I have two mailing lists I use: Reverbnation and Aweber.

Reverbnation is designed specifically for musicians. In fact, one of the reasons I was the #1 Celtic musician in the world on that site last year was because of how I grew and used my mailing list. I also like it because it easily allows me to target specific regions of the world when I go touring.

In general, I prefer Aweber though. It's a much more robust and solid mailing list. It even allows autoresponders. These are automated emails that allow me to share information with ALL my subscribers. My internet street team mailing list is largely comprised of autoresponders because a lot of the tasks designated are things that need to be done regularly. The Celtic Music Magazine uses autoresponders to engage fans of the Irish & Celtic Music Podcast.

If I could only figure out how to target specific regions for touring purposes, I'd probably move entirely to Aweber. But at present, I haven't figured it out. (Anyone know how?)

The other problem with Reverbnation is that my mailing list of 3114 subscribers is misleading. Those are not fans. Reverbnation tries to be a social network. A lot of bands “friend” me there, but don't even listen or care about who I am or what I am doing. How many are truly “Gunn Runners”? I don't know.

It also occurs to me that I don't tour much. Yes, I have those gigs where it will be useful, but overall, I do more and more “touring” online where that location-based data is unnecessary. So why do I keep using Reverbnation?

Probably the #1 reason for not changing now is that I've been migrating to new mailing lists a lot of the past couple o'years. I hate changing. I lose a lot of fans. But then again, I'm 9 subscribers down from what I was at the beginning of the month. Were those fans or “band friends”? I don't know

And that's the problem. The nature of Reverbnation's ecosystem, I can't tell if Gunn Runners don't find my mailing list interesting or if I'm losing random people who signed up but aren't really interested.

Gah! I guess for now I will keep it as is. But I would like to ask you a few questions.

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