decently recorded. It doesnt have to be done in a full blown state of the art studio. Make sure that the recording is clean and sounding good.

Shotguning is sending your CD to hundreds of industry people without checking out what types of music that they work with or if they accept unsolicited submissions. If you are sending to labels check out other artist that are on that label and compare their music to yours. A label that puts out rock albums may not be interested in a country act. The best thing you can do send a letter explaining about your act and that you would like to submit a CD to their record company. Include a self addressed stamped post card for their reply. This will help save you money on postage from those labels that are not interested or wont accept unsolicited CD's. Use postal mail for this contact. Emails get easily missed and may not reach your intended industry person.

Well there you have it, follow these quick and dirty rules and you will get you shot at the industry. Good luck and let me know how things work out!