In an Indie Band? Chances are, if you are, and a lot of people are (which has saturated the market to the brim), you are marketing your band to potential fans on Facebook, MySpace, Reverbnation, Twitter, and a host of other websites.

Chances also are that you are unknowingly spamming thousands of people and turning people away from your band rather than turning them on to your band. It's not your fault. Everyone is doing it. However, if we want to turn this around we need to get classy rather than feed this intensive devaluation of independent music.

First off, it should be apparent by now that spamming is not the way to gain new fans. You all know it to be true on some level. It's just that we don't want it to be true. We want to believe that it's possible to sit in front of our computers, put the time in, and earn our band the respect it deserves. This is a half truth. We can definitely build our band's profile and gain new fans by putting  tv media wall in time marketing online, but it needs to be done the smart way.

I recently set up a Facebook page, and I was overwhelmed by the sheer amount of spam sent to me by independent musicians. Right now I have over 500 messages in my inbox, and I can guarantee you that none of them are actual genuine, personalized messages. I never asked to be on any of these mailing lists. Any artist who promotes this way is pretty clearly saying that they would rather send the press an email such as "Hey! Check us out!" than actually ask respectfully and provide the necessary information with some class and professionalism. That's not to say you can't use templates. By all means, use a template. You don't want to have to type every email from scratch. But at least make the emails individual. If you are contacting a music blog, make sure you are messaging them in a way that is respectful and personalized. Include all the necessary information on your band such as album download links, bio, and website information.

What most bands don't realize is that the general public loses respect for them when they spam. You will gain much more success if you put the same amount of time into properly marketing your band. People are on information overload. First, print advertising became devalued because of the upsurge of social media advertising, advertising through word of mouth digitally and so on. Now the print industry as a whole is suffering. Then social media was embraced as the holy grail, but as it turns out (and this is a point indie bands need to be aware of), OTHER PEOPLE need to do the talking for this to work. This means that when you talk yourself up or send mass emails about yourself (unless it is on a proper mailing list), it has a reverse effect. OTHER PEOPLE need to talk about your band.

What kind of other people? Anyone. But preferably not your Mom.

Ideally, the music blogs should be talking about your band. Podcasts should be talking about your band. Music websites and magazines should be talking about your band. Online music communities should be posting your mp3's. The sad thing about our predicament today is that most indie bands don't market themselves to music blogs or podcasts or any of these places. They just throw their music at the general social media wall to see if it will stick somewhere. This just doesn't work, folks.

Yes, you should have a Facebook page, and there are a ton of ways to promote it. You can sign in as the page and respond to comments, give rewards to Facebook page members, offer contests and sweepstakes via applications such as Wildfire, set up a targeted Facebook advertising campaign, join and comment on other Facebook pages, and post your music and videos when appropriate. Use widgets and video to promote yourself and encourage others to do the same. Your page should grow organically. Always include it as part of your email signature.

Should you have a MySpace page? Yes, but it's debatable at this point. Set it up professionally but don't spend much time on it.

You market yourself for the love of your music. You believe that people should hear it. Then show it the proper respect. When was the last time you heard someone describing how they found out about a new band, and they said "Yeah, I got this email from them saying 'Please! Download our album for free!' and I was hooked!" It doesn't happen that way. So show your music the proper respect and push your music behind the scenes. Get other people talking about you.