Content Marketing for Musicians
The age of the internet brings us a plethora of new opportunities to spread our music as far and wide as possible. Social media and press coverage are valuable means of marketing, but you could get your music so much more attention by adopting a content marketing strategy!
If you find yourself asking how to promote your music… well, I’ve got news for you. Content marketing has been breaking its way into the music industry for some time now. The beauty of this? Music is content, so music and content marketing go hand in hand!
Content marketing for musicians can be hard. It’s tough to figure out a starting point, as well as learning how to keep an online crowd engaged.
Well, we’re here to help you. We’ve broken down what content marketing is and how musicians can make content marketing work for them, as well as how to properly market your music as well as how to market on social media.
Traditional methods of music marketing such as paying for advertisements can be effective methods of communication to reach new fans, but you’ll only get lifelong fans through organic clicks and plays.
What is Content Marketing?
Any web page you go on – you’re looking at content. From an Instagram page, a blog page to a site home page… content is everywhere.
Content marketing is a marketing technique with a hyper-focus on educational, entertaining and inspiring content. We’re all used to traditional methods of marketing that push a product or service. Content marketing looks to push a personality. It’s about selling yourself first and your music second.
By now, you’ve probably heard of Patreon? You may have even subscribed to a few of your favourite artists and/or producers on there? If you have, you know that they give out content to all of their Patreon subscribers.
The content they distribute on this platform ranges from educational videos, exclusive sample packs to mixing and mastering services!
But unless you have a reasonable following already, you can’t just jump straight on to Patreon and expect the flood gates to lift immediately and witness a hoard of eager fans asking you to take their money.
First, you have to get their attention. To get their attention you need to give them something valuable – and that something is content, content, content.
Why Use Content Marketing?
Content marketing is the most valuable form of marketing for those of us with small budgets. It’s affordable and, with a proper workflow in place, not overly time-consuming. But we’re not going to tell you that it’s easy peasy.
Anyhow, artists and brands alike are adopting content marketing, as well as entrepreneurs and businesses in other industries the world over.
Consistently posting content that allows people to get to know you will allow them to develop a relationship with you. Not a relationship like you have with your close friends. Rather, they develop a relationship with your content. Your content thus becomes your personal brand.
Adopting a content strategy will make your music only one leg of the stool that attracts new fans. Music isn’t personable, but content marketing will attract lifelong fans because it’s human nature to want to get to know other humans. We’re social animals, remember!
This means that the more authentic your content is, and the more content you post, the more fans you will gain.
The beauty of content marketing is that it doesn’t mean that you have to add any more to your workload. It makes marketing your music easier because you can simply post your music creation process on Instagram, ask engaging questions on Twitter, post sneak peeks to upcoming projects on Facebook, post video tutorials on YouTube, and send exclusive content such as free music to your email subscribers.
How Do I Promote My Music with Content Marketing?
Before we go into how to market yourself and your music, we wanted to highlight the importance of emails.
Emails are direct access to your fans. Platforms like Mailchimp allow you to store an unlimited amount of email addresses that you can contact at the click of a button.
Say you have used content marketing for a while and you’ve earned yourself a few thousand followers. Great job!
But then you decide you want to change your alias and want to restart the whole process. You to open new social media pages and start from the very beginning.
But how do you tell your fans about this? A post on any social platform will never reach all of your fans. Period.
But if you have their email addresses, you can email all of them directly to tell them about your decision. Include all of your new social media links in the email and you’ll see most if not all of those fans follow all of your new pages!
And if not all of them open the email, which platforms like Mailchimp inform you about, then you can send the email again or send a follow-up email.
To further incentivise your fans to follow your new page, you can use Content Unlocks on PUSH.fm to give them free content for following your new pages!
Content marketing allows people to get to know you so you can build relationships.
Content marketing is about being as personable as possible. Showing people the human side of your digital music by showing them you will allow people to get to know you.
