The future is independent
THREE HACKS EVERY INDEPENDENT ARTIST SHOULD KNOW ABOUT
At Phantom Sound Media we believe the future of music is independent. Streaming platforms, social media, and the affordability of creating high quality audio and video content is changing the game and providing new and exciting opportunities for independent artists. Did you know more than 60,000 songs are being uploaded to Spotify daily? That’s a new track every 1.4 seconds!! While all of this is amazing for the independent artist, it’s nearly impossible to know all the things out there that can help you get your music to the right people. So we’ve picked out 3 of our favourite hacks that we think all independent artists should know about.
www.isitagoodplaylist.com
Whether you like it or not playlists are one of the best ways to get your music to people. With so much music available a lot of people prefer to let playlist curators do the heavy lifting and instead actually use playlists to find new music. Everyone knows that landing a spot on an editorial playlist is the holy grail here, but there are literally thousands of playlists on Spotify and individual people and companies behind each of them.
As an independent artist you should be spending time on Spotify looking through playlists to find the right fit for your music. Many playlists will actually have the curators Instagram or email in the description, and if they don’t - curators often use the same name across social platforms so you can also try searching them on Insta, Twitter, or even Facebook.
Once you’ve found a playlist that fits your sound and you’re ready to submit to the curator, make sure you head over to www.isitagoodplaylist.com and use their free analyzer to see some important data about the playlist. The site will show you the artists on the playlist, how long they’ve been on it, how many monthly listeners they have, and how often they are discovered on the playlist (this is the most important piece of information).
Playlists with high “discovered on” data tells you that artists are being discovered by new listeners on that list.
2. Learn about Facebook Ads
The Ads space can be a little intimidating if you haven’t been here before. But don’t worry, it’s honestly a lot easier than you think to get started and surprisingly inexpensive. Side note - if you are planning to release new music you should always always always have a little budget set aside for marketing. We see too many artists spend so much time and energy (and money) creating amazing music but then don’t do enough once the music is released to get it heard.
We like Facebook Ads because they allow you to target the specific audience that is most likely going to be interested in your music. Listen, there is literally a niche market out there for everything including your sound. With Facebook Ads you can target audiences based on location, hobbies and interests, similar artists, and more. And every time someone sees your ad and clicks the link or watches for an extended period of time you’re getting more data on the type of people that like your sh*t and the algorithms are going to use that data to make sure your reaching more of those types of people. It’s legit a cheat code.
Don’t worry, I’m not going to write out the instructions below but you should check out this short YouTube video to learn more. And if you have questions, shoot us an email we are always happy to share what we know.
3. GET ON TWITTER
I know, I know Twitter? Yes, believe it or not Twitter is an independent artist’s best friend. Like you, we were skeptical at first about how valuable Twitter would be but after spending the last few months learning more we can say without a doubt that if you are an independent artist you should have a Twitter account and you should definitely be spending time connecting with people and sharing your music there.
Not only does Twitter have 200 million active daily accounts, but a lot of those people also love music. There are tons of people everyday on Twitter looking for new music and a massive independent artist community to connect with. We aren’t going to go into all the details about how to user Twitter here, but we do recommend starting by following and connecting with other independent artists and searching #playlistsubmission and other similar hashtags to find people on their looking for new music.