Company creates Facebook application for independent music

Music company ReverbNation launched My Band, a Facebook application to help promote independent bands through the Web site, when the application became available July 17. \nAccording to its Web site, ReverbNation provides marketing solutions that musicians need in an online environment. Artists can use ReverbNation as a home base for their music and promote it across the Internet through social networks, blogs or the artist’s homepage. \nJed Carlson, co-founder of My Band and chief marketing officer of ReverbNation, said when a Facebook user clicks on the My Band application, it takes them to a “full blown” user profile. The profile includes a biography, band members, brand profile picture, genre, interactive tour map, links to buy tickets for their shows and a sign-up for the band’s mailing list. \nCarlson said unlike MySpace, the My Band application allows artists to upload an unlimited amount of songs. Each song can be up to eight megabytes, which is high quality music but not as good as a CD.\n“When Facebook opened up to a third-party application, it was natural to extend our artists’ reach to Facebook,” Carlson said. “It’s what we try to do for musicians.” \nCarlson said that only three days after the release of My Band, they had approximately 900 artists using the application, and that they have been adding nearly 200 bands a day since. \nNeal Moody, artist and customer service representative of ReverbNation, said the My Band application has been very well-received within the Facebook and ReverbNation communities. Moody explained that the application was received especially well by existing users of ReverbNation. \n“(My Band) integrates key parts of their ReverbNation account so easily and seamlessly to their Facebook page, allowing them to promote their band inside of Facebook,” Moody said, “which is something that was near impossible before.”\nMoody said ReverbNation has received a couple of feature requests regarding the new application. Most of the requests have been about adding the application to a group page, but because Facebook doesn’t allow applications to be added to groups, they haven’t been able to implement the suggestion, he said. \n“We talk about each suggestion an artist or user has, and in the past have implemented many suggestions from users into our own site,” Moody said. “We have made the My Band application to benefit the artist, so when they tell us ways that it could be better, we listen with open ears.”\nConor Logan, singer for the band The Logan and new media director at A&M Records, said his band started back in January with a focused goal to bring positive, hard-core rock music to everyone. He said it will be interesting to see if Facebook can really allow bands to have pages with which fans can interact.\n“Right now, I use Facebook myself for a personal page, but I can embed my music from iLike or ReverbNation into it so my friends that visit can listen,” Logan said. “But it’s still a personal page. That’s wholly different than a page that is strictly for pushing a band to its fans.”\nLogan said he feels the My Band application is important for every band. He explained that Facebook has a more personal approach than MySpace, but either way, it’s 100 percent crucial for bands to get their music across \nthe Internet.\n“The Internet is the biggest personal marketing tool ever,” he said. “Anyone that doesn’t utilize it to help promote what they are offering is really doing themselves a disservice.”\nLogan said he expects a mixed reaction to the Facebook application.\n“Some people will welcome this with open arms, but many will scoff and thus stay with what they are used to,” Logan said.\nCarlson said it’s too early to define success for the application, but ReverbNation figures it could be extremely successful if bands can adapt to the idea of individually joining Facebook and using the application.\n“Every artist (is) looking to promote (their band),” Carlson said, “and we give them the tool to do that.”