Social media can be a powerful tool for building buzz around your show. It’s also a great way to reach people who wouldn’t otherwise know about you. But if you don’t have time to manage your social media strategy, it may not be worth the effort. The key to making social media work for you is to set up your own personal automation system so that when something happens, you get an alert and can take action right away!
The number one rule of thumb when promoting your show is to start early.
The number one rule of thumb when promoting your show is to start early. If you start early, it gives you time to test out different strategies and experiment with what works for you. This will also give you time to build up some excitement for your show before it airs. You’ll want to be able to tell people about the release date and make sure that they know where they can find it!
You should also try getting involved in social media communities related both specifically and tangentially related areas. For example, if I were writing a sitcom about two friends named Claire and Danny who run a coffee shop together, I would join groups on Facebook like “Coffee Shop Owners” or “Coffee Lovers.” These groups may not be as huge as something like Comic Books as a whole but they can still reach people who are likely interested in my show!
Write a great pitch for your show.
When promoting your show, you’ll often find yourself with the task of writing a short, catchy headline. This is the most important part of your pitch and should be concise, informative and engaging in order to get people’s attention.
Include the show title and dates (ex: “The Great Gatsby at Theater XYZ”)
Include the venue (ex: “Theater XYZ”)
Include ticket prices (ex: $15–20)
Include time/location information (ex: 7pm–8pm Saturday Jan 14th at Theater XYZ)
Start by making a poster that includes all the information people need to know about your show.
Start by making a poster that includes all the information people need to know about your show, including:
The date, time, and location of your event.
A catchy title for your event.
An image that visually shows what you’re promoting (for example, if it’s an art show, include a photo of an artwork).
The idea is to grab people’s attention with something visually appealing so they’ll want to learn more about what you’re doing. The more professional and clear your poster looks, the more likely people will want to come see it in person!
Start a Facebook event and invite all of your friends.
Facebook events are a great way to promote your show. You can use the event page to promote ticket sales, or you can create an event for free shows so that people who aren’t familiar with your work know about them.
You’ll want to include a link on your event page that takes users directly to the ticketing site or your website, so they know where they need to go in order to buy tickets.
Share your social media posts as often as possible, but don’t annoy people.
You don’t want to annoy your audience with too many posts, but it’s also important to show that you’re actively working on your content. If you post very infrequently, viewers will assume you aren’t doing anything and will lose interest in your account. To maintain a healthy balance of posting frequency, try posting five times a week at most. In between those posts, share other relevant information that isn’t related specifically to the show (behind-the-scenes photos; personal stories).
If people are tired of seeing only one kind of thing from you, they might unsubscribe from your channel or stop following along on social media altogether. There are plenty of different types of content—try mixing things up so that each social media platform has its own unique feel (for example: use more photos on Instagram than Facebook).
Consider creating a hashtag for your show.
Now that you’ve got a show, it’s time to promote it on social media. While you might be tempted to jump right into creating a Facebook page, Twitter, TikTok and Instagram feed for your show, remember that creating a hashtag can help people find your work more easily.
To create one, ask yourself this question: what are people going to say about my show? If the answer is “it’s too long,” then you should probably rethink your idea. But if the answer is “this is hilarious” or “I love all the characters” or whatever else comes up during your brainstorming session, try turning this into a hashtag using these steps:
Make sure it’s not already in use by another company or person. This may seem obvious but just wait until someone else has used “#FunTimesWithCandiceAndKirby” before you get started on yours!
Keep it simple—you don’t want people having difficulty remembering how they found out about the show in the first place!
Post reviews of your show on Instagram or other social media sites.
As a playwright, you have likely seen the importance of reviews. Reviews are an opportunity to share your show with people who haven’t seen it yet, as well as a way to thank fans who have supported you by seeing the performance.
If you’re running a show that has been produced before and is being revived in another city or region, consider posting reviews from previous productions on Instagram and other social media sites. You can also gather friends or family members who have seen the production previously and ask them for their thoughts about it so that you can post their feedback online as well.
Create link-backs from outside resources to drive traffic to the url you want people to visit (the event page or ticket sales page).
Here’s how it works:
Create link-backs from outside resources to drive traffic to the url you want people to visit (the event page or ticket sales page).
For example, if your show is about dogs and you have a blog on dog training, create an article on your site titled “Tips for choosing a good dog trainer” that links back to your show.
Or if one of your sponsors is a pet supply store in town, they might want to create a coupon code just for people coming from their website. They will then post the code on their site and promote it on social media.
Link-backs work best when they are written by someone who has expertise in the same subjects as your content but aren’t directly involved with promoting it online themselves.
