WineCowboy Country Music Blog

Artist & song writer Holly Williams is from a famous family that has not only captured my attention but deserves it. The daughter & grand daughter of Hank Williams Jr & Sr.

Holly’s current album “The Highway” is getting a lot of attention and rightly so. Holly self-financed the album and released it independently but this doesn’t mean she was by herself. Throughout the process, the Nashville-based songwriter was surrounded by a talented & supporting cast, including co-producer Charlie Peacock (The Civil Wars), her multi-instrumentalist husband Chris Coleman, bassist Glenn Worff (Mark Knopfler), pedal steel guru Dan Dugmore (James Taylor, Stevie Nicks), and friends like Dierks Bentley, Jakob Dylan, Jackson Browne and Gwyneth Paltrow who all make guest appearances on the record.

Two of my favorite songs on the album are (1) Drinkin and (2) A Good Man. The album is definitely worth the spend $$$! You’ll find that you’ll go to it time and time again as its that good.

Holly and her band are currently touring so be sure to catch a show or two. If you do you’ll be treating yourself very well.

Be sure to follow Holly on Twitter @hollywilliams1 and visit her web site at http://www.hollywilliams.com/music/ You won’t be disappointed in what you hear as I give the album FIVE STARS*****

Every day there are millions of new accounts being added to the already daunting number of members using social media platforms? An average of 150 000 new twitter accounts is being created every day and as of March 2013 Facebook is toting over 1.06 Billion users and 618 million pages.

Throw in the number of members on Pinterest, Instagram, and Google+ (not to mention the thousands of other platforms) and the amount of information that is being shared is astronomical. So how do we begin to take advantage of all of this information? Where do we start?

Your potential audience is willing to share and grow with you, so create a strategy and be willing to share and grow with them. There are thousands of members actively looking to establish relationships and using social media in creative and entertaining ways is a great way to create a healthy following.

These top strategies of Social Media Marketing are powerful tools in building your brand power and creating positive awareness for you and your music.

1. First and Foremost - Create a Marketing Strategy

It is crucial to understand what it is you want to accomplish with social media before you start using social media to accomplish it. Some good questions to ask yourself before you start using social marketing media to help achieve your business goals are:

• How can I use Social Media to direct traffic to my website, music, and or company?
• Who is my target audience and how can I reach them on different social media platforms?
• What are some popular concepts that have to do with my music and performances and how can I use them to engage with my followers.
• How am I going to create my brand identity?

2. Listen as much as you talk

A big mistake when starting out is to get overwhelmed by the amount of information streaming by and decide that the only way to get your music heard is to bombard the platform with images and messages. People enjoy personal relationships and feeling valued. Make sure that your friends and followers understand that you are willing to have a two-way conversation with them– spend time looking at and commenting on what other people are doing and answer any questions that come your way from the fans.

3. Quality is better than Quantity

Stop looking at how many followers you have and start looking at who is following you. Are they keeping up with your feed? Are they really interested in what you have to offer? If you use too much material with not a lot of content people get bored and stop following what you have to say. They may not unlike your page, but you have essentially lost them as a follower. Be sure to always use something that will pique your followers’ interest when trying to engage with your audience.

4. Be Consistent

Your audience has a very short attention span, and there are many other feeds that they can find to replace you with. If you aren’t around to engage with your audience, they won’t wait for you to return. They are constantly looking for interesting things to keep them occupied so keep your profile updated regularly.

5. Be Creative

and Authentic! If people know that your posts, likes, shares and photos are for your followers’ enjoyment and not just phishing for information and sales you will be a successful social media marketer.

Be yourself and make yourself unique. Using photos, articles, links and opinions to create your online identity will go a long way. Ask questions to understand your followers. Look at what your friends are doing and tell them that they are doing a good job, share it with the world and find something original to use from their post.

It’s time consuming yet the payoff is worth it!

