Posted on April 15, 2022

How To Brand Your Music On Instagram

By Barbara Drews

When wondering how to acquire a following on social media, having high-quality material on your profile is beneficial. Once people first visit your page, they should understand who you are and why they should follow you. What do they stand to gain by following your page? What can they hope to get in return? How will you provide value to their lives? That said, social media for artists can be tricky.

First impressions matter. Thus said…

#1 Your Username

Choose a catchy, clean and creative username. Consider just using your own name if you’re trying to get famous as an artist. Decide on a simple and straightforward username. And definitely avoid using symbols and underscores. There’s also your name, which is distinct from your username. Here’s JLo’s example: 

#2 Your Profile Pic

If you’re an artist, you’ll want to ensure that everyone who lands on your Instagram page is quickly introduced to who you are. Why? Because “you” are the most essential element of your identity, you should introduce yourself to your potential followers right away. Choose a headshot that is perfectly cropped and that incorporates an eye-catching pop of color. 

#3 Your Bio

A brief but meaningful biography on your profile will assist people to grasp what you stand for. Give a quick overview of who you are, what you do, and what you have to offer. Even if you don’t have any released songs, show folks who you are and what they can anticipate from you. Make sure to have a link to a website as well. Whether it’s a blog, your Spotify profile, or your YouTube channel. If you want your future followers to learn more about you, make it simple for them to do so.

#4 Your Posts

Show up and post constantly. When it comes to growing your brand, you need to know your art and be excellent at what you do, but it won’t help you if you don’t come online and communicate with people on a daily basis. Increase your brand’s visibility by posting stories, Reels, photos, and feed videos. So don’t neglect your feed! When you’re aiming to attract the curiosity of your followers all across the world, your posts must stand out. Leave them in awe of your artistic ability. Here are some possibilities, before and after shots, behind the scenes, a typical day of your life, exciting news, etc. 

#5 Your Captions

A hook is the opening line of your Instagram caption that allures users and invites them to read further. Start with a quote, write a joke, or surprise with a controversial statement. Captions are an excellent method to convey a story about yourself and your art. Emojis in captions can increase Instagram interaction. They are simple to keep users’ interest while leading them to your call to action. When you add a similar emoji to the end of your description, it urges readers to leave comments, check your link in your bio, visit your website, and so on. Ensure that your captions are not long though, they need to be simple and catchy. 

Putting It All Together

That about sums up the key concepts you’ll need to know as you assess your Instagram performance and strategy, but there’s still plenty more fun to come! Keep in mind that the creation and sharing of art connect you to a large number of people. Being polite and respectful to the community can help you create a good reputation and be recognized.
Make sure you check our blog regularly and follow us on Instagram for more music marketing-related updates.

Posted on March 22, 2022

SOUNDON – TikTok’s new music distribution platform

By Yvonne Martin

Great news for all the artists out there, whether you’re a well established artist or an emerging one, TikTok is launching a music distribution platform, SoundOn, to help more artists get their music heard, with the promise of giving 100% of royalties directly to artists, (or 90% thereafter).

TikTok’s influence in today’s music industry is huge, sending songs that find popularity on the app to the top of the Billboard charts. Now artists will be able to upload their music directly to TikTok and parent company ByteDance’s own music streaming service Resso, in addition to global streaming platforms like Apple Music, Spotify, Pandora, Tencent’s Joox and Deezer, with ZERO fees!! No distribution fees, no transaction fees, NADA!

TikTok says SoundOn will pay 100% of royalties to musicians and producers for an unlimited time on ByteDance-owned platforms. This includes not only TikTok, but video editing app CapCut, and Resso in large territories like India and Brazil, with all rights being retained by the artists.

For global streaming services, the payout is also 100% in the artist’s first year, but will drop to 90% in year two and beyond. By comparison, competitor DistroKid charges artists and labels on a subscription basis, while allowing artists to keep 100% of their earnings, while TuneCore charges for distribution on a per-song or per-album basis, but also promises artists to keep 100% of streaming revenues.

Other than its handling the mechanics of music distribution, SoundOn offers other promotional tools and support, including audience insights and development, advice from the SoundOn marketing team, access to TikTok’s song tab (where music is linked on profile pages), TikTok verification, editorial placements on Resso and CapCut, and promotional support through creator marketing on TikTok’s platform.

