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Let’s face it - a MySpace profile with a few songs and a basic event calendar is just plain boring. It might draw in new friends, but if you don’t offer something more, will they stay on your friends list for very long? On the other end of the stick, if you blanket them with bulletin updates and comments on their profile, they might decide you are annoying and remove you just as easily. What is a band to do?

A blog can help you get around both obstacles. It’s amazing how versatile these simple online journals can be, but they truly work. Artists, filmmakers, comedians, and regular Joes have made themselves famous simply by writing about what they do on a regular basis. Without further ado, here are 5 ways you can beef up your profile with a blog.

Bring ‘Em Back Every Day

If you bring back your fans day in and day out to read your next blurb about the progress of a prospective record deal, your show over the weekend, or the new track you might be posting in a few days, you can create readers for life. The thing about blogs is that they need to be updated constantly to be of any use at all. If you get lazy or forget about them too quickly, they fade into oblivion and your readers dissipate. Keep at it every day or two and it will only continue to grow.

Hold Conversations with Your Fans

Nothing brings fans into the fold more thoroughly than feeling like they belong to a community. If you create a forum where your fans can comment on your recent exploits and offer their opinions, to which you reply, they will almost assuredly return.

Blog-First Announcements

Give readers a bit of incentive to visit your blog regularly. Make announcements on your blog, offer free tickets, and share the inside information they have been waiting for. Never underestimate the power of information. People always want to be the first to know something - give your fans a place and location to do so and they will stick with you.

Want to Subscribe to My Feed?

Blogs have feeds and feeds keep fans in the loop. By providing an RSS feed, as a MySpace blog does, you can make sure your fans read your posts even when they don’t visit their MySpace profiles. It’s like getting them on your mailing list, but with a direct link to your profile. What else can you ask for?

Broadcast to the Net

Beyond your immediate fans, a blog allows you to hit up the rest of the music hungry community on the Internet. Upload your blog to Technorati and other blog indexing services and start marketing it to a wider audience. MySpace is only a small corner of the Internet. If you can use the tools it provides, you can spread out even further.

Use the tips here and you can start the ideal technological vortex where your fans enter and have a hard time leaving. Offer inside information, be a buddy before a musician, and spread the good word of your band’s hard work - it will pay off big in the long run.