The street team is a great promotional tool for indie artists, what is it?
In the vynil, cassettes and CD eras, the street team (ST) was a group of people that would “take the street” to promote the musicians they liked, either by passing out flyers, put posters up and collect names and addresses from fans so they could send the fanzines to their homes.
Nowadays, even though street team members are still doing some of those things, the main focus of the ST’s promotion strategies are focused online.
How to create a street team?
Well, it is not difficult tho find those followers that support you in every concert or event you do, why don’t you ask them to be your street team? I am sure they would be thrilled!
You still don’t have those kind of fans? Don’t worry about it! I am sure you have some family members or friends that will be more than willing to help you either being your ST o creating it!
What can a street team do?
As I said before, there are several fields that your ST can cover, both online and offline:
ONLINE
– Facebook: The ST memebers can help administrating the Facebook page, posting different things, inviting people to the page or events, promoting your music on other FB pages (no spam please!)
– Forum: There are different forums and chats about the different music genres, I suggest your ST members to register in those forums and start talking about you, so people that are into your genre can know about you!
– Twitter: Very well known are retwits and hashtags, but your St can also promote you by trying to make you “trending topic”, even if only in your city or country, or promoting your latest single or next concert by different hashtags like #livemusic, #Barcelona (or the city where you will be playing) #rock (or your genre), #newsingle, etc.
– Radios & Magazines/Blogs: You can ask your ST to contact radios to demand your music, or maybe write the editor of that music blog or website so they may feature you there.
OFFLINE
– Post posters: At high schools, colleges, coffee houses, depending on your genre!
– Pass out flyers: Same as posters, they can pass out flyers to your next gig or maybe about your album.
– Word of mouth: As easy as that, they talk about you to friends and other people, new people know about you and… maybe they like you!
AT THE GIG/SHOW/CONCERT
You might need a hand at your concerts and I am sure yous ST will be more than willing to help you! Not only you can relax before your gig, but it can also mean they get to be around you backstage, or in the soundcheck. How cool is that for your fans? P
– Help organize: Put some of your promotion flyers around the tables, get your merch ready for sale, etc.
– Merch sales: You’re going to be rocking the house, who’s gonna take care of your merch table? Maybe your ST?
– Ticket sales: Either at or outside of the venue, before or while…
– Counting attendees: Sounds silly, but a lot of venues will pay the artist based on the attendees, so just to make sure the promoter honors his word… have your ST help them count! 😉
– Collecting emails for your newsletter: Pen and notebook, have them go at it!
What do you do to thank them?
It’s obvious that all this free promotion cannot be paid with money, and you have something better than that: your music! There are many ways you can get your ST something special that no other group of fans will have:
– Free music: Send them a coupon they can use to download your album for free, or maybe some unreleased song/songs.
– Special performance: A very private and special performance for your ST, that nobody else has access to.
– Invite them to your studio session: As a special treat, invite them to your studio session.
– Add them to the guest list on your show: This is an obvious one, if they help you for free, why would they have to pay to come see you at your show?
These are just a few ideas of how to get a ST going, hope this helps you! Let me know how it goes!