Band Promotion Online

It's no longer a secret the Internet is a powerful place for music or band promotion.

Two years ago the Oakland Tribune reported on the power of social networking sites in promoting musicians...famous or not.

Through promotional deals with record labels, over the past couple of months MySpace has debuted albums from the Black-Eyed Peas, Weezer and former Smashing Pumpkins frontman Billy Corgan before they were available in stores. The records are streamed, which means they can't be downloaded.

Corgan and Rivers Cuomo, the singer for Weezer, also keep active MySpace blogs. It's a win-win deal for both MySpace and the labels: The former wants folks to hang out on the site and look at their banner ads; the labels and bands get buzz and promotion for their music.

According to MySpace's publicists, more than 320,000 sites have been created for musicians or bands.

In December Vibe magazine conducted a search online for rappers in all 50 states, plus D.C. Amazingly, rappers and M.C.s were found in places like Utah, Idaho and Montana. All were found through their MySpace page.

One of those newly discovered rappers hails from Salt Lake City. Originally from Indianapolis, 2uce Betta is riding a wave of popularity following his win in the Vibe contest. A recording deal looks imminent because of the publicity from his MySpace page.

Bands interested in promoting themselves online should use all avenues of promotion the web offers. The StageGold video player is a powerful, free tool because it offers a variety of custom skins, playlists and is compatible with most blog software and social networking sites, especially MySpace and Facebook.

Blogger Tips for Using StageGold

Here's a tip if you're trying to embed a video into the Blogger platform. Use the smallest size embed code from StageGold to ensure fast and smooth loading.

If you want a larger size video, be sure to select one that begins with "CA." These are the new player skins that support full screen video.

This allows you to have a smooth loading page, while providing a full screen view for your visitors that want it.

Create Your Own Video Player With StageGold

StageGold lets you create your own video player. More importantly, you control what's in your playlist. We have dozens of video player skins to suit your blog, website or social media (MySpace, FaceBook, etc.) profile. More are coming soon.

What sets our video player apart from anything else available is the capability to make playlists from multiple sources. Someone could have a playlist made up of videos from StageGold, YouTube and other sources all contained within the same player, with the ability to be embedded on a personal page or blog. It's cool and flexible.

Don't settle for the color schemes in our custom skins. When you select the player, you can change the color to match your site. Self expression!

When you create your own video player, choose StageGold for the best technology and best skins.

StageGold in Action - Frankie Miller

The most rewarding part of creating an application like StageGold is being able to see how creatively it gets used in the real world.

Frankie Miller, an influential singer and songwriter in the rock and blues genre, is using a StageGold player on his myspace page. His use of the StageGold video player is a great example of real world use of the playlist and custom skin features.

Miller never made it to the stop level of stardom, but did have some hits in the U.K. during the 70's. He also wrote songs which were recorded by Johnny Cash, Ray Charles, Rod Stewart, The Bellamy Brothers, Kim Carnes, Waylon Jennings, Bob Seger, Bonnie Tyler, Roy Orbison, Etta James, Joe Walsh and The Eagles to name a few.

Most remarkable about Frankie Miller is his return to music after recovering from a brain hemorrhage that left him in a coma for five months. Miller's latest album is Long Way Home.

Using Playlists - Will it Blend?

One of the unique features of StageGold's video player is the playlist functionality. In the example above, a popular series of YouTube videos is loaded into one player. Browsers of this site can play the first video selected to show and then click "Playlist" to play the other videos. Those familiar with this player can simply click "Playlist" first and choose the video they want to see.

For the webmaster or blogger who installs this player, they can add or subtract videos from their playlist from their StageGold account without having to change the embed code. Additionally, the order of the playlist can be changed at any time without reinserting code.

StageGold's playlist has no limit to the number of videos that can be added. Further, videos from different sources like YouTube, MySpace and StageGold can be added to the same playlist.

Go ahead and experiment with the Will it Blend playlist to get an idea of the full power of the StageGold video player.