Do you think your fan base might like to read about what you’re doing? Of course, they would, you’re answering.
One of the ways of getting in touch with your fans is through the numerous blogs and news services dedicated to bluegrass music. YES, there is more than ONE.
I can think of more than a handful of sites that do basically the same thing yet it seems that whenever a bluegrass group or artist gets a story of a new CD, a new band member, or something similar posted on one certain news site, that posting link seems to get Tweeted, Facebook’ed, and plastered around numerous social media sites. Time and again I continue to see this social media sharing of just one internet based news service … as if that is the only one in existence. What an oversight.
Yet if (or when) anything is posted from any of the other sites who also provide the same basic service, it’s usually the site’s owner who is posting it.
What has happened to sharing? There are some of these web-based news services who may do what they do for the sheer joy of doing it, but most are operating a business and struggle to make a living. I wonder if the courtesy they show any artist by posting a news story might be worth sharing? I wonder if they may like to have a few of that artist’s social media friends know about them and their services?
A while back, I wrote about a friend of mine who basically had the same to say about the services provided by their radio station and the oblivious and perfunctory attitude being shown by many of their on-air guests.
(https://www.facebook.com/notes/prescription-bluegrass/care-to-share-/494060560667204 )
It’s not just radio. And it’s not just news services. It’s everyone and every entity that does anything that helps an artist’s career, whether that be news, interviews, reviews, endorsements, quotes, etc. There are so many ways to pay back those folks and a simple sharing of what they have done is not only so easy to do, but is one of the ways.
The act of NOT sharing is a reckless practice. The act of expecting and accepting services from other publications but only sharing from one favorite source time and again is negligence. When we see this careless attitude demonstrated over and over by so many, it speaks loudly. But rather than speak for all, let me speak for just Prescription Bluegrass.
I can’t tell you exactly how many times we’ve been first to publish a news story and find that other services were a day or more behind our posting, but I can tell you that it happens quite frequently. I also can’t tell you exactly how many artists or their management teams are aware of this fact, but I can tell you that we’re not an unknown entity to them and many of them are often surprised by the quickness with which we are able to post their news stories.
So why do we publish any news stories for any bands/artists? We’re in business to earn a living. We can only do that through the sale of advertising, which is based on the number of readers we have. The more readers we have, the more chances we have to attract better advertising contracts. News generates readers. Being the first to publish a story sometimes helps that effort, but when the artist(s)/bands then direct their fans to another site to read the very same story published a day or more after our publication, we’ve gained very little for our efforts.
When we post a news story from a press release sent by an artist, or their management, and that same story also gets published in several other outlets but that artist then shares the story posted in just that one certain other outlet, they’ve helped that one outlet to grow some but have slapped all the others in the face. Much like a parent giving all of their attention to just one child, you might expect the others to rebel.
If an artist is going to share their news story from one outlet only, time and again, I wonder why they bother sending the press release to any of the others in the first place. Is there really any need for the others? I know, that’s a rhetorical question. The reality is that they want it all. They take and take but when it’s time to give they’re selfish. Selfish with their time (it takes so much time these days to point and click on a share-icon). And they are selfish with their intent (the all for me – me – me syndrome).
We like sharing. Granddad used to always say that good news needs to be spread like good jam on toast. Please feel free to share the links for any of the stories we’ve posted on our blog over on your Facebook page, or share the link on Twitter. We even make it easy with popular social media icons at the bottom of each story. (We’ll even add more if someone were to request some that we haven’t found.)
And you don’t have to limit yourself to just stories about you and your band. Feel free to share the stories about your friends and any other news that strikes you as interesting. Chances are, others will be glad you did. And so will we. Thank You!!!