Looking for a few ways to attract website visitors in the New Year without compromising your ethics or stooping to spam techniques? Give any of the following options a try:

1.     Focus on content creation. Good content markets itself. When you put the effort into building and promoting great pieces of content, the natural result is more traffic to your website via shares and referrals.

2.     Add social sharing buttons to your website. Don’t assume that your readers will take the initiative to share your content on their own. Instead, make it easy for your site to accrue more visitors from social networking sites by adding social sharing buttons to your web page.

3.     Answer questions on social networking sites. When you see people asking questions online, provide whatever helpful information you can. Doing so will earn you both website traffic and fans for life.

4.     Distribute press releases for actual achievements. While you shouldn’t abuse press release distribution websites to promote insignificant accomplishments, take advantage of this traffic stream whenever you have something noteworthy to share with your fans.

5.     Use SEO responsibly. Don’t over-optimize your website, but do make use of current SEO best practices (which put the emphasis on looking “natural”) to let the search engines know where they should list your site in the natural search results. High rankings will result in plenty of new visitors to your website.

6.     Invest in your website’s blog. By publishing high-value posts consistently, you’ll build your relationship with your fans, resulting in visitors who check back frequently to view your latest posts and updates.

7.     Share slide decks and other presentations. Posting informative materials to sites like Slideshare andScribd will help you to increase both brand awareness and website traffic through exposure to new markets and new potential fans.

8.     Build a killer email newsletter. When fans find valuable email newsletters, they tend to share them with others. If you’re current email follow-up sequence is lackluster, making improvements here could result in significantly more referral traffic.

9.     Publish a helpful podcast. Similarly, producing a regular, high-quality podcast will increase referred website fans, while reaching new fans through podcast directories.

10.   Deploy info graphics. Info graphics get shared more often than most other types of content. This makes them ideal candidates for traffic generation campaigns that make use of content marketing.

11.   Run a YouTube channel. YouTube is one of the web’s largest search engines, making it a great way to expose new audiences to you and your music. As an added bonus, your videos may be listed in Google’s blended search results, leading to even more traffic to your site.

12.   Ask visitors to share your site with others. Simply asking your visitors to forward your music, tour dates, etc.to others or share them on their social networking profiles is a great way to quickly boost page views.

13.   Write guest posts for top industry sites. Ask other websites in your industry if you can pen guest posts for their blogs. Having your content/music featured there isn’t just great for traffic – it’s a good way to build your perceived authority as well.

14.   Connect with influencers in your niche. Having an authority figure in your industry share just one of your blog articles or a single can result in a tremendous amount of new traffic, subscribers and buyers, so make relationship building a key part of your self marketing strategy.

15.   Pay attention to up-and-coming social networks. Newer social networks like Tumblr and Pinterest are sprouting up all the time. Because there can be a significant “first adopter” advantage to the people that establish a presence on these sites early on, keep an eye out for these future opportunities.

16.   Eliminate website errors. If the search engines aren’t able to index your website properly (which can occur due to a number of different errors), you may not be receiving all the search traffic you should be. Check your Google Webmaster Tools account for information on common problems.

17.   Add pillar content to your website. Every website should have at least a few pieces of “pillar” content — in-depth, well-written content that will always be of interest to your fans — to help drive traffic via person-to-person sharing.

18.   Over-deliver on your company’s products or services. From a word-of-mouth traffic standpoint, over-delivering can’t be beat. When you go above and beyond in your industry, fans will recommend you to others – leading to more traffic and a higher marketing ROI.

19.   Interview experts within your industry. People love hearing from experts, so if you can snag an interview from an A list artist and publish it on your site, you’re in for a big surge of traffic from the authority’s existing audience.

20.   Comment on other websites. Leaving valuable comments on other websites’ blogs can be a great way to build traffic back to your own site. Just be sure to say more in your comment than, “Great post!” or “Thanks for sharing!”

Now get at it!

When to Tweet and How to Tweet!

How do you make sure you’re being heard and you’re not just tweeting out into oblivion?

