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Band Insider's Guide

The Magic Bus Music Forum is a very powerful promotion tool that was designed to help unsigned musicians take their music further. By understanding how to use our services wisely, you can organize how your band does business and how it gets promoted.

First and foremost, The Magic Bus Music Forum is about promotion. We create a Free General Admission webpage, promote your music, and give you many tools for your success in exchange for a simple link from your website and kind words to your fans about The Magic Bus Music Forum. We also ask that you help refer clubs and other bands to check out the Magic Bus Music Forum, so we can develop a larger audience. A larger audience means more people. More people mean more exposure of your music. More exposure means more music and merchandise sales for you!

For information on linking to the Magic Bus Music Forum please visit our links page. It is really simple and it shows us that you are serious about being successful in the Music Industry. We do take note of those who support the Magic Bus Music Forum.


Benefits On Using Your Free General Admission Webpage:

Our custom developed software delivers to you a very professional and free webpage that links to your official website. There is no cost for this service, and you are welcome to update it as much as you need to.

We submit all of our General Admission webpages to various search engines. Most of the time our General Admission webpages are found before the official band website is found. But remember, we link to your official website, so people can find you through us. In some cases, we are the only way to find some bands on the Internet, since they have never submitted their band website to the search engines.

We have a growing team of individuals promoting our bands and clubs not only on the Internet, but in all mediums where music is present. This includes concerts, music festivals, local, national, and international magazines, clubs, radio stations, as well as many other avenues. Every advertising dollar that we spend is advertising for your band at no cost to you.

The Magic Bus Music Forum has also developed the very unique "Book the Band" feature that can send you gig requests from people you have never heard of. We incorporate this feature into every Magic Bus Music Forum General Admission webpage that our software generates, and at no charge to you! Try it out on your own General Admission webpage after it is online.

You can count on our servers and our website to outperform many other "Free" websites on the Internet. If your official website goes down, there is still your Magic Bus Music Forum General Admission webpage for your fans to access.

Our General Admission webpages are integrated into our proprietary, cutting edge database that supports many types of search features not found on other music sites across the Internet. This means that there are many ways for people to discover your band, your music, and your website.

Tips On Using Your Free General Admission Webpage:

Many bands are using their General Admission webpage address as their main Internet address because it is SHORTER and EASIER to remember. Yours may be something like http://www.somethingcity.com/vegas/strip/bluelight/6969/yourbandname.htm. Ours is simply http://mbus.com/bands/genadm/Your.Band.Name.htm

Use your General Admission webpage address as your main Internet address if you change your band's official Internet address and hosting often. You can count on our pages to remain in the same place. You can always update your General Admission webpage with your new Internet address.

This also goes for your email address. Your General Admission webpage should be updated by you when you change your email address. By using your General Admission webpage address as your main Internet address, people will always be able to find you.

Update your General Admission webpage immediately when you change your email address so we don't think your band is not together anymore. This will prevent your General Admission webpage from being deleted from our extensive and FRESH music database.

I've heard enough, I want to join the hundreds of other professional bands on the Magic Bus Music Forum and create my own General Admission webpage, to take my music "Further"!


Benefits Of Using The Poster Art Creator:

This tool is a must for any band playing any gig. The bottom line is how many people can you get to come out to a gig. This is really your livelihood. Even if you get a straight fee and are not playing a gig for a percentage of the cover charge, people still could buy your merchandise if you get them to come to the gig. How do you do that? Advertise. The Magic Bus Music Forum's PosterArt Generator makes it easy.

Clubs, venues, and festivals that see you taking an active role in promoting a show (and in turn their club, venue or festival) will be more inclined to dub you a professional organization and welcome you back and may even recommend you to other promoters. Building relationships is instrumental in your success!

There is no need to learn desktop publishing, programming languages, or any other programs to have a professional looking flyer. Just fill in the blanks. It's that simple.

