Marketing Your Music & Building a Fanbase
How to gain more listeners with or without a budget.
When we talk about marketing in the music industry, what people really want to know is how to build a fanbase. Traditional marketing focuses on how to sell a product or service. Being in a band is about so much more than just selling music. When you are building a fanbase, you are creating a community. To understand the core of this community and the best way to market it to new fans, be sure to first do the work in developing your brand. Your next step is marketing that brand.
The most successful artists create an experience for their fans and bring people together through storytelling, eye-catching visuals, and a sense of belonging. These are also the components of great marketing. Catch their attention, tell them your story, and tell them why they should be a part of it.
Simon Sinek coined the phase, “people don’t buy what you do, they buy why you do it.” There are artists who are more talented than you are who won’t succeed. There are people with more compelling stories than yours who won’t succeed. There are people who are so capable and so passionate who won’t succeed because they don’t know how to tell their story. Or even worse, they do, and no one is listening.
I want to make sure that when you tell your story, people are listening. I’m going to do that by talking about your band as a business and reviewing traditional marketing concepts through the lens of an artist.
How do I build a fanbase?
In order to build a fanbase you will need to develop a process for turning listeners into fans. The best way to visualize this process is with a marketing funnel. Building a fanbase starts with the 3 elements:
Increasing the number of people listing to your music by catching their attention.
Increasing the number of people at your concerts by telling your story.
Increasing the level of engagement you have with fans and the level of engagement they have with one another by building a sense of belonging.
In terms of traditional marketing, you are building awareness & interest, creating desire for a customer to purchase your product or service, causing them to take a desired action such as making that purchase or singing up for your email list.
In 2008, Kevin Kelly published an essay titled the “1,000 Fan Theory” where he outlined a framework for how creators can establish roughly $100,000 in revenue each year if a fan were to spend an average of $100 on their products This is an excellent goal, but when you are first starting out, it’s better to focus on your first 100 fans. If they enjoy your music and are invested in your story, they will share your music and your message, helping you to get the remaining 900 fans.
Growth can have compounding effects, but growth is hard and takes persistence. Not everyone who hears your band will follow you online; not everyone who follows you online will buy a ticket to your concert; and not everyone who goes to your concert will become a loyal fan.
If you want to make 100 loyal fans this year, you might need to play for 1,000 people. How can you play for 1,000 people? Get 10,000 new listeners. Let’s talk about how we can break that down.
How to Get More Listeners
How can you get 10,000 people to hear your music? There are four primary ways to reach new fans and I will be sure to do an episode on each one of these.
Direct promotion requires time and energy . Early on you you should send a link of your new song to your friends and family. Have each of your bandmates do the same. Pass flyers out at a local concert, hang posters at local music venues, or spend time engaging fans of similar bands on social media. This method is effective and cheap, but can be time consuming.
Playing live is the natural next step because in order for someone to become a true fan because they need to hear your songs brought to life. Every band dreams of opening up a large concert with their favorite band headlining. You will need to draw 50-100+ people to your own show before a promoter will
Streaming & social media are considered to be the most viral components of growing a fanbase. How do you please the algorithm on streaming platforms and get added to playlists? By getting more listeners, specifically in the first week of a release. Algorithm playlists are a great way emerging artists can get exposure on Spotify. Short form video including Youtube Shorts & Instagram Reels have the potential of going viral as well and are a great way to give your fans a preview before the release.
Digital advertising is the most effective method and the most expensive. This is how successful acts reach a majority of their new listeners. I highly encourage you to start on Youtube by promoting your first music video with 15-second non-skippable ads. Focus on catchy part of the song that have eye catching visuals. Drive them to a single page on your website where you have more content, links to your streaming and an option to subscribe to your newsletter.
Create a Marketing Plan
You will need to form a plan around which strategies you will focus on and when. The best way to approach marketing as a component of your business is to have a plan. Here are the 6 components of an effective marketing plan.
1. Market Research & Target Audience
Spotify for Artists / Apple Music for Artists / Youtube Analytics - understand the demographics of your listeners, what content gets the highest engagement and where your listeners are geographically. This data will be very useful when it comes to digital advertising.
Start by targeting fans locally. Once you build a process that works you can apply that to a larger audience.
2. Market Strategies
A market strategy focuses on the 4 P’s: Product, Price, Place & Promotion.
Product -Some businesses have the best product, with music that is subjective, so just ensure your recordings are professional quality. When it comes to your merchandise, remember that if it is comfortable someone will wear it more frequently.
Price - Competing on price is largely ineffective because music is highly commoditized and streaming has given people free access to millions of songs. Ensure your merchandise is competitively priced and you are good to go.
Place is where people can find your product. Make sure it is convenient to find your music on all digital platforms. Check out Distrokid for affordable distribution. Also make sure you have a website to boost your search engine results (SEO).
Promotion - I highly encourage you to put the most effort toward this category. Consider what platforms you will promote your music on. Focus on finding unique ways to promote your music.
3. Goals & Metrics
Set measurable goals and decide how you will measure your success. Short term goals will include monthly and quarterly goals. (Ex. 5k monthly listeners on Spotify by the end of the year, $500 in merchandise sales each month, 100 new subscribers on your newsletter each quarter.)
If your goal is to get 1,000 fans in a year, you would need an average of 83 new fans per month. Determine early on how you will measure your number of fans. Remember, followers aren’t fans. Subscribers to your newsletter might be a better indicator or the number of people who purchased your new record or t-shirt.
4. Timeline / Objectives
Know the timeline for accomplishing your goals. Set expectations for growth. Create short term and long term objectives that compliment your goals. The objective behind gaining new fans could simply be to build a welcoming community around your music. The objective behind the goal of selling selling merchandise could be to secure enough funding to ensure you can keep writing, recording & releasing music.
5. Budget
Decide how much you will spend each month. I encourage you to start with $50-$100 per member of the band per month. Consider a budget for digital and physical advertising as well as the cost of the tools or software you are using.
6. Tools & Technology
Think about the tools you will need to execute your marketing plans. Tools could include software to design marketing materials or a video camera to get high quality video footage.
Use technology to track progress towards your goals, be more efficient with your resources, and save yourself time & energy. Use a social media scheduler to publish content regularly. Try using ChatGPT to re-write your band’s biography.
In Summary
In summary, I want you to focus on three things: getting new listeners by capturing their attention, increase the number of people at your concerts by telling your story, and creating a community where people have a sense of belonging.
Reach new listeners through direct promotion, playing concerts, streaming & social media, and digital advertising. Find special and unique ways to engage your fan base and encourage them to interact with one another. Your biggest fans will become your biggest supporters and promoters
Create a marketing plan that highlights your goals & objectives, your timeline, how you will do it, the tools you need and how much it will cost.
If you have questions, feel free to reach out to me at david@yourbandisabrand.com