How to Build Your Band’s Brand

These days, finding your band’s sound is only step one of finding success in the music industry. The second, and arguably the most important step after figuring out what kind of band you want to be, is how to communicate that image to the rest of the world.

Properly branding your band is vital to going from local sensation to international superstardom.

Find Your Message

What do you hope to accomplish in the music industry? What sort of message are you hoping to push out into the world? These are questions that you might have considered but not fully developed answers to.

The best thing you can do as a band is to make your message personal to you. Those bands who find the most success are the ones that truly open up to their audiences.

Now, this doesn’t mean that you have to abandon all sense of privacy and forgo having a personal life in order to be successful. Rather, find the message that you want to convey to your future fan base and make that as genuine as possible. A general, broad message that appeals to the largest amount of people might sound like a good idea on paper, but it is the purely personal that time and time again has shown itself to stand the test of time.

Utilize All Platforms

The amount of media platforms at your fingertips can actually be overwhelming at times. Furthermore, each one has its own recipe for how it should best be utilized. If your goal is to reach as many people as possible as quickly as possible, your band must have a presence on at least all of the major social media platforms (think Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, etc.).

What follows is the big question of where to begin. The first thing you should do as a band is to invest in content for your social media pages that reflects the brand you are looking to develop. The good news is that with the amount of quality online marketing specialists out there, you typically don’t have to go far in order to find the right resources.

For example, if you are a London-based band, you have the benefit of having a range of experts within your reach. There would be no trouble in finding the right photographer or video editor in London that fits your band’s style.

Be Consistent

Once you’ve discovered your message and developed the start of your social media presence, the biggest thing to keep in mind is consistency. With so many other artists looking to accomplish the same goal, it is critical that your brand is coherent and unwavering.

If a fan finds your band’s Facebook page and then attempts to follow you on Instagram, they are going to look for the same (or very similar) profile pictures and bios. If these are significantly different you risk creating confusion. For more specific advice on how to create brand consistency, see this article from Entrepreneur Magazine.

About the author

There’s a lot of music out there - good music. At Essentially Pop our remit is that we cover music that deserves to be heard, with a particular focus on independent artists. That doesn't mean we won't cover your old favourites - rather we hope to give you some new favourites as well.

We no longer accept unpaid PR agency work. We believe the creative arts have value, and this includes writing. As always, we will write about artists who contact us - or who we contact - for free - but we can no longer work free of charge for PR agencies. We work hard, we put in a lot of hours writing, and we ask that you respect that. Contact us for our very reasonable rates.

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