Do you need some ideas on you can use some free Google tools to help promote and, ultimately, make more money with your music? I thought so. Here's quick and dirty guide I call “Google for bands.”

While trying to promote my band I started noticing all of the different features of Google that help make things easy. I started compiling all of these into a list and how I am using them in my music marketing.

Artist Hub

This is the easiest way to get your music into Google's Play Store. You pay a one time fee of $25 and you can then upload an unlimited number of albums and songs. Probably the best thing that has helped us out is having a free bootleg album that can be spread around.

URL Shortener

This is useful as it creates a QR code that can be scanned by mobile phones and sent to a link. I use this to make posters for shows or our albums that have links to the digital content. It's quicker and easier than hoping people remember cards or flyers.

Google Sites

Quick and easy website creation. Built in ability to embed YouTube videos and playlists and calendars. They are even adding abilities to have a shopping cart for albums and merch.

YouTube

This one is obvious. Whether you record live shows or you produce full on music videos, YouTube is a great place to have them. Their musician playlists make it easy for you to share a whole shows worth of videos.

Google+

Everybody's scared of this new network but I have found it to be quite useful. The people that are on it currently are mostly artsy like people and are more than happy to be turned on to new and exciting things. Be sure to make your band as a Page so it will be recognized as a “brand”.

Hangouts

This is probably the neatest thing I've seen on the internet. We use this to broadcast shows live, and it automatically adds the video to YouTube. This is a powerful thing and can be used in many ways. We have been experimenting with using each band members' phone as a camera for themself, as well as a laptop with an HD cam as the overall band camera. Having somebody that knows the songs running the hangout on the laptop can make for some awesome live videos.

Circles

Circles get shared on G+ a lot. Getting yourself in a circle and having it shared can bring in hundreds of new fans in a matter of hours. There are Pages that are completely dedicated to sharing music and band pages, find a few of these and re-share some of their circles and you'll build a new audience in just a few days.

Using Google+ will also help your SEO. Having your page set up properly and building a presence on the site will help with your ranking in search results for your band's name or for other searches.

So did I miss anything? Are you using any of these services in your music marketing plan? Let us know in the comments below.

Guest Post: I am Brian Keesbury and am one of “those” kind of bass players. I've been in a string of bands since I started playing and maintain a few at a time. I currently play bass in Dead Girl Sorry, a grundgy bluegrass/americana band. I am also a writer and amateur photographer (who isn't though). Visit my website to hear my music and follow along with my music marketing what-not.