One DJ promotion technique I love to apply is finding the Facebook Fan Pages of other big name DJs in my area, and auto add their fans as friends for my own Facebook page. This is easily and quickly done with a Facebook Friend Adder Program. You can pull the IDs off a competing DJ’s Facebook Fan Page, and then set the software to automatically add all of their page’s fans to your account.

It would take months to manually add thousands of people to your Facebook account, but with that program, you can add 100 people a day with the click of a button.

Why only 100? If you try to add more than 100 people a day, Facebook might delete your account. So make sure you set the software to stop after 100 people.

Here is a quick tutorial for how to steal the Fan Page IDs of a competing nightclub DJ, and automatically send friend requests to them for your own Facebook account:

If you don’t yet have the Facebook adding software, I highly recommend you get it. It will save you tons of time, while letting you add thousands of new, highly-targeted Facebook friends each month.

You can pick up the Facebook Friend Adder software here.

Creating a brand around your name is a great way to market yourself in the social media world. There are a couple good techniques for really burning your DJ brand into the minds of fans using the most popular social media outlets: Facebook, Twitter, and MySpace.

Profile Photo

If you want to improve your branding as a DJ, you should use the same profile photo for all three of the major social media networks. If you can, have a professional photographer take a good press photo, and use it for all your profiles. Feel free to change the photo every once in a while, but make sure you change it for all three social media sites at the same time. This will help burn your face into the minds of your fans, and is great for branding purposes.

Bio

Just as with the profile photos, use the same exact biography information for all three sites. Keeping things simple and repetitive is what great brands do. It re-enforces your message.

Regular Posting

To keep active in the social media community, you must actively post content on the sites. The key is to not waste too much time on them, while still posting enough to keep you relevant in the eyes of your fans. I like to dedicate only one hour a day to posting new status updates, photos, or messages on the three major sites: Facebook, Twitter, and MySpace.

That’s one hour for all three together, not each. You don’t want to waste too much time in front of your computer, or you won’t get anything else done. I recommend a maximum of 2 hours posting on these sites. Any more than that, and you may have a social media addiction problem!

Twitter can be a powerful tool in your DJ marketing toolbox. If you want to be a successful DJ, you have to network with your fans. You also have to constantly find new fans. Twitter is just another social media outlet for you to do this.

But taking the time to add followers on Twitter can be very time consuming, and you should always be spending most of your time doing what you’re best at, DJing. This is how you can add tons of followers, very quickly.

One way to quickly create a strong following of Twitter fans is to use an adder program. A Twitter adder program let’s you quickly and efficiently build a following on Twitter with much less work. I use this program specifically for the purpose of adding fans on Twitter. With it, you can add up to 200 new followers a day, just by pressing a button.

You can even target someone else’s followers, like a famous DJ who plays the same kind of music as you. This way they are more likely to follow you if you have a similar sound.

When you use a program to automate your tedious-yet-necessary social media marketing work, you’ll have much more time to spend on searching for new music, practicing your DJ skills, and booking yourself at nightclubs around town.

But if you neglect to market yourself with social media like Twitter all together, other DJs who ARE taking advantage of these techniques will have a stronger following than you will, even if you’re a better DJ.

You must not undervalue the importance of good social media marketing techniques in today’s world, or you’ll be left behind in the dust.

We all know that Facebook is taking over the social media scene. But there are still hundreds of thousands of people who haven’t made the switch. MySpace is still a very popular platform for many people. All club DJs should be promoting their events and their music on MySpace, and anyone who doesn’t is guilty of being lazy.

Laziness is a common problem for some DJs. Once you get a nice cushy gig, you can get lazy. I can tell you that laziness will hurt your long term success. Start spending some more time promoting on MySpace if you want to increase the customer base for your events find new fans for your sound.

Promoting parties on MySpace is not the only thing you should be doing though. You need to add more and more friends to your profile on a consistent basis. Anyone who accepts will become new potential customers, so you must learn to add people like a pro.

