Music Promotion & Marketing

Independent Artists: Send Music CD for Radio Airplay

Posted on July 13th, 2009 in Offline Marketing & Promotion, Online Marketing & Promotion, Radio Airplay.
Tags: airplay, demos, fm radio, independent artists, internet radio, online radio, Radio

Hopefully you’ve already tackled the radio airplay route and, if you haven’t, why not? Local FM radio would be a good option – particularly university radio or community stations – but also Internet radio stations are a great way of getting targeted, global exposure for your music and often are much easier to contact.

There are many radio stations that will offer airplay for independent artists’ music CDs and demos for free and is an option that should be considered quite seriously as a means of achieving further exposure as an independent artist.

Many radio hosts love to help promote and offer exposure for new music as it helps keep their shows and the station fresh and interesting – not to mention the fact that and they are getting free material to play from new artists that’s not far from being exclusive. Some even have a dedicated section of their show for independent artists or new music, demonstrating the perfect opportunity you should be looking out for.

Independent artists can underestimate radio airplay as a medium for getting their music heard. Not only does it promote the music itself, it raises awareness of your existence and can help towards the hype or the ‘word of mouth experience’ – recommendations.

It’s often a hard task to get radio hosts interested in your music and if you manage to get hold on a contact address to send music to there’s no guarantee they’ll play it. To improve your chances of getting your work heard ensure:

• it sounds the best it can be. Make sure you are completely happy with the track before sending it to anyone in the industry.
• make sure you send your music to radio stations or hosts that already play that style of music. If your demo fits within the genres they are interested in they are more likely to include it within the DJs sets or hosts playlist.
• aim for radio airplay targeted to a genre or specific audience but on a global level.
• you address your demo to the person you want to receive the demo using their name – either the host or DJ themselves or the producer of the show. Personally addressed mail is more likely to be opened than one addressed to ‘The Producer of …’ or ‘The Host of …’
• you do whatever you can to solicit your submission. Many people – labels included – won’t accept any demos that have not been approved to be sent. Do what you can to ensure your submission will be received and opened.

Anything you can do to make your as attractive as possible to ensure it gets opened is worth doing. I heard a story once of a band with a name relating to apes or monkeys, although I can’t remember their exact name. They sent their demos to a large label in a huge box full of press releases, other information and bananas, of all things.

Of course the box got put under the desk and left as the guys had plenty more demos to go through. A week later the box was still there but there was an odd smell coming from somewhere in the room and the team were trying to find what it was that was causing the smell.

They found the source and had to empty the box but it got them to open it and brought attention to their CD demo, which is exactly what was intended. Although it didnt work in the way they intended they still succeeded.

That story was based around a band sending a demo to a record label as opposed to a radio DJ, but was a clever idea in making sure they got noticed. You can put this idea towards your own endeavours and see where it gets you.

If you’ve have any success in getting your radio submissions heard on the radio or if you have any other tips and ideas please comment below and share your ideas and experiences.