I was recently interviewed by Bob LeDrew of Translucid Communications about my music, and more specifically about how I use social media tools.  At the end of our interview he asked me to send him a list of all the tools I use, and I thought it would be nice to share them with you as well.

Some of these may be really obvious to you, but I hope that you’ll find at least one new useful tool in this list.

First things first: If you’re a musician, you should really have a website/blog.  I use WordPress for this site.

SOCIAL MEDIA

Next, the social media sites.  There are SO MANY out there, and I actually don’t use very many.  These, to me, are the big 3:

• Facebook is great for having discussions, something that’s non-existent on Myspace.  You can set up a “fan page”…or …what are they calling it now?  I don’t know.

• Twitter is like a bar.  It’s fun, but don’t hang out there all day. And don’t burst into the place screaming “buy my album!”

• Myspace – As annoying and sometimes useless as it is, you should still have a Myspace page.  The uniformity of it makes it easy for any visitor to navigate.  I think Myspace passes the “mom test.” (can your mom understand the layout?)

To keep it simple, I’d focus on those 3 sites in the social media realm. Youtube would be the 4th one, but I don’t have much experience with it.  So far, I’ve only posted one video up there.

SALES

• CD Baby - A must. They also set you up for digital distribution on a whole bunch of other sites.  Easy to use.

• Bandcamp - My new favourite!

• Kapipal – I’m currently using this site to raise funds for my new album.  There are quite a few other sites like it, but some of them only work for US residents.  This ones international.  Check out some of my friends who are using it, too!

A few other tools you might find useful…

• Fanbridge – This is the site I use to manage my email list.

• Dropbox – I can’t live without this one.  It’s crucial if you’re going to be sharing files with people.

• Freckle – My time tracking tool.  As you may already know, I’m a raving fan (read my interview about it)

• Yojimbo – This one’s offline.  I use it to manage everything on my computer that doesn’t belong in either itunes or iphoto.

That’s about it.

Oh, and I’m currently trying out Action Method to manage my actions.  So far so good, but I haven’t fully committed to going digital.  I still love paper.

What social media or productivity tools do you use and why?