I consider adding friends on MySpace to be so important, that I actually employ a guy to do it full time for me. You can’t increase your income without new fans. While not everyone may be in a position to hire someone to add friends for them, you can still work to make the adding process faster and more efficient. No one likes sitting in front of the computer adding people for 5 hours.

For the past 4 years, I’ve been using this program to add friends to my MySpace accounts. It significantly speeds up the process of finding and adding people based on your target party demographic. Looking for black males between the ages of 21 and 29 in New York? No problem. How about single girls between the ages of 18 and 26 who like “house music” and live in Miami Beach? Find them instantly, and add them to your friends list.

You can add twice as many people in the same amount of time with this thing. I highly recommend you check it out, it’s saved me (and my people) a lot of time over the years. Check it out here.

Adding people to MySpace takes some finesse these days. Not everyone will add just any stranger anymore. One trick I use to get people to add me is to leave a simple message when adding them. Something like: “It seems we have a mutual friend… ”

Now, this works because it makes people curious. They’re thinking, who is this guy? Who is he talking about? Many time’s you’ll get added right away, or at least your profile page will get looked at in depth. Another trick I use is to make my profile private. People are more likely to add you if your profile is private. It makes them curious. They feel special somehow because you decided to let them into your “private” world.

One last tip, use a real profile picture of yourself. I can’t stand when club DJs post party fliers as their profile pics. It just screams “I’m a spammer! I don’t really care about you, just your money!” People like to deal with other people on the web, not companies.

DJ Gigs are getting harder to find for some people these days, so you need to know how to set yourself apart from the competition.  The biggest key to doing this is professionalism.  Club owners and promoters can spot a newbie from a mile away. To land the good DJ gigs, you will have to look and act like a pro.

These means having your demo CD in a professional package, not just writing on it with a marker.  Graphics go a long way to promoting a professional appearance.

DJs should also carry a professional looking business card at all times.  Not one of those cheezy free designs either, but a custom one.  It’s attention to details like this that will make you stand out in someone’s mind. Check out the Resources page for some free business cards.

Your demo mix should be top notch, if it’s not, keep recording until it is.  Regularly keep in touch with the people who can get you jobs.  Send a friendly email, drop by the club, or take them out to lunch one day. Personal relationships go a long way in this business.  People give jobs to DJs they know personally, not any old stranger.

Music is important, but it’s not everything.  Improve your networking & business skills to land many more DJ gigs.

We all have our favorite way to play music. I want to know what is the most popular right now.  I know many of you probably use more than one type, but let me know which music medium you use the most.

Times are changing fast. Are DJs changing with them?

Every DJ should have a professional mailing list. Too many people don’t realize the importance and value of a good large list. Any serious DJ should have an account with a professional mailing list service.  

These services usually charge a small monthly fee, but these fees are WELL worth it.  The features and control you have over your mailing list is phenomenal.

The time you save & benefits you get from using one of these email services easily justifies the cost.  I use and recommend Get Response.  I’ve used other email responders, like Email Brain and Constant Contact, but nothing compares to Get Response when it comes to value.

You get all the great features of the other guys, at a lower price. A DJ can easily send out upcoming event details, DJ mixes, and keep their fans informed about what is going on.  Having a big list will also impress club owners, and they will be more likely to let you spin at their club if you can show them an actual list of people that follow what you do, rather than just talking a big game.

Actual numbers and figures are what will land you those gigs.  Back up your big talk with a big email list.

Is Vinyl making a secret comeback?

YES!

When Serato came along, everyone finally thought vinyl was going to die out.  I am happily glad they were wrong.  Hipsters have fallen for vinyl’s old-school coolness, and vinyl record sales have jumped recently. Ah, Hipsters.  What would we do with out you?

Vinyl records have long held a special place in many peoples hearts.  The soft, warm sound they produce will always be more pleasant than cold, boring MP3s.  Vinyl’s collectible aspect is also a big plus.  Collecting MP3s is pretty lame.  Showing off your MP3 collection to someone is likely to put them to sleep.  But stepping into your Vinyl library and exploring 2,000 different colorful records is much more fun.

