TourView
By Tara Tinsley
D.Y.I. P.R.
GET MORE PRESS. HOW TO WRITE YOUR OWN PRESS RELEASE FOR YOUR TOUR.
Being a local musician in the big pond of the Entertainment Industry is a hard job. Not only do you have to have talent, good songs, and time to practice but you also have to be a self-promoter, self-manager, self-booking agent, and heck, might aswell be a self-CEO. Local musicians, in reality, wear many hats which is hard on the spirit when all you want to do is play music but all of them are necessary to where on the road to success.
A Press Releases is something that every artist needs to know how to write if they want to submit to newspapers and magazines so the person receiving it wants to print it and doesn’t just throw it out.
In my opinion, they are somewhat of a pain especially when you are playing a lot of dates in a lot of different cities. But in order to get more attention for your gig and your music, you have to be everywhere. If someone doesn’t see your Facebook, they’ll see your flyer, and if they don’t see your flyer they’ll, hopefully, see you in the newspaper.
In today’s modern world, press releases are usually sent via email. There are many layouts that can be used but, I say, the simpler the better and grabbing attention in the header is key even if it’s cheesy. The header can serve as the subject of the email and title of the press release. An example of a header that I’ve used in the past is: For Immediate Release “Chicago will know what a “Beautiful Day” sounds like June 26th” The title of my album was “Beautiful Day” so it went creatively with my tour and drew attention to what was to come next in the release. I was hoping they’d read on thinking to themselves “Hmmm, what does a beautiful day sound like? Can it make a sound at all?”
The subtitle sums up and explains a little more into the release without them having to read the entire thing and is usually typed just below the title in the body of the email. An example I used for the subtitle of the Chicago release was “Tara Tinsley will grace the stage at Red Line Tap on her U.S. Summer Tour”
The rest of the press release should explain all of the details of the show, a bit about your band, and your music. Don’t forget to include your contact information, including your website.
Who do you send it to? Now that you’ve got it written, the next step is sending it to the right person. Researching the papers and magazines in the city you are playing and calling them directly is best way to go about it. That way you know it’s going to the right person. Usually there is one person who deals with press releases at a media company or at a publication who submits it for printing and if it’s interesting enough, they might forward it to a reporter and do an actual story on you.
Some newspapers and magazines receive so many press releases every week that some get lost in the jumble so make sure to follow up before the event to make sure they received the release and that they’ll print something on it even if it’s just a small little blurb announcing the show.
You’ve probably heard the line “Any publicity is good publicity…” well, that may be true in some cases but revised, “Free publicity is good publicity” fits more with the local musician’s style. 🙂
