Three Tools You Will Need

There are so many marketing tools out right now, it really gets confusing on which ones to use. The answer to this is simple. Only use the tools that best fit your needs. There is really no need to use any marketing tool that doesn’t truly benefit your style of promotion. Why use tools for Twitter when you are more active on Facebook and vice versa?

1. Always schedule your posts: Social media sites like Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook are best utilized in real time. In fact, your fans including regular people go on these sites for fun and to see what the world is up to. As music artists, we use these sites for more than just killing time. These sites help us grow our fan base and connect with them on a deeper level. Some of our posts may be for fun but some should have a “call to action.” Just to remind you, a call to action is when you want someone to do something. An example would be sharing a link of your music to have people either listen to it or subscribe to your channel. For whichever reason, it is best for us as music artists to reach people when they are mostly online. It is such a waste of a post if you share your music when everyone is having dinner or are asleep. My favorite tool to schedule my posts is Buffer.  It allows you to not only schedule your posts but to add multiple posts and at different times. It also analyzes your social media data and gives you information on your best posting times and which posts give you the best results.

2. Link all of your social media mediums the smart way: Recently I started using “If This Then That” or better known as IFTTT because of its awesome functionality. I do have my Twitter, Facebook, Soundcloud, and Instagram all linked together but it only does one thing; distribute my post throughout each other. What “If This Then That” does is something a bit smarter. Have you noticed whenever Instagram shares a post onto Twitter, it shows up as a crappy looking link instead as a native picture similar to Facebook? Well with “If This Then That” it allows Twitter to post them as native pictures which looks a lot more attractive in people’s time lines. When people see only an Instagram link, they tend to skip over it. Since IFTTT posts Instagram photos as native Twitter pictures, people will always see what you post on Instagram and are more likely to be interested in what you are doing.

3. Last but not least, BLOG: I am very aware that most of us don’t have the time to consistently update a blog but there is another way to use it. These days, many blogs give you an option to design them in a way to where it looks like a website. All you have to do from there is just post any new music or videos to your blog and host it there. That’s what I did for my hip hop instrumentals and hip hop beats before I invested in a website. You can also connect your social media links to your blog with “If This Then That” and schedule multiple posts throughout the day through Buffer.

These three simple and free tools may be all you need for now to get your music to fans by yourself. It is a form of automation which frees up your time to focus on what is most important; the music.

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Show Your Face

I was watching this recent Master P interview the other day and something he said made me realize something about online artists today. A lot of artists these days rhyme about hustling and making power moves but still have trouble getting their music out. The main reason is because they only upload their music online without a business or marketing plan.

“This generation with the social media, they all get around and talk about each other and I’m like, them people where I live at don’t care about what you think. They don’t even see you, you don’t even exist.”

That really got me thinking about this generation of artists. I’m not saying marketing online is corny, in fact online is the best place to get your music heard by hundreds upon hundreds of millions of people. The problem here is that sharing a link is as far as many of these online artists go.

Aside from online spam artists, there are also more serious artists who actually put out music videos, do marketing campaigns, submit to blogs, and stay active on their social media platforms. Many of them have a strong fan base and great amount of followers. My next piece of advice goes to these types of artists. If you are doing these types of things and currently investing in yourself, then my advice will be a game changer for you.

Get in front of the camera.

What I mean by that means more than music videos. Show your fans who you are behind the music and just talk. What you may not know is that many fans and followers love hearing and watching what their favorite artists are about. They love content. When you talk about certain things or share information, you are delivering content. As an artist, you must also understand the business and marketing side of the music industry. You must understand how to grow the loyalty in your fan base and keep them wanting more. We live in the social media generation, if you will, and always want new content. Why do you follow certain pages on Facebook about sports or music and why do you follow people who deliver you funny tweets on Twitter? It is because they provide you with content.

Since you are already putting in the effort for serious marketing, getting behind the camera and sharing your thoughts shouldn’t be a problem. In fact, it’s free and it has a bigger return on investment. The reason I recommend serious artists to do this and not spam artists is because the more serious artists already have a steady fan base and decent following. Serious artists already have people to show their videos to; spam artists do not.

