Members sickman Posted April 7, 2010 Members Share Posted April 7, 2010 I have been tasked to create/improve our cover band's website. We currently have a myspace that could be improved upon. The page is going to be used as an online promo pack type of thing to send to venues. I'm not that computer savvy so I am wondering is Facebook or Myspace more user friendly? Another option would be getting a .com, but I don't see anyone else chipping in and I'm not going to front it on my own. Plus, I know nothing about html. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members plepue Posted April 7, 2010 Members Share Posted April 7, 2010 We do it all. Myspace used to be big but it has faded and Facebook is growing for us. We have a .com as well becasue we find that for private shows, casinos and other higher paying performances, having a .com makes you more respectable. Having just a myspace is very garage band. It's well worth the small investment in a .com. If you want to make it easy, check out bandzoogle.com for great easy web creation for musicians at $15 a month. It will meet your "easy" requirements and look very professional. Book one gig off it and its paid for itself for several years. My examples: www.thecured.net (html site) www.freezeframeband.com (html site) www.pjearly.com (bandzoogle created site) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members rhat Posted April 7, 2010 Members Share Posted April 7, 2010 I think you need more of a shotgun approach ,,, face book is nice but i do think you should also have a myspace too. Its a format that everyone knows how to get a listen to your stuff ,,,, You cant beat it for easy of being able to listen to a band after you have checked out their other one line stuff. So i would say ,, myspace. facebook and band website .... and even twitter ,, but its pretty easy to over promote on face book and twitter. You have to really be aware of that ,,, too much is worse than not enough... so on those deals less is more. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members GmanJeff Posted April 7, 2010 Members Share Posted April 7, 2010 We use a .com address, also hosted by Bandzoogle. We think it's far more professional than social networking sites, where all pages tend to look rather similar, and we're convinced we've gotten gigs because our site looks professional rather than amateur. We pay for it by taking the money for the annual cost off the top of a gig's earnings once each year. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members flanc Posted April 7, 2010 Members Share Posted April 7, 2010 We have Facebook, Myspace and a website. Of the three, Facebook get's us more butts in seats. We've been doing Facebook for a few months and don't have a large following...I think it's just over 600...but they are all real prospective fans and it grows every day. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members TrickyBoy Posted April 7, 2010 Members Share Posted April 7, 2010 Facebook and a website - no myspace Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Zeromus-X Posted April 7, 2010 Members Share Posted April 7, 2010 Another option would be getting a .com, but I don't see anyone else chipping in and I'm not going to front it on my own. Plus, I know nothing about html. Really? Is the $3.99 a month for a hosting and domain package going to break you? Because if so, I'd recommend getting out of the music business altogether. At the very least, register your own band's domain name, and have it point to your MySpace or Facebook address. It sounds much better to say "Go to Bandname Dot Com" than it does to say "Go to W W W Dot Myspace Dot Com Slash Bandname". We have two web addresses (that both point to the same site), MySpace, Facebook, Twitter, ReverbNation, and will most likely have a Sonicbids account for the hell of it. Each person in the band is in charge of maintaining one of those. That way, one person doesn't have social networking overload. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members sickman Posted April 7, 2010 Author Members Share Posted April 7, 2010 It sounds like a .com website is the way to go. I think I can get one other guy to split the cost with me. I'm not sure why the others don't see the benefit/economics of paying $45/yr each. Even if it only gets one gig it is worth it. I will look into bandzoogle. Thanks! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members rhat Posted April 7, 2010 Members Share Posted April 7, 2010 Facebook and a website - no myspace When you whiff the myspace,,, you also run the risk of people getting fed up with trying to get a listen to your music because your other place are a PITA to get to run. I dont know how many times on here I have had trouble getting a listen to the band. all that pro image {censored} aside ,, if you cant get them to work , they are worthless.. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members keithtoxic Posted April 7, 2010 Members Share Posted April 7, 2010 I highly recomend the combination of a social networking site like facebook with bandcamp. Myspace is great, but it just doesn't have the local connectivity that facebook has, and the player sucks on both ends of myspace and facebook. When you combine bandcamp you get the full quality versions of your songs, plus people can buy them in whatever format they want, and you can even offer phsyical goods off of bandcamp. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members newmaxnew Posted April 7, 2010 Members Share Posted April 7, 2010 Facebook, Myspace, and web site they all contribute to our promotion efforts. It does seem as if Myspace is really starting to die however. Max Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members jeff42 Posted April 7, 2010 Members Share Posted April 7, 2010 above all else... get a dot com! and myspace and facebook. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members TrickyBoy Posted April 7, 2010 Members Share Posted April 7, 2010 It sounds like a .com website is the way to go. I think I can get one other guy to split the cost with me. I'm not sure why the others don't see the benefit/economics of paying $45/yr each. Even if it only gets one gig it is worth it. I will look into bandzoogle. Thanks! I'm not saying that our website is earth shattering, but my wife put it together in a couple of hours, it was cheap, required no real knowledge of HTML and there were a ton of themes to choose from. I can get you what she used. If you're interested, PM me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members tele-vangelist Posted April 7, 2010 Members Share Posted April 7, 2010 Make it easy on yourself - register your domain name - that's about $10 per year, and then setup a blog with either wordpress or google blogger. For a small fee (IIRC) each will allow you to point your domain name at the blog. Since you don't know HTML this will get you a reasonable looking site with little effort. PM me and I will help you (tech geek is my day job). Edit ... custom domains on blogger are free:http://www.google.com/support/blogger/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=55373 wordpress charges $9.97 per year ($14.97 if you need a new domain name):http://en.support.wordpress.com/domain-mapping/ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members GCDEF Posted April 7, 2010 Members Share Posted April 7, 2010 We have all three. For us, MySpace is the most active still, but a lot of people do seem to be moving away from it. The nice thing about MySpace and Facebook is they're a good way to get your word out to a lot of people easily. A .com adds a degree of credibility and you can format it any way you want to, but it doesn't give you the networking MySpace and Facebook do. