PUSHING YOUR MUSIC AS A SMALL ARTIST
BY XANDER
Why does marketing seems so hard????
As a small up coming artist you can’t maneuver the same way you would as a big hitter. You can’t surprise drop and expect thousands of streams unless you already have built a dedicated fan base. So the question is, how do we as independent artist go about marketing our music? The answer is actaully quite simple but it won’t come easy. Just like small artist, there are small content creators who are trying to break into the scene by putting out playlist, blogs and even podcasts.
The key to any growth is community building, so just how you build a fan base, they are building theirs too. Those are the people you want to try and reach out too. why?. Because they are willing to build with you and create a relationship that is mutually beneficial. There are many outlets that you can cold e-mail and pitch your music to, but chances are that they are getting thousands of pitches each day and yours may get lost in the wave. With smaller outlets, each pitch they receive is a chance to grow and reach new audiences via your music and vice versa. As independent artist, small playlist placements, while are cool and do see some success, are not your main priority. Playlists such as editorials will expand your audience, but, you should be focusing more on blogs and interviews. This way you have some credit while pitching your music because they can see that there are people who want to know about you. The best way to go about this is by reaching out to the individuals of the brand rather than the brand itself (I.e writers & curators).
PRE-SAVES
while a pre-save campaign is important for algorithmic reasons, they can be very daunting and intimidating. The best thing to do if you do not have a set audience is to not really worry about it. Post the link and push it but make sure it’s not the main focus. Snippet videos and good short form content should be the main focus and then add the presave link as a cherry on top. With so much happening, people will save and forget and then maybe (big emphasis on maybe) come back to it once release happens. You want to be able to push the song and have them immediately listen. So make sure you have a lot of content for the back end push after the release instead of mainly focusing on before hand release. Being able to convert impressions into listens on the spot helps not only your music but also doesn’t allow time for the content to be forgotten about.
While there is a ton of extra info, knowing the basics and having a solid base will allow you to get to places you could only imagine.