If you are a musician – no matter if you play solo or in a band – you will definitely want to develop your fan audience. In the past, artists had to hire special PR agencies for this purpose. Now, the internet and social media make it possible for every musician to launch a self-promotion campaign. Despite obvious advantages, the main drawback here is that there are many independent musicians, who, like yourself, want to leverage the power of internet platforms, which results in high competition in the industry.
So, to become extremely productive in your marketing strategy, you need to promote your music art efficiently. Understandably, not every musician feels like becoming a marketing expert and running a promotion campaign for themselves or their bands. Yet, this is unavoidable if you really want to make it big one day.
There are several digital channels where you can spread the word about yourself, but YouTube with its immense popularity and millions of users is the king. So, what can you do in practical terms to promote your music on YouTube?
Story Stages
Set Up a Brand
Unfortunately, even if you are very talented, just having great songs with resonating lyrics is not enough to grow your base. To tackle this issue you need to establish your personal brand. Simply put, a brand is a combination of your music works and your personal story behind the creation of your music. Having an efficient brand means that you get immediately recognized by people as soon as they hear your name. Eventually, this will result in building a loyal following.
Thumbnails in Spotlight
Surprisingly enough, getting famous on YouTube is not only about music. When you upload your videos on the platform, you make them visible to users. What you want them to do is to choose your pieces over your competitors’ ones. And that’s when a thumbnail comes in very handy. A good thumbnail can immediately attract attention and stir people into finding out more about you, your brand and your music videos. The main rule is to use colorful, high quality and professional images. Whenever you are shooting a video for your channel, remember to take some photos. Later, you will be able to use a youtube thumbnail maker to easily edit them or create new ones from scratch.
Offer Various Types of Video Content
Since YouTube is a video platform, the main type of content you need to generate is videos. Video is an effective and efficient method to promote your work and engage your fans. As a musician, your YouTube channel is mainly used to post and promote your music videos. However, there are some concerns here. Firstly, you won’t be able to produce so many high-quality professional unique music videos to keep your subscribers engaged and interested. Secondly, regardless of how good your music really is, your fans can get bored if you don’t offer them any alternatives. There are plenty of other ways to showcase your music on YouTube. For example, you can include vlogs, covers on your favorite artists, Q&A sessions, behind the scenes videos etc. This will allow you to build a real community around your music project. The extra content mentioned above makes a significant contribution to your brand’s storytelling, which is good for retaining your subscribers and increasing your visibility.
Cross-Promote Your Videos Through Other Channels
Let’s be honest – there are many talented musicians with great music content on YouTube, but far not every of them becomes popular. The thing is that the competition is so high, that even professionally-made channels can easily get lost. To avoid this situation, you need to seek other ways to make your channel highly visible. And one of the most efficient ways is to invite people to your channel using other internet platforms and tools. For example, try embedding your video into a monthly newsletter or share it on your Facebook page or Instagram stories.
Collaborate with Other Musicians
Collaborating with musicians working in the same genre or with a similar target demographic is also an advantageous strategy that is beneficial for both of you. Importantly, there are many ways of how exactly you can collaborate with colleagues. For example, you can record a song together or show up on each other’s album. Alternatively, you can launch a music battle or competition, or a joint Q&A session. Also, recommendations are an effective way of increasing exposure and growing your fan base.
Final Words
Obviously, you want to rush and become successful as soon as possible. However, if you take it slowly but surely, step by step, this will be more likely to lead to the establishment of a popular YouTube channel with thousands of active subscribers. Take the time to market yourself online by first establishing a consistent and authentic brand.