Always keep in mind that your fans want to see you on their level as well. That means they want to feel the human side of you and not just the musical side they look up to. That is why making videos and video blogs can easily connect you with your followers and fans. Videos also become more viral than regular posts and you can easily connect things you are trying to promote with them. For example, you can link them to your Instagram page and they can follow you there as well. Now you have two avenues of easy content for them and they can stay updated with you much easier. The possibilities are endless and with a bit of creativity, you can create loyalty with fans much easier than any marketing campaign.

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Facebook Promotion Trick

Cross promotion is one of the most effective forms of marketing. It is extremely effective because not only do you reach another person’s fan base but they also provide you with social proof with their endorsement. Social proof is a crucial part of marketing your music online because it shows that people are actually listening to your music. The beauty of Facebook is that it is a social proofing machine. It informs you when your friend likes a page, likes a post, comment on something, create posts, or anything for that matter. It also suggests you pages, articles, and advertisements based on your browsing habits and will even let you know if any of your friends like it as well.

Finding other artists to cross-promote with is rather simple and can also become a great asset to your grind. They provide you with social proof which presents their fans a reason to give your music a chance. The more they endorse you with a shout out or by sharing one of your links, the more it resonates with their fans which in turn build what marketers call “brand awareness.” When people are aware and familiar with your brand, it gives them a more of a reason to check you out. Remember in music, you yourself are a brand. Creating popularity for your brand can intrigue and spark people’s curiosity about you; all this just from creating familiarity.

Look at the people in your network as assets. The more assets you have, the better equity you have. With that logic, also consider the quality of these assets. That should obligate you to grow your network. Now imagine doing the Facebook cross promotion with 10 artists instead of just one. That can surely bring in more potential fans to your music. Acquiring these artists is easy but it takes more than having common interests with them in order for them to cross promote you. What you must do is reciprocate. That means you will promote and endorse them as well. Don’t be afraid of sharing your fans with other artists. Just because you endorse another artist doesn’t mean that you are giving your fans away, it simply means that you are sharing them.

The most important part of cross promotion is that you must actually like the artist you promote. Your fans are your fans because they take an interest in you as a person as well as your cause and message. That means that the artist you share is an extension of your interests. If you just share any artist for the sake of cross promotion, your fans will notice that and you will lose value with them. Keep in mind that they see you as a person of value because they are fans of your content, your music and most importantly you.

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Biggest Mistake of Hip Hop Artists Today

The internet has become the new promotion playground of all kinds of music artists in this day and age; especially for hip hop artists. Unfortunately, one thing that has become associated with hip hop artists online is spam. I’m 100% positive that you’ve received links of random artists in your inboxes on Facebook, Twitter, and email. I’m also 100% positive that you’ve spammed a random person at least once in your music grind. I don’t blame you either, I’ve done it too when I first started.

Over the years, I’ve learned that I get better results creating business relationships as well as friendships rather than spamming. The problem with spamming is that it is impersonal and extremely annoying. If you’ve read my past music blogs you would understand how passionate I am in avoiding spam. You would also understand why I emphasize so much about branding yourself as an artist because spamming harms your brand so much more than you realize.

The reason hip hop artists today still use spamming as their only source of promotion is because they are too lazy to try other strategies, they do not believe in themselves enough to invest at least a small amount of money in their hustle, and simply: it is the only thing they know. I find it funny how many hip hop artists call spamming “grinding.” If you ask anyone with experience in marketing, they would call it a waste of time. That is because you spend all that time copying and pasting the same message to random people and yield little to no results.