The Magic Bus Music Forum's Poster Art Creator can be used from anywhere in the world on a moment's notice. This is handy for when you're on the road from show to show.

The Magic Bus Music Forum's Poster Art Creator does not require you to depend on a friend who usually does this type of work for you. Plus, it's done in less than a minute! You will never again "hope" that it gets done in time for the show or even worse they arrive ten minutes after the gig started.

Who knows, maybe your Poster Art will become collector's items when you make it BIG! If you do, please remember the Magic Bus Music Forum and throw money at us and give us good tickets.

Look for even more enhancements to this service in the coming future!

Tips For Using The Poster Art Creator:

It is recommended that you check your printer settings to ensure best results. Since the Internet is of lower resolution, your printer should be set on low resolution or 100 DPI (dots per inch) or less.

If your band has upcoming shows, just spend a couple of minutes with The Magic Bus Music Forum's Poster Art Creator and VOILA! You have professionally designed flyers completed for your upcoming shows. Just take them to a print shop and have copies made accordingly.

Visit the college campuses in the town you're playing and post them in appropriate areas. Some bands will trade a CD and/or a spot on the "guest list" with students in exchange for helping to post and hand out the flyers. This is a great way to start a fan base in new areas. Some bands end up having a free place to stay in that city due to the relationships they create with the volunteers.

Post the flyers in the local music stores and do the same thing for the owners of the shops like you did with the volunteers on the college campuses. This can even lead to them selling your music at their store and aiding in promotion activities next time you play in that area. Building relationships is instrumental for your success!

Post flyers wherever it is legal and considered ok to do so. Obviously, we recommend that you do not litter or mass post to supermarket parking lots and the like. Be responsible and respect the environment! RECYCLE whenever you can. It will save you money as well. The karma will be reciprocated.

You can also FAX these flyers to the local press and radio stations. Do the research before you head out. When you get into town, take this flyer to a FAX service, hand them the list of numbers and you can FAX one document to an unlimited number of possible places that can help you get people to your gig in a matter of minutes! Sometimes it helps to do this before you go; this gives enough lead-time for the press to get it into their publications.

I've heard enough; I need to join the hundreds of other professional bands that use Magic Bus Music Forum's Poster Art Creator , to take my music "Further"!


Benefits of Using The Mailing Lists:

The Magic Bus Music Forum's MusicNet mailing list was developed in early 1996 for bands to network with other bands and clubs around the country.

The hundreds of bands that have participated in the MusicNet mailing list have utilized this tool to further their music and expand their fan base by gig swapping and networking with other bands and clubs.

We have expanded the our services to include regional mailing lists designed expressly for self-promotion. MusicNet is a moderated list for music industry related topics only.

Look for even more enhancements to this service in the coming future!

Tips For Using The Mailing Lists:

The MusicNet mailing list is used strictly for networking with other bands and clubs and industry professionals.

Absolutely no commercial postings of any kind.

The MusicNet Mailing List is not for promotion to fans. There are no fans on the list.

Please, for you own sake, no shameless self-promotion. This list has been known to attract booking agents, and other people in the music industry, so it is always important to remember that you should act as professional as possible at all times. Building relationships is instrumental to your success!

The MusicNet Mailing List can be used for finding target markets around the world to gig swap with other bands of similar styles. This can be a great tool to get the inside scoop on the cities you are heading to or to break into cities you have not yet played.

Encourage other bands you know locally to participate in the Magic Bus Music Forum's MusicNet mailing list, you will be doing them a great favor in helping to grow their music.

Join our regional mailing lists for self-promotion of your band. These lists were designed to be open forums for bands, clubs, and fans alike. This is the place to announce your upcoming shows, your new website, your new CD, and anything else to help spread the word about your band's unique talents.

I've heard enough; I need to join the hundreds of other professional bands that use the Magic Bus Music Forum's Regional Mailing Lists and the industry-only MusicNet Mailing List, to take my music "Further"!






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