Build buzz with contests.
Contests are a great way to build buzz, and they’re especially effective if your prize is something related to your show. For example, if you’re promoting an improv comedy show, give away tickets or free passes. You can also set up a social media contest with the prize being tickets—just make sure it’s easy for people to enter by tagging the post in their own post and including the hashtag #ContestEntry. Don’t make it too complicated or time-consuming; just ask them to tag themselves once on Twitter or Instagram. This will help you grow your following because users will be exposed to the content of others who’ve already entered (and possibly shared) this same contest!
A successful social media marketing strategy can be simple and not time-consuming if you make it easy for yourself by getting ahead of it and automating some processes!
In order to be successful, you need to be consistent and get ahead of your social media marketing. You can do this by using tools like Buffer or Hootsuite that allow you to schedule posts in advance, so that all you have to do is post and forget about it! Also, if you’re not sure what kind of content people want from your show, just ask for feedback. If people are responding well to one type of post over another then keep doing more like those!
If there’s a trend in the industry or news that could benefit your show’s audience, make sure they know about it and add it into their feed somehow! Don’t just stick with what works though—you need to stay on top of new trends so that when they come out next time around they’ll still be relevant enough for people who weren’t paying attention before (because who has time?).
Conclusion
As you can see, promoting your show is not complicated or time-consuming. The most important things are to start early and be consistent with your efforts. If you do those two things, then your social media strategy will work for you!
You know that feeling you get when you’re on the subway, and someone sits down next to you, and you just feel… connected?
You can’t explain it, but suddenly your lives seem to intersect in this weird way. And there’s something really magical about that.
That’s how we felt when we listened to jsin’s music.
It’s music that makes you feel as if you’re on a journey with someone else. It’s reassuring, it’s comforting, and it’s also not afraid to make a statement about the times we live in.
You may have heard of jsin if you live in Toronto—he’s been making big waves in the city lately with his debut album Surrender. But even if you don’t live here, it’s time for you to get familiar.
jsin is a musician, and like many artists and creative entrepreneurs, he’s spent years trying to make it as a musician. But as a performer, he knows that building an audience is all about connection.
So jsin got to work creating social media accounts for his music, but he quickly found that posting on social media had become a chore. He was trying to post at random times throughout the day, whichever stories came to him first, and it wasn’t working.
After tirelessly working on his new EP, jsin wanted to release his music out into the world in a meaningful way. He pulled together music videos, lined up a few media interviews and started working with a major publicist in the music industry. He reached out to The Social Media Artist team for help to manage his Instagram as it was the platform that was the most effective for him and his music.
Problem
jsin wanted to reach more fans through social media and maximize his visibility on Instagram. The visualization of his brand was already in place, but he required help in developing a strategy that would communicate the right messages and reach the right audiences.
The challenges jsin faced included:
Creating a social media strategy for Instagram that included posting for stories, IG reels and posts.
Creating a brand identity on Instagram that matched jsin’s existing music brand.
Finding the balance between personal and promotional posts to keep audiences engaged.
Learning how to manage Instagram independent of a marketing agency.
Solution
Our work with jsin started by establishing his brand voice. It was important that his brand would feel like it fit jsin’s unique way of connecting with the world. We used Canva templates to help maintain consistency for his feed—but we also researched the kinds of hashtags that were trending in the music scene in Toronto. This allowed us to help jsin grow his following by joining in on conversations already taking place among musicians and fans.
We helped him create a posting schedule that would help him grow his audience in a more intentional way. Instead of scrambling to come up with posts on the fly, we came up with a plan together and created content that he could use each week. Our strategies incorporated ideas and images from jsin’s own life so that the posts felt authentic to who he is and what his music represents. We also focused on building trust with his followers by encouraging him to show more of himself behind the scenes—we’re talking childhood posts, mental health awareness and personal stories.
We made sure that each post on Instagram had a distinct purpose: meditative lyrics videos featured jsin’s songs playing over soothing video backgrounds, while we encouraged his followers to play games with him on his stories. In this way, he was able to connect directly with his audience—and it helped him become known as an artist who cared about other people.
Results
Engagement increased by 536.1%!
Followers resonated with jsin’s personal posts and shared their own stories with him
A clear content plan including a content calendar with ideas for Instagram posts and stories as well as video and image templates that jsin can continue to use to connect with his fan base!
Now, jsin has an engaged audience of fans who are excited about his music and are ready for more! Here’s what he had to say about working with us:
“My main challenge was figuring out what/when to post. Lara helped me out with putting a plan together for the month and even created content that was published as per the plan. Lara was curious, thoughtful and thorough in getting to know me as an artist, giving me content ideas to build on and always making sure I was happy with it. Easy and a pleasure to work with.”
jsin, Musician
We are so excited to see what the future holds for jsin! He is a talented artist who is passionate about connecting with his audiences. We have had an amazing time working with him and we can’t wait to hear his new album. Check him out here.