Spamming is not networking. The sooner you come to terms with that, the sooner you can start bringing in results. Hip hop artists online talk about having connections with all kinds of leaders in the music industry. Believe me; I’ve heard it all whenever someone is trying to get free hip hop instrumentals from me. Though many people have these connections, the results I’ve seen from them tell me something different. It tells me that they have not utilized their connections enough to learn anything from them.  I only have a few friends and colleagues who are truly in the entertainment and music industry but the knowledge they happen to pass on me is used to my benefit. I take that knowledge and find a way to incorporate it in my own music hustle.

Once you can break away from that filthy habit and start thinking outside the realms of spam, you will broaden your creativity in marketing and learn more about your fans and peers. This is because the way to build a fan base is by creating relationships with people. Creating relationships with people, whether business or personal, gives new information and perspective. What you learn from them will help you develop the correct strategies that fit your needs and more importantly, your target market.

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A Numbers Game

     The amount of followers one has on social media can be a crucial determinant in how valuable an individual is on social media. When we see a person with an astounding amount of followers, we automatically presume that he or she is of some importance. That is one reason there are dealers online who sell followers for all social media platforms. The reason is to influence other people to follow them under the presumption that they are worthy of following. Though this tactic is used by some, it is just something I couldn’t do for myself. I don’t want to trick people into thinking that I have something to offer. I want them to follow me because they know I have something to offer; which are my hip hop instrumentals. Buying followers on Twitter or likes on Facebook may work for some, but it’s not something that I would waste my money on. The reason is because I’m more into building my fan base organically and not under the false pretense that I’m a person that they need to follow.

     I have been doing a lot of research on what intrigues people to follow a certain person, the truth is that I’d rather work on music than work on branding myself as an artist but the downside of that is if I don’t let people know I exist; then my own music ceases to exist because my fan base ceases to exist. We as artists must understand that music is half art and half business. Well, instead of calling it business, let’s just call it promotion. Always remember that our main reason in music is to spread our values and beliefs to other people in order to create unity among certain cultural environments and communities. If your sole purpose is to create music for no one else but yourself, then more power to you but don’t expect the same accelerated results that the next artist is working day and night for to push their music across the globe.

     So forget about buying followers and allow me to provide more tips for my artists. According to a study done by one of my favorite magazines Fast Company, a good way of gaining followers is by sharing information. Everybody follows information and sources that either share or provide information. There is no denying that anyone using social media also likes and follows people and organizations that either enlighten or entertain. The study also showed statistical data between those who share information about other things and those who only share information about themselves. The data showed that those who shared information had twice as many followers as opposed to those who only talked about themselves. Another interesting piece of information from this study is that 52% of followers want special offers and free giveaways. This was a Nielson research conducted from the U.K sometime in March of 2014. The last tip they mention in their article was to tweet and frequently post about things that relate to your fan base and target audience. The more you post, the more things you will come up with that relate to your fans which in turn gives insight on how you can predict what your followers will engage with.

     The last aspect to consider is how much authority you promulgate on social media. People will only follow you if they consider you as an authority. This means that you have done your part in showing them that you are an important figure in the music culture. It doesn’t matter if you’re a mainstream or underground artist, as long as you are worth following, they will follow. The best way to gain authority and clout is by word of mouth marketing. Being featured on blogs, interviews, videos, features in songs, and internet radio can help boost your clout and authority while further branding your name as an artist. There are many ways to become popular online; it just takes a lot of research. If you don’t have time to research, you can always hire online marketers that specialize in branding and public relations.

     A huge following always asserts authority and popularity. The reason that I don’t recommend purchasing followers is simple. If you don’t have actual content to offer actual followers, there is a huge chance they will unfollow you and not recommend you to their friends. People can usually tell if your followers are not real by simply viewing your profile. If you don’t have interesting content on your page like music or information, then they will conclude that your followers are actually bots and fake dummy profiles. Not only that but they may even view your followers and notice that they do not have any human characteristics. That is extremely harmful to your brand as an artist and can make you appear foolish. Reversing the consequence can be timely and take five times the effort to restore. Just keep in mind that you must be transparent among your fans meaning that you must be honest and believe in the information you share. Increasing your follower count may seem vain but it is an actual demographic of who supports you and who does not.