So, you’ve spent weeks or months working on a song, EP or album, it’s scheduled with your music distributor, and now you’re beyond excited to share it with the world. But how do you ensure it reaches as many people as possible? Just releasing music isn’t enough, as an indie artist, you also need to hustle to promote it and spread the word of your latest masterpiece. Let’s dive into our music promotion tips for independent artists!
Why Do I Need To Promote My Music?
It can be a little overwhelming planning your music promotion, but it really is necessary work. Plus, if you get organized – there’s no reason for it to be a stressful process!
Promoting your music before release builds hype, lets people know what you have coming up, and teases the audience to keep them interested. That way, when release day rolls around, people are already invested and excited.
Promoting your music after release means spreading the word, increasing engagement, gaining new fans and creating further opportunities for yourself as an indie artist.
Different Types Of Music Promotion
There are various platforms and ways to promote your music, including:
- Social media
- Creating a website
- Playlist features
- Music videos
- Email lists
- Securing reviews, blogs and plays on radio stations
- Word of mouth
We’re now going to take a look at some of these options, giving tips and guidance as we go. Let’s go!
Music Promotion Tips For Indie Artists
Without further ado, here are our music promotion tips and tricks!
1. Create A Website
With social media stealing the show in recent years, websites can sometimes be overlooked. However, don’t count this out as an option.
Websites bring in audience members from all around the world (who may or may not have social media platforms) and collects them in one place. It is also a place to sell merch, post about events, announce new music and more. It doesn’t need to take a ton of time – in modern times, creating a website couldn’t be quicker or easier. Sites such as Wix allow you to create and customize great looking websites for free!
Don’t forget to establish and think about elements such as branding, logos and more beforehand. That way, you know exactly what you want to get across, and how as an artist, your business communicates who you are to your audience.
2. Get On Playlists
In recent years, playlisting has become one of the things for indie artists to focus on. Playlists are an extremely popular way for fans to discover new music and artists, with millions of playlists gaining traction and connecting fans with new artists that they may not have known before. Spotify also has a feature where you can submit your music for Spotify playlist consideration, to instantly reach huge audiences with your music.
When promoting your music, make sure to put aside some time to reach out to playlist creators to get your music featured. Search for playlists that suit your track, story, aesthetic or genre. Even getting featured on a couple of playlists with a decent following can create loyal fans for life. You could be the gem they find from a playlist, and they may never have found you otherwise!
3. Make An Email List
Email lists are another great asset to have (which can also sometimes be overlooked!) Using email, artists can promote songs directly to fans – almost guaranteeing that the promotion will be seen. Plus, fans who provide their email addresses are already engaged, so you’re communicating to a warm audience who has opted into your updates.
This is also a great way to reward loyal fans – which is also a selling point of getting people to sign up to your email list. Giveaways, sneak peeks, early access and more work as brilliant incentives for people to get involved, helping to create a stronger connection between you and your fans on the way.
4. Find Your Niche & Know Your Audience
If you’re promoting your music to audiences, you’re also promoting yourself.
Make sure to clarify with yourself what exactly you have to offer. Ask yourself:
- What makes me different to other artists?
- Who is my target audience?
- What do I want to achieve with my music?
- How can I express my personality?
The way in which you market your music (as well as where and to whom) can make all the difference. Finding and understanding your niche as an artist is an important part of your promotional campaign, as finding the right people can help you explode in certain subcultures and groups. Knowing this information can also help you find gigs, groups and more – after all, you can’t find your place if you don’t know who you are or what you’re selling!
5. Set Up Press Coverage
Getting featured in music publications such as blogs, webzines and magazines can really catapult your music, spreading awareness and reaching new fans that are truly passionate about music. A lot of blogs are really passionate about indie artists – as is their audience, so it’s the perfect place for you to get your music and name out to.
There is also the option to hire professional PR help to handle your campaign – but as an indie artist, this can be unaffordable or difficult. DIY PR is a great alternative, as long as you can commit the time, energy and effort to the process.
To start getting in touch with blogs and so on, you’ll need to create an EPK (Electronic Press Kit) or Press Release. This should contain information about you and your music, as well as release dates, artwork and links to your DSP profiles and social media accounts. For a rough idea of where to start, we offer guides on Film Press Kits & How To Write An Email Pitch.
6. Be Active On Social Media
Social media is one of the most powerful tools for sharing and promoting your music. There is a whole host of things that you could put in your content plan connect with fans, promote your music, establish a connection, grow your following and reach wider audiences. For example:
- Share behind the scenes footage, outtakes, live performances and so on
- Ask for your followers’ opinions – whether that’s on outfit choices, cover art, lyrics or anything else they can get involved in!
- Share links to your music, announce release dates, share pre-save links, snippets of music videos and more
- Hold contests and competitions
- Share merchandise (and get your followers involved with a designing contest, for example)
- Use paid or sponsored ads to reach wider audiences
Above all, social media is a way to speak to your fans and supporters. Whether you’re uploading covers to YouTube, sharing the recording process on Instagram or promoting your music on TikTok, social media hits so many targets. Show them who you are, share your personality and remember to post consistently to keep your audience engaged. For more information, check out our article on writing engaging social media captions.
Final Thoughts
Music promotion doesn’t need to be a headache – you just need to create a plan, get organized and work hard to get people excited about your music. With so much music released every single day, you need to find a way to make yours stand out, and get people engaged and invested. Good luck, and we can’t wait to hear all about your releases through your awesome music promotion!
Audiosocket is always here to help with our industry knowledge and passion for helping artists and truly comes out on top when compared to sync licensing companies. You can also submit your music to be part of our family, or check out our catalog of over 80,000 tracks available for licensing!