Sometimes as an artist, you may not have the funds to work with a marketing agency – and that’s okay! As long as you have a plan in place and a bit of time each week, you can manage your social media on your own. Let us help you strategize, create templates and take the heavy work off you so you know exactly what to post on social. We’d love to help, tell us about your art here.
Snapchat is a quintessential app for “living in the moment”. Snaps are shared on the fly and in the heat of a moment without the attached worry of how many likes or comments they’ll receive, allowing for more realistic and unedited looks into people’s everyday lives. When using Snapchat as a musician, following this level of openness and transparency shows personability, promotes your art, and shows interesting content beyond your music that fans will be sure to love.
A Day In The Life
If people take an interest in your music, chances are they’ll take an interest in how it comes to fruition. Try snapping some footage of your process, and what goes into making your music what it is. This could come straight from the inception process in the form of songwriting or jamming, to actually recording and mixing the track with snaps of studio sessions and various instrument demonstrations.
But hey, you don’t always have to snap about your music! Let people know that you’re a human being; give them a glimpse of your life outside of music. What goes into your smoothies? What do you do to de-stress after a day of producing music? Fans like to know that their favourite musicians are people who they can relate to: people who take part in everyday chores and activities just like they do. So stop overthinking and let your snaps show your fans the real you!
A great way that musicians can easily use Snapchat to promote their music, is by previewing new songs. This can be as simple as firing off a quick snap story of you listening to a track that’s currently in the works, or even recording a new track in the studio with your band.
Previewing new work creates a buzz. It gets your followers excited for what’s to come and gives them something to look forward to. Not to mention that sharing these quick snippets is essentially creating shareable content in the easiest way possible. If you’re already in the midst of recording or listening to an upcoming track, why not turn it into a shareable snap that can get people talking about your music?
Behind The Scenes Footage
If you perform live, giving your fans a behind the scenes look is a great way to create excitement and give them a VIP treatment of what goes on backstage. You can show them snaps of what it’s like to make sure your instruments are in tune and ready to go, how a sound check works, or even the various staff at the venue who are working hard to make the concert a reality!
This also goes back to being personable with your followers and shining a light on what life as a musician is really like. Even if your just cracking jokes in the green room or making small talk with the sound guy, most of your fans are likely unfamiliar with what happens beyond the stage, so let them into your world!
Creating A Geofilter For Your Show
This one’s more so for those with a bit of graphic design skills. But if you can pull it off, it can be a HUGE benefit to your live show and the promotion of your music. Ever noticed how when you go to a certain location, new filters directly related to that location pop up for you to use? These are called Geofilters, and they’re actually free for anyone to make! So making one for your show that features branded images and awesome graphics related to your band is a surefire way to get people snapping and sharing that they’re at your show! Pricing to use Geofilters changes according to size of duration and campaign duration.
This is a Geofilter!
To learn more about these Geofilters and how to create them, check out this great walkthrough by SocialMediaExaminer.
If you have extra marketing budget, look into Snapchat Lenses. Similar to Geofilters, a Lens can appear according to your geographical area. Here’s an example of how Ed Sheeran used Snapchat Lenses to promote his new single.
Snapchat Spectacles
Snapchat Spectacles are the newest and greatest thing to come out of Snapchat’s parent company Snap Inc. Spectacles are sunglasses with built in cameras (talk about 007) that allow you to take snaps hands free, from a high definition, first person POV.
As a musician, these can be used to add an entirely different perspective to any of your snaps, with the most notable setting being live shows. Showing your fans what you see from stage is an awesome way to let your fans virtually walk in your shoes, and it gives them a much more intimate feeling of what it’s like to be you!
In conclusion, it’s truly best not to overthink it. As long as you remain tasteful and appropriate, your fans will be interested in what you post because they are already interested in you and your music; so get out there and start snapping!
What’s up musicians?! Do you ever find yourself sitting and staring at your Soundcloud analytics page, not really sure what to do beyond checking your weekly plays and likes? Don’t worry, you’re not alone. Getting valuable insights from statistics and analytics can often be tricky; it takes some skill to put all those numbers and info together to add up to something that makes sense. In this post we’re going to give you the rundown on Soundcloud analytics navigation, which statistics you’ll want to measure, and what this data means for you as an artist. Let’s get started.