It’s also nice to be able to hold the record in your hands, appreciate the album art, and pop it on the ol’ Technics SL-1210 M5G.  I will never get rid of my vinyl collection, and I know I’m not the only one.

This is the beginning of a multi part series.  Today’s DJ Mixing Tip is simply about Scratching.  All DJs should learn how to scratch, and incorporate scratching into their DJ mixing routine.  Even House DJs.  Just beat mixing your tracks is boring.  Additional mixing techniques should be used to spice up a good DJ set.

If you’re a House DJ, don’t go overboard, but adding a few scratch routines into your normal set will make you stand out from other House music DJs.  If you’re a Hip Hop DJ, you’d better be scratching up a storm already!  Drum & Bass is another great genre that can benefit from a great scratching routine.

One of the keys to becoming a great club DJ is variety.  The more you can do, the more you’ll be worth to club owners and promoters.  So open you mind up a bit, and practice all forms of DJ techniques, no matter what genre you’re into.

A DJ press kit is a very important step for club DJ success. A press kit or “press package” use to consist of manila folders filled with information about you, nowadays you can fit everything on 2 CDs. One of these CDs will have your demo mix on it.

See the section How To Record a Demo DJ Mix for tips on doing that properly.

Once you have your demo, make it look nice. I recommend hiring a friend that is good at graphic design to create a cool looking CD label. (if you are not a good designer yourself). That may cost you $50, but well worth the extra effort and money.

You want the mix to catch a person’s eye, and poorly designed CD labels will not impress anyone. If it looks like crap, many people will assume it sounds like crap too. The objective is to get them to listen to the thing, not throw it out. And you’d be surprised how many demos may get thrown out.

Do not use those stick on CD labels. They can ruin car CD players, as well as some of those thin Apple computer CD drives.

Have your design printed right on the CD from one of those special home CD printers, or what works even better is to get a company to print them up professinaly for you.

For an example, I have always used the company Mixonic.com to print up my demos. You get professional quality CD printing, and fast turnaround times. It deffinatley helps you stand out from other DJs that printed their CDs at home, and your CDs won’t get stuck in car CD players… people hate that!

Incorporate your DJ name and contact information right on the CD label (website, email, MySpace, phone number, etc.). I wouldn’t recommend using a full size CD jewel case, personally I like to use Clamshell CD Cases. They are just large enough for the CD, so you can put the whole thing in your back pocket if you wanted to.

This makes it much easier for people to carry the CD around with them. Sometimes if I’m at a club enjoying myself, and get handed a demo in a full size jewel case, I’ll probably chuck it because I won’t want to lug the thing around with me all night. But the slim clamshell cases are the perfect size for your back pocket. In fact, you can also get the Clamshell CD cases added right to your CD printing order at Mixonic. (I think they call them “Flexible Plastic Cases” there.)

The second CD will contain your biography, contact information, and any press photos you want to use for possible flyers or other advertising. If you’ve been DJing for a while now, you should also include your resume of clubs your played at, event companies you’ve worked for, etc.

All DJ press kits have this kind of information. For the resume and the biography, just write it up nice and save it as a Word (.doc) and a Text (.txt) file. Don’t make the biography sound cheesy. Be honest and real with it. If you’ve played with some well known DJs, you can include that. Maybe include the names of big parties you’ve played at.

For press photos, get a photographer to take them, not your best friend. Or maybe a friend studying photography. Crappy photos of you spinning in your bedroom will not work. In fact, don’t take photos of yourself spinning at all. The photos should look like head and body shots for a model agency.

Don’t worry, you don’t have to be a model. But even fat hairy TV actors have professional head shots. Save 2 or 3 photos in .JPG format and add them to your DJ press kit CD. Make sure that CD makes it clear that it contains press materials, and a list of what those materials are.