You can let people get to know you very easily. By offering content that advises your fans with what to dos and what not to dos, showing them your life “behind the scenes”, and getting your followers involved in what you do is a strong method to make your fans feel included. Your offering experience in these types of posts and that’s what people want to know about!
To reward people for being so involved with your music, reward them with exclusive content! People love exclusive stuff. It makes us feel like we’re a part of something.
By allowing people into your zone in this way you are building the relationships we said about earlier. To strengthen those relationships, be sure to interact with your audience! Replying to their comments and even following them back is an amazing way to make them feel included too.
Posting anything at any time presents an opportunity for engagement which leads to relationship building, especially streaming live. Live streams are an amazing way to interact with your audience too! Give shout outs and reply to their comments! Don’t forget about direct messages either!
Interacting with your fans in this way opens up opportunities for your fans to help create content with you too!
Promoting your music with content will encourage fans to get feel invested.
Humans are hard-wired to love stories. That’s why content is the most effective way to generate new fans!
Say you’ve got a new track coming out today. Do you think it was a good idea to post only one or two social posts before the release? Do you think that’ll make your fans feel invested?
But if you’d posted every day or every few days for the last month about the song, do you think your song would get more listeners?
We’re not talking about sharing the same post over and over again.
What if you posted the artwork on day one, and then shared a short clip the following day? Why not share some lyrics with your fans? A video to demonstrate how you made it will always go down well.
Not only will content marketing make your current fans feel invested, but it’s also more likely that they’ll send your content to their friends!
Content allows you to demonstrate your personal brand with action, not words!
Your personal brand is who you are. What do you value and care about? What makes you unique?
To get a good idea of what your online presence currently says about you, Google yourself. Get a friend or two to also Google you.
The reason for this is that anyone who wants to work with will Google you. Not to do any referencing like in a for a job, but to get to know you!
If they like what you represent, they’ll contact you! This is why solidifying your personal brand with content marketing will separate you from other budding artists and producers because you demonstrate who you are through your content!
From promoters to managers, your online presence is all they know about you. What do you want them to see?
Content Marketing Ideas for Promoting Your Music
Without further ado, here are our favourite content ideas to market you and your music with content marketing.
Always remember that people have short attention spans, so if a particular piece of content you’re uploading is to gain new followers then keep it short.
Image Content
- Shots of your studio
- Shots of you with a fan or multiple fans
- Shots of your latest live show
- Any images of you partaking in another of your hobbies and interests
- Posts of your upcoming release artwork
Video Content (Long Form)
- “How I made this” tutorials
- “Behind the scenes”/”day in the life of” videos
- Recordings of your live shows & live streams
Specific Content (Short Form)
- Amount of streams your new song has gained
- Clips of any completed songs
- Polls for your fans to vote on whihc songs you should release next
Competition Ideas (with exclusive content or show tickets as a prize)
- “Like, Share and Comment This Post/Page” competitions
- “Best fan photo”
Content Marketing Conclusion
Content marketing is a long term marketing method. It requires both planning and patience.
It’s okay to make mistakes too! How else will you learn?
Remember that it’s important to be as transparent as possible, as well as demonstrating who you truly are. This will enable you to build long term relationships with your fans and solidify your personal brand.
Any piece of content should have a specific purpose. And don’t ever be afraid to repurpose your content! A clip on Instagram can serve a different purpose on Facebook, and vice versa. What do you want out of that clip?
People love stories, so learn to be a storyteller! Your music & you have a story, so why not start telling people?
Posting content that is personable, entertaining and educational will see your fans base grow exponentially. Gone are the days where an independent artist only had to write music and play gigs. An artist is now an entire brand.
What do you want your brand to be about?
Creating content is a fun way of marketing yourself. But when it comes to your music, you just can’t find the right inspiration to get that new song started or finished. What if there was some content to help you with this?
Mixxed has thousands of samples for you to choose from. Ranging from guitars and vocals, 808’s and Trap snares, or maybe you’re looking for some synth and instrument loops?
Sign up today to find your sound!