Layout and Navigation
To access your Soundcloud analytics page, click on your profile icon in the top right corner of the homescreen, followed by the stats button in the drop down menu.
You should now be on the main Stats page. From here, you’ll see that the default date range shows the last 7 days. This can be changed to the last 14 days, 30 days, 12 months, or any custom date range of your choosing. For easy navigation between dates, the arrows located beneath the graph area to the left and right will move forward or backward in time based on the date range you’ve selected. For example, if you set your range to 7 days, hit the back arrow to see the previous 7 days, and the forward arrow for following 7 days. Pretty straightforward, right?
Beneath the date range options you will see a list of your uploaded tracks defaulted in order of most-least plays. You will also see these numbers laid out in a graph in the main area of the page, telling you which specific dates the different plays came from. In the upper left hand area of the stats page you will see the options for plays, likes, comments, reposts and downloads. Clicking on any of these will change the information displayed on the graph accordingly, as well as the way in which your tracks are ranked.
To see statistics for an individual track, simply click the name of the track you wish to isolate in the track list in the upper right hand area of the page, and the bar graph will change to a dotted line graph showing analytics for that specific track.
Basic Statistics
For the most part, the basic stats offered by Soundcloud analytics are pretty straightforward; you’ll be able to see when and with what tracks you’re getting the most plays, likes, comments, reposts and downloads. But where these stats can start to give valuable insights, are in cases especially when things don’t seem to add up.
[Tweet “it’s important to try and put yourself in the shoes of the listener #soundcloudanalytics”]
Maybe one track has less plays than another, but it has much more likes, or maybe more reposts. In these cases, it’s important to try and put yourself in the shoes of the listener. Perhaps the reason your most liked song is getting a low number of plays is from something as simple as the name, or even the image paired with the track. What is it that is different about the most played track that is getting it all of those listens?
Another great way to use these statistics is when you start using other social media platforms to push your work as well. For example, say you just uploaded a ton of promotional posts to Facebook telling people to check out your Soundcloud page. If you make note of the dates when these posts went live, you can see how it reflects in your Soundcloud analytics. You can experiment with different social platforms to see which methods of promotion and which channels bring you the best results.
This is where Soundcloud can start to provide you with some very valuable insights. With a Pro Unlimited account, you’ll get more advanced statistics such as which specific people are listening to your tracks the most, which countries and cities give you the most plays, and which websites your listeners are coming from to get to your Soundcloud page.
Let’s start with your top listeners. This is a very valuable statistic that essentially lets you see who your biggest fans are. You can use this insight to reach out to them directly and show appreciation, ask their opinions on your music and what they’d like to hear from you in the future, and if they’re a fellow musician, collaborate!
[Tweet “ask for opinions on your music and what they’d like to hear from you in the future, and if they’re a fellow musician, collaborate! #soundcloudanalytics”]
Knowing which countries and cities are giving you the most plays is a great way to see where your biggest fan base resides. You’ll be able to see which locations your music resonates in the most, where potential marketing efforts will be the best received and what locations may need more attention, and which destinations would be best to gig at while on tour!
Arguably the most useful pro statistic is the ability to see which websites your listeners are coming from. One major benefit of this is seeing which social platforms are best for focusing your marketing efforts. For example, if the majority of your fans are coming from Facebook then you’ll definitely want to spend more time there; create more paid ads and maintain a consistent presence while engaging with your fans on a regular basis. Another benefit is the potential for finding new websites or bloggers who have linked to your tracks on their own means; this is a great way to reach out and make new connections for future collaboration!
In conclusion, you can use Soundcloud analytics as a reflection of the current standing of your music, and a great indication of what steps you should take next. We hope this post will get you started off in the right direction, but if you have any questions don’t hesitate to tweet us @thesm_artist to learn more about Soundcloud and other social media marketing tips :).
As all things slowly start to hop aboard the digital train, music promotion has already boarded and is finding its seat. Music streaming and digital sales are edging out physical merchandising and advertising more and more each day, and having an online presence for your music is now a must-have. But it doesn’t have to be so hard! We’ve put together a list of what we believe to be 5 of The Best Social Media Sites for Musicians to get you started. Let’s dive in.
Soundcloud is an enormous community of artists and one of the best platforms to share tracks, receive feedback, build a fan base, and find other musicians. Many artists such as Post Malone and Bryson Tiller actually started their careers off the backbone of Soundcloud and were discovered straight from the site itself. With the music scene shifting more towards streaming rather than direct physical sales, this is a great platform to be taking advantage of.
Some of the great features of Soundcloud are:
Users can like and repost your tracks. Similar to Twitter, when someone reposts your track, it will show up on their personal stream and allow their followers to see it, ultimately putting your music in front of more sets of eyes – Score!