Say goodbye to a lot of major labels in years to come. Tiktok created a platform called ‘SoundOn’ and they’re giving 100% royalties to artists in year one and 90% after that 🤯

— Caesar 🇳🇬 🦅 (@Obaa_Charles) March 14, 2022

TikTok been making big moves lately. They partnered with music distribution company, TuneCore, to create their own distribution platform named SoundOn. During the 1st year, artists will get 100% royalties directly to them and 90% after that pic.twitter.com/0gVzemJ6du

— Da Spot (@dassspot) March 18, 2022

“TikTok creators are the lifeblood of our platform and the reason sounds become hits. When you release through our platform, our team will activate diverse creators to make videos with your track. This helps you broaden your fanbase and reach new communities that these creators are a part of.” SoundOn’s website mentions.

This could definitely encourage many new and emerging musicians to use the offering in the hope of garnering attention from influential profiles, thanks to TikTok’s viral trends. Fans then follow artists on music streaming services, where that loyalty is converted into *CHA-CHING* actual dollars and cents.

“New artists and musical creators are a vibrant community within TikTok and SoundOn is designed to support them as they take the first steps in their career,” said Ole Obermann, global head of Music at TikTok, in a statement about the launch. “Our SoundOn teams will guide creators on their journey to the big stage and bring the expertise and power of TikTok to life for the artist. We’re incredibly excited about how this will surface and propel new talent and how SoundOn will contribute to an increasingly diverse and growing global music industry.”

The SoundOn platform had been in beta testing since last fall, and is now fully available in the U.S., U.K., Brazil and Indonesia, with an undisclosed number of artists and creators already using the service, including Games We Play, Abby Roberts and Chloe Adams in the U.K.

SoundOn is not TikTok’s first move into the music distribution space. The company in 2020 announced a deal with UnitedMasters, which became the first music distribution company to be integrated into TikTok.

To conclude, this is a HUGE opportunity for all artists, to reach new and bigger audiences while earning $$$ doing what they actually love – sharing their music. So, what are you waiting for?? Get joining!

Make sure you check our blog regularly and follow us on Instagram for more music marketing-related updates.

Posted on January 17, 2022

Artist’s Guide: Create A Live Event Marketing Strategy

By Shawn Spence

If the previous year has taught us anything, it’s that events can get canceled at any time. As an artist, you should be prepared for anything and to help you, we have prepared a guide to facilitate your live event marketing and planning strategy. Numerous venues are finally ready to embrace concerts and music events after the restrictions placed by the pandemic. And of course, people are more than ready to attend these events, which is something both artists and fans are excited about. 

In order to gather an audience, you’ll need to market your event to the audience that will be eager to attend the event. We advise that you map out your timeline. Most music-related events follow a similar timeline when it comes to this — presale and announcement, ticket onsale, maintenance period, and closeout (Wavo). 

First Up, Create Buzz

The event won’t sell itself, so you should try to announce it early on, creating buzz and collecting fan data for future marketing. Create a Facebook Event where responses can be recorded or a page where people can submit their emails. This will give you great info as to which segments of your audience are likely to attend the event. From there you can begin to promote your event, making the time and location clear. You may find it useful to mention any surprises or special guests that will be participating as this often sparks more excitement. 

Ticket Onsale

Around four to five months prior to the event ideally is the onsale period. The objective here is to fill up your tour venues. Using specific targeting that is now available to you after the Announce phase, you can easily promote your event to the exact audience that showed interest and is likely to attend the event. Wavo reports that “including live footage from a previous show with an engaged crowd and the artist performing,” is a great way to engage fans fully. 

Maintenance Phase

At this time the ticket sales will probably be slower. You should, however, continue to remind your audience about the event, intriguing them further with fun footage and clips of what’s to come. If you find that the marketing strategy is not performing well enough, you may allocate part of your budget to be spent on other channels of advertisement or consider offering packaged plans to buyers. This phase is mainly dedicated to process of reigniting interest in fans.

Close Out Phase

Two to three weeks before the event, during the close out phase, your strategy should be to create one final push to sell out the last remaining tickets. One way to achieve this is to optimize the ads that have been circulating. Another thing to consider is the segment of your audience who has landed on your page or tried buying the ticket but then abandoned the cart. This audience should be sent reminders that the event is happening soon to boost ticket sales even more. Typically, half of the campaign budget is spent on the close out phase. 

To recap: spread the word of your event well in advance, creating a buzz. People hate missing out on things everyone else is talking about so leverage that. Using specific targeting to show off your event and then continue reminding them about it. Share promo videos that will give people a taste of what’s to come, considering all segments of your audience. Having this simple timeline and strategy at your disposal, we are certain you’ll do a great job of marketing your event and gathering loyal fans along the way. Happy holidays!