How to Market Your Music Online

Over the years, the music industry has experienced an enormous change, from physical sale of music in form of vinyl tapes, to digital sales of mp3 songs over the internet. 

There is no doubt that the inception of technology has impacted the business and art of making music in ways we can’t imagine. Wait, you didn’t know music was a business? You have got to be joking. How do you think that artists like Lecrae, Jay z, Davido, Wizkid, Frank Edwards and the rest make their money? Or you thought they just made a hit song and people started gifting them with money? No! They had strategies, platforms that made the cash flow in.

“Even Real Talent Still Needs Promo”

- Falz the Bahdguy

    

Making a hit song is a part of your success as an artiste; the larger part has to do with your marketing and promotional strategy.

  
  In this article I will show you the holy grill of digital music marketing.

Are you ready? Here are;

 5 Steps to Market Your Music Online;

1.          Social Media Omnipresence
2.          Make Good Music
3.          Get a Digital Distribution Deal
4.          Know Your Audience and Promote Your Music To Them
5.         Use Local Blogs For More Promotion

Let’s get into this;

• Social Media Omnipresence

In any marketing or commercial activity, you need to meet and interact with people for them to know and eventually buy any product, where do you meet people online? Social media of course!

The key here is to make your presence known across “marketable” (in such a way that you can put money into it and get money out of it) social media platforms/networks, like facebook, instagram, twitter, pinterest, reddit etc.

 Don’t have a facebook page yet? Create one; don’t have an instagram or twitter handle? Create one fast!! You will see the use of these later on as you read through this article to the end.

• Make Good Music

This step is one you cannot mess with, if your product is bad nobody will buy! Same as if you make wack music no one will listen or buy your record.

Make sure your lyrics are locked down, the beat or instrumentals made for perfection, your flow and charisma; top notch! And most importantly the mixing and mastering should be superb. Whatever you do make sure your music is great.

• Get a Digital Distribution Deal

Global music industry revenue statistics of 2016 states that;

·         50% of profit made to the industry are from digital revenues

·         34% from physical format sales (CDs, Vinyl, Cassettes)

·         14% from performance right (radio, shows, tours etc)

·         2% from sync revenues (movies, ad syncs)

Digital revenues in the music industry from 2016 till date have increased significantly. That is to say more artistes are making money from digital sales every day. One could wonder how a soundcloud rapper could make so much money without leaving his/her bedroom, its crazy right. Yeah I know.

You as a musician can’t have your songs on top digital music platforms like spotify, iTunes, Amazon, boomplay just like that. A digital distribution deal is what you need, if at all you want to make some cash in this digital music sales thing.

Distribution companies are much and as such very easy to find, but like in every industry you have the more prominent ones like;

·    
           FreeMeDigital (Nigeria and Africa)
           GodsOwnDeal (Nigeria Gospel)

·         CD Baby

·         DistroKid

·         TuneCore

·         DittoMusic

·         Reverbnation

·         iMusician

·         TheOrchard (they work with labels only)

Choosing the right one for your audience, location and genre of music you do is key.

Your distributor will only be as good as your marketing plans to sell the record. Don’t expect them to do your (promotional) work for you.

-Indie Bible

No doubts of the fact that getting a digital distribution deal is a step forward in your career, but it is just the tip of an iceberg of work you need to do.

Although most digital distribution companies promise to promote your record as a part of the agreement you sign or make with them, but they do little to no promotions that could give you the butt load of cash you desire.

Not to worry, in the next step I will show you how to effectively promote your music to thousands of people who will stream and buy your record across different platforms.

• Know Your Audience and Promote Your Music to Them

Promotion means dissemination of positive information about a product, product line, brand or company.

You as an artist represent a brand and a product the world needs to hear. What can you offer? Music!

Now remember the SOCIAL OMNIPRESENCE step I talked about earlier? Where I said you needed to create a facebook page, instagram or twitter account. This is the time you need to use them.

When you receive the link for your song from your digital distribution company(which takes 3months or 5 working days for your record to be live on all platforms, depending on the distribution company.) you can post those links to your facebook page, instagram (business)account of twitter handle.

But you wouldn’t want to make you post look spammy by jumbling a bunch of links on your page, which would look messy. Use linktree or fanlink to get all your links organized in one page and get a single link for your post.

Once you post the links with the song art or a short video clip of the most hyped up part of your song and a little compelling write up for people to read and know what the song is all about, you are almost good to go.

Once your post is published in most social media platforms like facebook, there is a Boost Post button underneath your post. Click It.

Now you will see different options for you to choose from to get to your audience precisely well, from demography to interest to age range to gender even to geographical location.

Here is the unbelievable secret to digital music marketing no matter your location;

“Different countries and parts of the world have genres of music that dominate each part”

So if you want your music to sell, target people who will listen to music you make.

-          Afro pop – Nigeria, but other African countries and the rest of the world (because Nigerian hardly buy songs online)

• -          Hiphop / Rap Music – USA and the rest of the world.
• -          R and B – USA and the greater part of the American continent
• -          Classical Music – France and the whole of the European continent
• -          Indigenous Music – Target your region where people understand the language you sing in.

And it also implies to other genres and places they are listened to the most.

Next, make your music available to the age range you know would love and vibe to it. I.e. age 15-35 or 25-55.

Targeting interests of your audiences will also help to increase the effectiveness of your boosted post. E.g. hip-hop, music, entertainment, trap, afro pop, frank edward music, Jayz music etc.

Leave every other thing the way it is and proceed to getting your budget and expected audience reach. The larger your budget, the greater your audience/revenue.

 After paying the amount charged you by the platform and your promotion is approved, just sit back, relax and see the cash stack up.

• Use Local Blogs for More Promotion

Now the money is starting to roll in, that means you have the fortune, now you need the fame to get the complete package of a celebrity life.

Charity they say begins at home. It is essential you are known at your locality, because trust me many people are into the entertainment industry to get known so why not get a blog in your locality to help you do that.

In, Nigeria music blogs help a lot in making artists popular. Blogs like Naijaloaded, Lifestylenaija, Voegist, 9jaflaver, Tooxclusive, Makhits, Notjustok, Kingdomboiz, Globalcasting and a host of other blogs.

Why do these blogs play an important role in the career of an artist from Nigeria? Simple, the greater population of Nigerians does not buy songs online rather they download mp3 songs online for free.

 So if you are looking to be popular as an artist in Africa and the world entirely reach out to a blogger today and patronize their promotional expertise.

For affordable and effective music promotions on Voegist click HERE and send us a mail today!

Conclusion

Follow these steps above and start making a living through your passion for music. It doesn’t matter the kind of music you do, or where you reside in the world. Grab this opportunity and make yourself the next big thing in fame and fortune.

If you are an artist and don’t understand any of the steps above, you could reach out to me so that we can talk about your career and how to help you move it to the next level. Click HERE

Any contributions you have would be welcomed in the comment section and will be replied according to relevance.