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members pjrake Posted April 7, 2010 Members Share Posted April 7, 2010 I will look into bandzoogle. +1 on Bandzoogle. although we're an original band, i would recommend using Bandzoogle for your .com site. -PJ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Vito Corleone Posted April 7, 2010 Members Share Posted April 7, 2010 Depending on the type of cover band you are, you probably need both a Facebook or MySpace and a website. If you play a lot of local gigs and depend on a regular fan base to show up for those gigs, then the networking sites are far better than just a website. Facebook seems to be the preferred site right now, but if you have the time, no reason to not use both. A website is needed mostly if you're looking to use that site as a promotional device geared towards potential new clients. If somebody is looking to hire an unknown band for an event, a Facebook page might just look a little too generic if you're competing against bands with slick sites. As others have said +1 for Bandzoogle. It's easy, cheap and they have everything you need. If you want to have a full site with pics, audio, video, etc, there's no better way to go, IMO. But if you're mostly just interested in keeping local fans updated on where you're playing next and expanding your email lists, then a Facebook is probably sufficient. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members TrickyBoy Posted April 7, 2010 Members Share Posted April 7, 2010 Our crowd is mostly college aged to early 30's and when we started out we asked people if they had facebook/myspace accounts. The result was almost 100% Facebook and almost 0% MySpace. That made our decision easy. We use Facebook for updating people when we're playing next etc. and our website for posting videos, etc. To me MySpace would add no value for what we do. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members tlbonehead Posted April 7, 2010 Members Share Posted April 7, 2010 yes, MS, FB, and a website. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members bassred Posted April 8, 2010 Members Share Posted April 8, 2010 i think any issues folks have with the myspace player is user error... Update your browsers... If you are dumping lo-res MP3's is not going to come out well... I've had no issues in many years. just saying. Besides, a place to load up 10 songs, many,many pictures, gig schedule that costs NOTHING and can easily link updates to Facebook seems like a no-brainer to me. Myspace is far from dead. They were one of the first, and have a lot of staying power. They are even in the music label business, so that seems like they have found a good focus. Make sure you don't ignore good channels because you think you're too good for them. Every band out there that has 'made it' still keeps and updates a MS page. Facebook is not my favorite. I have one, the band has a 'fan page', but I think it's too easily jacked up by annoying apps and a lot of requests get dumped because people are inundated with farmville, et all... that's my 2 cents. Get your domain. I have the .com, .info, .net and .org for a site, it doesn't cost that much at all, and if you are claiming any income from your band, it may be possible to include on your taxes along with gear expenses. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members SpaceNorman Posted April 8, 2010 Members Share Posted April 8, 2010 My private party act uses a band web site - with audio, video, complete song lists, pictures etc. Pesonally, I think it more "pro" than pointing folks towards a Myspace page. My bar band has both a Myspace page and a Facebook page. I think the Myspace page is pretty much fallow at this point and could easily go away and we wouldn't notice it was gone. Facebook on the other hand - now THAT we're loving large these days. We're finding it to be an incredibly effective tool for letting our fans know when and were we're playing. We're also finding that we're growing our fan base too - because anybody who "joins" our page also shares our name with their friends list. We typically send out three postings from the band's FB page to the folks who've "joined" the band's page - one 2 weeks before the gig, one a week before the gig and 1 the day before the gig. Each of us also "shares" the band post on our individual walls at about the same interval. It never ceases to amaze me how many times I see the band post show up on my well as our friends and fans "share" the posting on their walls. It is a great tool for helping to mobilize your fan base. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members jeff42 Posted April 8, 2010 Members Share Posted April 8, 2010 We still keep an updated myspace page. hell the photo album is linked from our website! It is still some use to me but most of the communication with people that come to our shows is done with facebook now. So I use & update both, and of course the main site: www.tbarocks.com Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members mstreck Posted April 8, 2010 Members Share Posted April 8, 2010 All of the above. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members piersonm Posted April 9, 2010 Members Share Posted April 9, 2010 We have a Facebook and Myspace with pics and gig info but that ties into a website. Its cool to have the 'friends' type of sites but, those start looking cheesy if thats your only internet option and bigger venues (aka higher paying gigs) want to check out your band. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members RupertB Posted April 9, 2010 Members Share Posted April 9, 2010 We have Facebook, Myspace and a website. Of the three, Facebook get's us more butts in seats. We've been doing Facebook for a few months and don't have a large following...I think it's just over 600...but they are all real prospective fans and it grows every day. +1They all have their benefits. Eric has worked in web marketing for a while, so he handles this stuff for us. We also do an e-mail blast a few days before each gig. IIRC, the list is around 200 confirmed addresses. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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