Most artists are still heavily active on MySpace, but many have started joining Facebook now. Is this the start of the next online music marketing revolution? MySpace, with its Snocap Music Store completely changed the music world a few years ago. It opened up possibilities for artists in the most remote areas of the world to be discovered by virtually anyone. What made MySpace the place to be for artists?

Essentially, it was a combination of three factors:

1. MySpace attracted new users by keeping a users’ pictures viewable to members only. The MySpace pictures section is actually the most visited area on the website - more so than the profiles themselves!
2. Artists were able to auto-play their music when a user visited their page.
3. Artists and users alike were able to pick their very own URL (myspace.com/myband)

These three factors supported and enforced the growth of MySpace, but strangely enough, Facebook, which has only the competitive user base, is beginning to steal artists away from MySpace. Why? For two reasons…

1. Spam
2. Competition

Spam has driven away users from MySpace and the artists have followed - have to go where the sheep are. Competition is another factor to consider. The less competition, the more likely change of getting heard by new fans, or even “found” by record label execs. Either way Facebook has started to take in more and more artists and things are changing on the site to accommodate for this.

Facebook knows that it will soon have to support the masses of artists from around the world and it’s changed its platform significantly to adapt. Facebook Pages are now available to sign-up to for bands and businesses alike. In addition, what many users and artists have been asking for, is a personal URL (as MySpace offers) for their Facebook Profile or Page.

Facebook has made a deal with Sony to provide their artists with their own URL. Check it out for yourself, below are a list of three random Sony artists:

1. facebook.com/bowwow
2. facebook.com/threedaysgrace
3. facebook.com/britneyspears

To make sure it was just Sony artists being chosen and not popular artists, I took a look at some Universal artists:

1. facebook.com/bonjovi
2. facebook.com/akon

With the help of an artist whom took it upon themselves to contact Facebook about their own URL for a band, Facebook has revealed that in the upcoming months, personal URL’s will be available to all artists and users.

To make the Facebook platform complete for marketing music we should look into auto-play and what their plans are. If you look back in your MySpace profile account options, you’ll see that MySpace had included an option to never auto-play music on profiles you browse. The reason they implemented this option about a year ago was because they got so much heat for the auto-play feature by users. Users listen to their music on the computer, browse to a MySpace Artist Profile where a song is auto-played, and the world ends. Not only does Facebook not allow music to auto-play, it does not and will not allow any application, music, video, etc. to auto-play.

This decision was made exclusively for the users of Facebook and poses a large hurdle for bands. The auto-play functionality is what allowed so many bands to be heard. Having a user click play on a track is much, much more difficult. This isn’t to say it wasn’t the right decision by Facebook, and it isn’t to say it will have a negative impact on their music platform growth.

Facebook has been the king of creative strategies. Through their clean interface, external applications, and tight networking ties, Facebook has lead the way for true social networking and web2.0. Music marketing will be strong on Facebook, but it will occur in new, creative ways, as opposed to the currently bold, “check out my myspace page” techniques. Instead, you will be seeing “Your friend is going to the Aerosmith concert on Friday, are you going?” Will marketing on Facebook be easier than MySpace? Probably not, but it will provide more quality and real fans.

If you’re not on Facebook yet, I encourage you to get on there as soon as possible. Many artists have begun using Facebook now, but most are not using it to its full potential. There are many secrets on the site to be discovered, so get on and take advantage of them. If you’re looking for a guide to help you out, check out the Facebook Book.

It will be interesting how Facebook grows with its new artists, and I think we will begin to see many new opportunities arise for artists. Selling music, keeping fans informed on concerts, and maintaining a personal connection to fans will become easier and more effective than ever. Piracy will continue to fall and eventually independent artists will do very well for themselves. Facebook is definitely the future of online music marketing.