Comments on tracks are time stamped at the specific time in the song in which they were posted, giving you a neat way of seeing what specific part of your track made people want to comment.
Real-time comments are one of the many great features offered by Soundcloud.
Statistics on when your tracks are getting plays, reposts, likes and comments are free with any basic account. Paid accounts can offer more valuable statistics such as plays by country & city, the names of the users who are playing your music the most, and which social networks and websites people are coming from to get to your songs.
Just like Soundcloud, Bandcamp is another one of the best social media sites for musicians, labels and fans to get together and share music. While Soundcloud is more social media based with commenting and reposting, Bandcamp is skewed towards creating a more well-rounded sales platform for your music and brand, and is home to more full length albums, merch sales, and more.
Some interesting features offered by Bandcamp include:
Setting a price or a “pay what you think is fair” option for your music so that you can start making money off of your track instantly. You can even create your own discount and promo codes!
New artist recommendations that can automatically put your music in front of new fans, ultimately growing your potential follower base without having to lift a finger.
In depth statistics showing what’s being purchased and when, where fans are coming from and more. A paid account can even link your Bandcamp statistics with Google Analytics for some serious data collection.
The ability to sell merchandise! You can bundle together your music and merch to make different packages available at different price points.
Although not directly related to music promotion, Facebook is an excellent platform to build a central hub for fans to reach out and have discussions, learn about upcoming shows, singles and more. With over 2 BILLION active users every month, it is also a great place to share content that has the potential to go viral.
Facebook offers many great page management tools that make it easy for you to highlight important info and find new fans;
The use of a strong header image that shows upcoming singles, gig dates etc. is a great way to advertise important events without actually showing people an advertisement.
Here’s an example of a good promotional header image.
The ability to pin posts allows you to pin popular content that is performing well to the top of your page where it can stay until you decide otherwise (perhaps a new video or single?)
Pro Tip: Previous posts that have performed well can be used to grow your fan base by simply clicking on the ‘likes’ button to see who has liked the post, then clicking the ‘invite’ button to invite those likers directly to become fans of your page.
When it comes to directly communicating with fans, fellow musicians, and even labels, Twitter is absolutely one of the best social media sites for musicians to be on. Creating a dialogue and engaging with those that are most important to you is an amazing way to build your fan base, get in touch with other artists for potential collaborations, and even get discovered by labels (fingers crossed!)
In order to get on top of the Twitter game, knowing how to get the most out of the platform as well as it’s features is crucial;
Start utilizing Twitter Lists. This feature allows you to categorize people/accounts into specific groups of your choosing. Make a group for labels of interest, number one fans, music blogs, favourite artists etc. so that certain people of interest can be found in one place with ease.
Twitter Lists is located in the drop down menu when clicking on your profile icon.
Pay attention to trending hashtags! Stay current and be aware if any of the content you are uploading will naturally relate to trending topics.
Reach out to other artists to build relationships, music blogs for possible features, and stay up to date on what your competition is doing.
Insert links at the beginning of your tweets rather than the end; they are more likely to get clicked on that way. Also be sure to use calls to action! If you ask for a retweet, there’s a better chance you’ll get it.
[Tweet “Reach out to other artists to build relationships, music blogs for possible features, and stay up to date on what your competition is doing.”]
Instagram is one of the most popular and active platforms today, so not taking advantage of it would be a huge missed opportunity. Being the major platform for photo and video content, creating a brand for music on this platform and showing off behind the scenes footage of new song development, musician life, live performances and more is a great way to get your music heard.
Some important tips for using Instagram are to:
Use relevant hashtags. Up to 30 hashtags can be included in a post and can easily be hidden in the first comment of your post instead of the caption to avoid the look of being too ‘hashtag-crazy’.
Use the ‘story’ feature located at the top of the app to post a photo or video that lasts 24 hours and shows people what you’re up to in the moment. You can also start live videos from here!
Follow other artists, labels, and music blogs. By now I’m sure you’re seeing a pattern. Building relationships is CRUCIAL on every platform and is one of the most important aspects of ALL kinds of marketing!
[Tweet “Building relationships is CRUCIAL on every platform and is one of the most important aspects of ALL kinds of marketing!”]
The world of digital music promotion can sometimes be a little overwhelming, especially when it seems like there is an endless number of websites and apps claiming to be the “be all and end all” for selling your work. But realistically, there is no one platform that is best to use, and instead you’ll find that creating a consistent presence across multiple platforms is the best method for successful music marketing. Hopefully this list gets you started off in the right direction, but if you have any questions, don’t hesitate to send us an email :).
