Creating music takes an immense amount of time, effort, and money. Without a plan for the release of your music, you are wasting your time and resources creating it in the first place. Creating successful music requires much more than the creation itself. Once your music is finished, building a buzz surrounding your release should be your focus. Remember, it’s all about the buzz!
It doesn’t matter how appealing your music may be, without a game plan your music will likely flop. Every release should have campaigns, content, events, and more surrounding it. Read below to learn 10 strategies you can utilize for your next single or album release campaign.
Pre-Save Campaign
Marketing and exposing people to your music release should start well before the release date. The first strategy you should utilize is a pre-save campaign. Getting people to pre-save your upcoming music will launch you into a strong release. This gives you a higher chance of showing up in Spotify algorithmic playlists like “Discover Weekly” as well as editorial playlists.
Don’t just make a post asking people to pre-save your upcoming music release. Get creative and give people an incentive. You can offer exclusive content that doesn’t cost you money such as access to exclusive interviews, remixes, or previous versions of the song. You can even offer access to an advanced listening link or an invite to a release party. For even greater success, host a giveaway.
Giveaway
A giveaway is likely one of the best ways to gain exposure for your upcoming release. The requirements for your giveaway should be to pre-save the song or album, follow your Instagram, and tag a friend in the comments. Prizes can include merchandise, physical copies of the album, or something else related to the music.
For example, JARETT’s pre-save campaign for his song “TRAVEL” offered a $500 Airbnb gift card. By giving away something uniquely related to your music, you will peak more interest in people waiting to hear your release.
Release Party
Excitement is contagious so make sure to show your excitement and confidence in your release. A way to spread this excitement is by hosting a release party. This gives your fans a chance to interact directly with you, give you feedback, and connect deeper with you and your music. I recommend waiting at least 3 days after the release so you can give people a chance to listen and form an opinion first.
Get creative with the activities apart of the release party and relate them to your music. For example, if your music is about introspection give everyone a prompt to journal about and 5 minutes to write. Afterward, everyone can share their thoughts and you can describe the meaning of the song more in-depth. You should also do a Q&A to give fans a chance to interact with you more personally.
Custom Stickers or Filters
Personalize your release and stand out from the crowd by creating a filter or sticker on Instagram or Snapchat. Doing this allows others to spread your music in a more creative and attention-grabbing way. You can even set up a giveaway for those that use your sticker or filter.
To create and upload a sticker to Instagram you must create an account with Giphy and get brand verified. This isn’t difficult but may take some time so make sure to plan ahead. You can apply HERE.
To create a filter for Instagram you must use Spark AR Studio. While this may seem complicated, Spark AR Studio makes it easy. This filter allows you to use personal elements and sounds. Filters create a fun and unique way for fans to interact with your release.
To create a snapchat filter you must use a graphic design application like Illustrator, Photoshop, or Canva. Create a clean and appealing design that fits within Snapchat’s boundaries as a transparent png. Submit and learn more about Snapchat’s filters HERE.
Exclusive Blog Premier
Premiering your release on a blog shows that your music is worth talking about and builds a buzz. Signed artists have been doing this for years. Show that you can compete with these artists by utilizing the same strategies that they do. This also informs fans and potential fans more about you, the release, and the qualities of the music.
Look for blogs that are covering artists similar to you (in genre and size). Make sure to contact blogs at least a month in advance and contact multiple to guarantee your chance at a blog premier. Don’t stop here though. Try securing at least 5 more blog features to form a solid buzz.
If you’re interested in premiering your music with Respect My Region, submit through our marketing page or email us at info@respectmyregion.com. Or visit our Marketing Page.
Playlist Placement
While numbers aren’t everything, they are important to show that people do listen to and enjoy your music. You can advertise the link to your music all you want, but people are likely not to click on it. Expose your music directly to listeners by utilizing playlist promotion. I recommend focusing on Spotify as it is the most widely used DSP.
There are websites like Daily Playlists that allow you to directly submit your music to playlist curators or you can reach out to curators personally. There are also services that will submit your music for you, check out our service HERE. Check out my recent article to learn how to get your music placed on Spotify playlists.
Create Various Forms of Content
We have become a species that craves endless content and even more since the pandemic. Gone are the days where you can just hand out mixtapes on the street. It takes much more effort to get people to do simple things like listen to your song and give you a follow. Artists wanting exposure and success must provide consumers what they want, which is a variety of forms of content.
You should focus on one main platform, but don’t forget the rest. Create every form of content available on your platform of choice. I recommend focusing on Instagram, but if you have a bigger following elsewhere then focus on that. This means creating content for your timeline, stories, IGTV, Reels, and IG live. Recycle this content on other platforms like TikTok, Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn.
Don’t forget to create content for the platform with the most users, YouTube. If you can’t afford to create a music video, at least create a lyric video or visualizer.
Create a Trend
Nowadays it seems like trends are what makes content the furthest. People naturally want to be a part of what their peers and influencers are a part of it. By creating a trend and getting other people to create content based on it, your music will get spread like wildfire.
If your music has a groovy or hard-hitting beat, consider creating a dance to it. On TikTok, dances have become one of the most popular trends. If you can’t dance, reach out to influencers to see if they would be willing to create one and start the spread. Give them an incentive such as merchandise or exclusive content! Or ask for their rates and pay them.
Get creative and come up with ideas based uniquely off of your music. For example, if your music is about childhood memories you can start a trend sharing pictures or stories from your childhoods.
Utilize a Linktree
People are lazy. If you don’t provide a link to your music, they likely won’t go search for you. It takes a little more than just adding a link in your bio to your song on Spotify. People use different streaming services so it is important to provide links to multiple platforms. You should also provide links to content related to your releases such as the music video or any press. To make this possible, utilize a Linktree or something similar.
Your Linktree should be featured in each of your profiles across all platforms. When sharing your music with anyone, you should send your Linktree rather than a direct link to your music.
Show your Face and Personality
The most successful music artists show their face and personality to the world. Music is about much more than just the sound. It is also about creating an emotional connection with listeners. While lyrics can create a connection, you need to take it further.
You should be showing your face and personality as much as possible. This can be done in multiple ways. You can live stream, send personal messages to fans, or post pictures and videos of yourself. Those all create a personal connection between you and fans.
You can take this even further by getting interviewed. This creates a personal connection to you and your music at the same time. There are countless blogs, students, and music lovers that are willing to interview artists. Find who is interviewing artists similar to you or use your trusty old friend Google.
If you’re interested in getting interviewed by us, submit HERE or email us at info@respectmyregion.com.
Your time, effort, and money is worth more than creating music that flops. Your hard work and creativity deserve love and exposure. Don’t release music without a game plan. Utilize these 10 strategies to launch yourself into a successful music release. Don’t forget, it’s all about the buzz!
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