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Film Production  » How To Get TV Stations At Your Gigs

How To Get TV Stations At Your Gigs

Did you know that you can get television and radio stations to

attend your gigs and give you media coverage? Well, you can,

*IF* you are performing the "right types" of gigs.

So, what are the right types of gigs?

Well, in short, these are gigs that are most likely to inspire

area stations to cover them because they are, largely, non

profit organization and charity fundraisers that benefit human

interest causes.

Just a few such charities/non-profit organizations include; Red

Cross, American Cancer Society, YMCA, YWCA, Boys & Girls Clubs

of America, Campus Crusade for Christ, etc. And, along with

these few, there are, literally, innumerable more that readily

seek musical entertainment to help support and provide interest

in their fundraising events.

How to Approach and Get Started:

What you first need to do is contact various non-profit

organizations and charities, and notify them of your

availability to perform at their fundraising events. They will

probably request your media kit for review. Then, if they

consider you a match, they will likely add you to their

entertainment roster for future consideration.

And, while the above listed charities are national and

international in scope, there are smaller sized and regional

charities and non-profit organizations that can equally benefit

from your musical services as well.

In fact, you may find it both easiest and fastest to work

through locally based and regionally based charities and

non-profit organizations, as well as local and regional chapters

of national and international organizations such as listed

above.

Using this method just may serve as a stepping stone and lead

to your direct performance with the organizations' corporate

sectors on national and international levels.

You should also consider foregoing any performance compensation

for these particular gigs and performances in the interest of

obtaining repeat performances when the organizations conduct

future fundraising events.

Also, keep in mind that, with charity and non-profit events,

audiences are usually much larger, more dedicated and

supportive, as opposed to regular gig audiences at normal music

venues.

As such, in lieu of foregoing compensation, do request to make

your CD available for sale to fundraising attendees who enjoy

your music and wish to purchase it during or after your

performance.

This way, you fulfill and appease to the non-profit and charity

requirements by foregoing compensation while also having an

opportunity to provide and make your music available to

attendees. And, at charity and non profit performances, you are

likely to experience greater sales of your music than at normal

gigs.

To find charities and non-profit organizations, simply review

your telephone directory's yellow pages under such categories as

"Charities," "Human Service Organizations," Non-Profit

Organizations" or related categories.

Getting Television & Radio Media to Your Gigs

Now that you know what special gigs are most likely to attract

television and radio coverage, once you have a charity or

non-profit gig, contact area stations and inform them of the

upcoming event. You will want to approach stations' news

directors, program directors and talk show producers of shows

that are most appropriate for covering the event.

Approaching television and radio news departments for your

event is as simple as your making a telephone call to them and

asking to be connected with their newsrooms, then, requesting to

be connected with their news directors.

Similarly, you will contact the stations' programming

departments and request to speak with their program directors or

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assistant program directors in order to learn of their most

appropriate talk shows and related programs.

With all, you should explain that you are the entertainment for

the particular charity or non-profit organization's upcoming

event.

As for program directors, request to learn the particular shows

produced by the stations that are most appropriate for either

interviews, or which programs may be interested in covering your

event as a show topic.

And, to obtain even more favor with program directors and talk

show producers, if you have not done so already, you should

become fairly well versed in the particular benefit or cause at

which you are performing in order to cohesively and effectively

discuss it should you be fortunate in obtaining media coverage

in any context.

This will go a long way in helping you to further secure

feature interviews, in addition to your regular performance, and

which not only provides you with interview experience, but can

also translate and springboard into more television and radio

coverage at national and international levels.

And, even if your event is already scheduled to be covered by

the charity or non-profit organization itself, your interview

and performance can give stations additional news and topic

angles, thus, providing them with more content.

Note: In addition to contacting stations via telephone, as you

are probably aware, many stations also have websites where they

also post their news directors' and program directors' telephone

and email contacts, as well as provide programming schedules

that list their various shows. Utilizing their websites for this

info will normally generate easiest and fastest results.

About the author:

Kenny Love is president of MuBiz.com, a multi-service music firm

providing radio promotion, media publicity, gig publicity and

business services for musicians. Get complete details at

http://www.myspace.com/kenlove