How NOT to Get Your Music Posted Online Posted by Nathan S. on 04/23/12 | Filed under Top Stories, Features, Opinion

Jay-Z is not going to open your terrible email.

If I get any question about my work on the mothership and RefinedHype it's, "Oh, you're white, huh?", which isn't really a question. But if I get any two questions, it's "Oh, you're white huh?" and "how do I get my music posted?" The truth is hookers and blow there's no one answer.

However, it's far easier to tell you how NOT to get your music posted, how to avoid the traps that will get your emails automatically deleted. And since there's no better teacher than reality, I've included some recent examples of emails I've received below.

Since my goal in this is to actually help artists get posted, and decrease the amount of deleted emails in my inbox, I've blanked out all the identifying info on these emails. Believe it or not, I don't actually enjoy being a dick to artists who often just don't know better.



First off, BCC your shit. Seriously. BCC. Speaking on behalf of my blogging brethren, our emails are obviously already out there, but it's just a common professional courtesy to not blast out someone's email to 500 other people. I know more than a couple folks who will never again open an email from someone who doesn't BCC. It's really not that hard, just do it.

Second, any version of starting with "Could You Post?" / "Tell Me When You've Posted" / "Thanks For Posting" etc. is going to be met with an automatic delete. Think of sending these emails as a mini-job interview. You wouldn't walk into a job interview and start by saying, "Thanks for hiring me. Do I get paid monthly or bi-weekly?" Don't do it here. (Or maybe you would, which is probably why you're emailing me instead of at your job.)



My honest reaction to this is, "So?" I literally see hundreds of YouTube links throws at me everyday, you need to give me a reason to check out your music, along with some info and more links. Also, if it looks like it took you 20 seconds to put together an email, that makes it look like the music's not that important to you. And if it's not important to you, why would it be important to me?



If your first thought upon seeing this was "BCC your shit", congratulations, I've taught you well young grasshopper. Second, on the real there's no way a blogger's going to open an attachment, read a Word doc, and then email you back asking for more. It's just not going to happen.

Include as much info/music/links in the email itself as possible, and be specific about what you're looking for. Again, getting someone to take the time to learn about you, listen to a bunch of your music and then think of a feature idea is going to frankly be nearly impossible. Ideally, you should be shooting for some version of a more specific "listen to this and this, if you're interested in more check out this".



Now this one is much better. Lays out all the info neatly, nice tone, SoundCloud link, it's pretty close to perfect. But after literally reading thousands of emails, this has all the hallmarks of a form email; although it seems personalized, it's really not. It feels more like, "Hey [insert name of site here], I really like the music you post - and the words you write. I'm a huge fan!"

Now, maybe this is completely honest and they do check out the site frequently, but there's no way for me to know that. If you're emailing a site you check out regularly, mention some specific content they've posted recently that you really dug. Make it clear that you've actually taken the time to check out the site.

Frankly, I'd rather just get a less personalized email than feel like you're pretending to be an actual fan of the site. You come across like that dude who sees a chick he made out with last weekend but can't remember her name: "Hey....you. It's so good to see you again? How's the...job that you have...and the place where you live?"

(In hindsight, that analogy makes me the chick. Oh well, whatever, moving on....)

Again, while I'm sure I'll end up pissing some people off with this, this post is really motivated by love. Tough love, but love. You're better off with someone being honest about why your emails aren't being answered than continuing to send them to silence.