Use characters wisely

Twitter gives you 140 characters to convey your message. And as short as that may seem, the truth is your message needs to be even shorter to be most effective. The average Twitter user is looking for quick nuggets they can click on for more information OR that they can Re-Tweet and share with their friends. You need to grab their interest early on in your message if you have any hope of getting them to act.

And don’t forget to leave some room in your tweet so that users can manually RT you, as well. By taking up the whole 140 character limit, you make them unable to add their own input into your message, limiting the chances they’ll share your bit of wonder with their world.

 Personalize your content

If someone is following you, they’re doing it because they want YOUR take on life and the industry. So give it to them in everything you put out. Want to share a link you found really useful? Great. But instead of tweeting [post title + link] personalize the tweet by adding personal commentary or by picking out a great line from the post and using that instead of the title. This not only shows you actually read the post; it gives your followers a meaty nugget to hold on to.

Find your magic number

How many tweets a day should you send out? It depends on your audience and their expectations!

To find your magic posting number it will take experimenting to see how many updates your audience best responds to. Ultimately, you want to post enough that fans look forward to your updates and you give them a reason to follow you, but you don’t want to post too much to the point where fans are ignoring you because you’re bombarding them with too much information. Test out different tweeting patterns to help you find your rhythm. There are also tools and services you can use which will analyze your Twitter stream to show you when your audience is most “alert” to your updates.

Find ways to engage

Entering social media means being proactive about hunting down conversations and opportunities to speak on behalf of your brand. Just because your fans are lurking on these social channels, doesn’t mean they’re ready to start the conversation. You need to be prepared to do that.

·         Do keyword searches to find people talking about your topic and then jump in and be part of the conversation like song writing, music, etc.

·         Find conversations related to your area/neighborhood or industry and introduce yourself

·         Start conversations with users who have retweeted your content

·         Answer questions or concerns for current or prospective fans and customers

There are opportunities everywhere to insert yourself into the conversation and be involved, but you have to find them. Don’t expect them to come to you.

Listen to your audience

The good news is your fans will tell you if your Twitter strategy is working. They’ll tell you through increased RTs, blog comments, site traffic, additional social media interaction, etc. So listen to them. If you see that certain types of content are doing better, it’s a sign your audience wants more of that. Try wording tweets differently and taking on different approaches to your engagement until you see what works and what gets a stronger reaction.

Use tools to monitor effectiveness

By using tools to help you schedule your tweets and monitor engagement, it allows you to spend more time crafting the tweets and less time chasing around mentions. Depending on the size of your fan base and or business, this may be as simple as setting up saved Advanced Twitter searches or using tools like SocialBro, SproutSocial or Buffer to help you increase the effectiveness of your account.

Have fun

If you’re not enjoying your social media interaction, you can bet your fans aren’t enjoying it either. Social media gives you a front row seat to the conversations happening around your industry, while also inviting you to host the show. Enjoy it! Find your fans and talk to them. Ask questions. Share resources you enjoy. Social media shouldn’t be a chore. It’s a new way to talk to your fans about your music, and or business.

 The band Jagged Stone is not just another “Band” that’s doing country music. These guys are doing country music “Down Under” style & they’ve got it right. Whether you realize it or not there are numerous country artists & bands hailing from Australia & some damn good ones. Let’s not forget Mr. Keith Urban! Let me include these guys into that positive mention.

Of the songs that I was privy to I especially enjoyed “Don’t Let Me Down” which tended to resemble what you’ hear coming out of Nashville. Don’t get me wrong all the songs are enjoyable yet this one was my favorite.

I remain hopeful that I’ll have the opportunity to meet these guys someday soon in Nashville. Until then we’ll just have to continue enjoying their music at http://www.reverbnation.com/jaggedstone Be sure to follow them on Twitter @JaggedStoneBand

FOUR STARS ****

 Country Artist Pete Stringfellow came to me like a song “out of nowhere” yet I’m glad he did as he’s making great music. Pete hails from the west coast, California to be exact & he’s doing country music just right.

