Permission Marketing for Musicians

multi-tasking desktopHave you ever heard of the phrase permission marketing? if not, read on.

I recently had a few people assume that I wanted to be on their mailing list and guess what – it’s not cool.

Not only that, but it’s technically illegal because it violates CANSPAM laws. Here’s the clincher, the people who have added me to their list are also people that I know or have met in person:

  • One is an amateur concert promoter whose kids go to the same school as mine.
  • One is a musician I worked with at a charity concert to benefit the same school.

In both cases, each person assumed that since I’ve emailed them personally about other business in the past and since I happen to be involved in music that I would LIKE to be on their mailing list. So they just added me without even asking.

Which I repeat is not cool.

Now I have to look like the bad guy and ask to be taken off their list, whenever I did nothing wrong and never wanted to be on their list in the first place.

Am I going to be a jack-ass and report them to the internet police or something? Of course not, but the fact that they didn’t take the small amount of effort to consult me prior to adding me to their list has closed a door rather than open one.

So just think, if you do this for people you don’t even know or haven’t met – how much worse can this be for you? Perhaps those people you don’t know who you harmlessly add to you mailing list will flag you as a spammer to the internet cops…

Sign up for an email auto responder service and take an hour or so to get it ready. This will involve setting up a welcome email or two, configuring the look of your email template and creating an optin area online where they can volunteer to receive your information.

To really cover you butt – ensure your autoresponder has double optin capabilities (most do) – so that after they’ve given you their name and email they’ll receive another email asking them to click on a link to confirm that they want to receive your information.

Laughing DonkeyThis my friends is known as Permission Marketing, which basically means that rather than ASSUME people want to learn more about your band that you ASK them first. This is generally considered in social circles as being nice instead of being an ass; consider it permission marketing for musicians.

If you want to be a rock and roll rebel and go the ‘ass’ route (by not asking permission) just realize that you’re closing way more doors than will ever open for you…so good luck with that.

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