Did ReverbNation Finally Get It Right?
By Nick Daugherty | February 3, 2008
Last week while researching Facebook apps, I ran across the all-new ReverbNation.com, and spent some time test-driving this new “indie artist empowerment tool.” Now, I’m not easily impressed these days, but they’ve made a believer out of me.
ReverbNation borrows heavily from MySpace, PureVolume, and others, but with two fundamental differences.
First, I’m a firm believer that every performing band should have their own stand-alone website that they personally own. ReverbNation acknowledges this with free and useful widgets. Virtually everything that you store or create on ReverbNation (tour dates, mp3s, blogs, etc) can be easily dropped onto your personal website and blog.
ST Tip: Widgets exist solely for the purpose of saving you that time and energy.
This is a win-win situation that makes me think ReverbNation finally got it right. Widgets make it easy for you (the artist) and familiar (to your fans); plus they help drive traffic back to ReverbNation. Just set them up and put them all over the web!
Second, ReverbNation acknowledges that your fans are your own. Unlike MySpace, they don’t lock your “friends” list behind their corporate wall. They have created a free — yet powerful — fanmail tool called FanReachTM that competes with many of the paid mailing list programs out there. Plus, FanReachTM allows you to export the list to your own mailing list program.
As if that weren’t good enough, you can get paid too! Under their new “Fair Share” program, you (the artist) will receive 50% of the revenues generated by the advertising displayed on your artist profile page.
From ReverbNation.com: At the end of each month, half of the advertising revenue from ads across all artist profile pages will be put into a pool. That pool of money is divided among the artists participating in the Fair Share program based upon the proportion of site activity each artist generated for the month.
Site activity includes things such as page view activity, song play activity, and fan activity.
To qualify, artists must hold the copyrights (or permission from the rightful copyright owners) to all the content displayed on their profile pages.
Once you’re signed up, be sure to fully check out the Artist Toolbox - it’s the orange tab located on your artist profile page. It is jam-packed with tools that will make your online life easier and save you time:
- FanReachTM - Collect fan emails automatically from anywhere on the web. Manage your contacts and target fans through emails more effectively.
- Widgets - Place your music, show schedule, etc. on your Myspace page or website. No need to double-post on both Myspace and Facebook anymore.
- Stats - Learn valuable information about your listeners, buyers and those promoting your music. Find new fans in different demographics you might never have thought about
- DistroNowTM - Sell your music online (partnered with Snocap).
- The TuneWidgetTM - Automatically created “super” widget that includes your band’s music, mailing list, videos, shows and more. The TuneWidget has cross-promotion capabilities with other bands and the ability to have fans share it across the web easily.
- Street Team Management - Recruit and manage your street team by creating missions with rewards for your fans. Results are tracked automatically!
The bottom line is the folks at ReverbNation have put together the most powerful suite of tools I’ve ever seen for the indie musician to get their music to the fans that crave it. And it’s all free. Record labels, be afraid. Be very afraid.
If you need help using these tools or you are interested in a short demo you can contact Neal Moody at ReverbNation, at (919) 321-2268 or nmoody@reverbnation.com, and he says he’ll be glad to set up a presentation for you.
Or you can just try it now.
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Loading ...About the Author
Nick Daugherty is a singer/songwriter on a journey. He earned more than 120,000 hits in one year on his site NicksJourney.com by using marketing strategies he reveals on his blog “How To Get A Record Deal in 365 Days.” Visit Author's Website.
Last 5 posts by Nick Daugherty
- Turbocharge Your Facebook Musician Page - February 1st, 2008
- How to Reach 25 Million New Fans on Facebook - January 28th, 2008
- Finally, A Visual Thesaurus For Visual People - January 18th, 2008
- Guitar Picks and Drumsticks Made From Wheat? - September 26th, 2007
- How To Subscribe To Podcasts Without iTunes - September 23rd, 2007
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