His songs truly reflect his life & experiences that many of us can relate to. A talented performer & song writer make Pete an artist that I highly recommend. You’ll thank me after just one listen of any of his many songs.

Pete’s new single “Pole Dance” is one tune that’s receiving some air time on selected radio stations across the country. It’s my opinion that it should be receiving air time in all states as it’s that good. It’s available at https://itunes.apple.com/us/album/pole-dance-single/id572006152 & its well worth the spend!

Be sure to visit his sight at http://countryartist.com/ & follow him on Twitter @ptstringfellow

FIVE STARS *****

 Artist Marthia Sides has been performing for many years now whether its Off-Broadway, TV, or performing live in front of thousands. Marthia is certainly not one dimensional as he talents spanned wide. I had the distinct pleasure of meeting Marthia in person earlier this year & I must say she’s a pure delight to be with. Not bad to look at either!

Her music video “Some Assembly Required” is done very well & the song..well, many women can relate to. Watch & you’ll see what I’m speaking about at http://www.marthia.com/video.htm 

Marthia is currently in the studio working on some new tunes, as well as a tour for next year. Definitely one to watch as she continues to ride the wave of success in Nashville. Be sure to follow her on Twitter @MarthiaSides & on Face book at https://www.facebook.com/#!/MarthiaASides?fref=ts 

FOUR STARS ****

Artist Rose Falcon is not just another pretty face as she’s full of pure music talent. A voice of music that is defined by her artful lyrics. She’s paid her dues many times over & the results is the release of her EP “19th Avenue” which is nicely done and well worth the listening time at http://www.rosefalcon.com/ 

You’ll find lots of beautiful female artists in Nashville but rare they are that can match up to Rose. She’s toured with Gary Allan & is making a name for herself in country music. What I really enjoy about her is that’s she’s “REAL” as in her statement below…

“My hope is that when people listen, they gain comfort in knowing they are not alone in the feelings they have, they are not the only person in the world who has ever been completely heartbroken or who secretly still drives by their ex’s house from time to time, yeah … I’m that girl”.

Be sure to follow her on Twitter @RoseFalcon or on Face Book at https://www.facebook.com/#!/RoseFalconOfficial?fref=ts

FIVE STARS *****

  Chelsea Rae is one artist of many that are trying their best to make it as a respected artist in Nashville. I’ve come across a lot of artists over the years that state their hard work & commitment to their craft yet Chelsea Rae is doing it. This young lady has “heart” & it shows in her performances & music.

Chelsea is extremely talented. Her lyric writing unfolds words of true honesty, and reflection of life. Pair the lyrics with music they make for great listening.

I was fortunate enough to obtain Chelsea’s CD “Ember” while in Nashville last year. A couple tunes on the CD that will grab you as they did me were “I Smell Smoke” & “Let R Buck” available at  http://chelsearaesongs.com/index.php 

If you’re in Nashville & have the opportunity to see Chelsea perform please make your plans as you won’t be disappointed. Be sure to follow her on Twitter @ChelseaRaeSongs

FOUR STARS****

  Matt Stillwell has certainly paved the road of success on his own & done a very good job. Getting into the music bizz was not going to be an easy road as he knew right away that he’d have to put his future success in own hands. At this time in his life his hard work and commitment has provided him the success he’s been chasing.

His album “Shined Deluxe” gained a lot of attention by labels & fans a few years ago. I must admit every song on this album is extrememly well written & worthy of the spend. My only regret is that I wasn’t aware of Matt until recently. One of the best albums I’ve listened to this year. It’s available at http://itunes.apple.com/us/album/shine-deluxe/id371108380

Matt has a few singles available “Ignition” & “Drunk Enough” that are sure to be ear pleaser http://mattstillwell.net/ I especially enjoyed his video on CMT “Ignition”  http://www.cmt.com/videos/matt-stillwell/785095/ignition.jhtml 

Matt is doing good things in country music! I expect him to be even bigger as the years progress. Certainly an artist to watch. Be sure to follow him on Twitter @mattstillwell

FIVE STARS*****