Tribes: Build Your Band Clan

A book review in a band blog? I promise this one won't bog you down. It's cheap, short, and it helped jell a lot of things that had been rumbling around in my brain about marketing a band. Author Seth Godin has published one hell of a lot of quick management and leadership books. This one puts leadership in the context of the new marketing environment that exists in the world of global instantaneous communications. Long and short of it: You need to build a tribe by defining commonalities of interest and then creating a forum for folks who share those commonalities to communicate with one another. It's an outgrowth of branding--or takes branding to a new level, one that focuses on the people who define themselves as those who share and partake in your product -- i.e., your fans -- just as strongly as it focuses on the product itself -- i.e., your music, CDs, videos etc.

Pick it up, read it on the beach, see if it resonates with you. Rock on, and lead your people!