INDUSTRY NEWS

Advertising Your New Releases Online

Advertising Your New Releases Online

The Tunedly Team

If you are a singer-songwriter or artist, releasing new music presents opportunities to please your current fans and attract new ones. Creating the right impact means taking a coordinated approach to releasing the new song or composition. Having a record label pushing things in the background can take some of the pressure of promoting off your hands. 

On the other hand, if you are an independent artist, you will need to handle advertising on your own, and chances are high that you have a meager advertising budget to play with. How can you ensure your release gets the maximum chance of exposure in relation to your budget? Here are some ideas to keep you on the right track.

Acquaint yourself with online advertising

When it comes on to music promotion tips, there are a few things that are considered a given, especially if you are a serious artist looking to gain exposure. To begin with, you should have a website already set up, along with an accompanying press kit and marketing materials. A newsletter mailing list is also a great idea, as well as active profiles on one or more social media platforms. Having these in place do not automatically lead to exposure. You also need to know about the different ways you can advertise online using various platforms. These include creating and running Google ads, display ads, and social media ads. 

While each platform is different, the objective is pretty much the same – getting people to click on and share your content, which will bring more attention to your new release. There are tons of free and paid courses and tutorials available – online as well – that can get you up to speed with different forms of online advertising. Google, LinkedIn, and Facebook, for instance, offer certificate courses on various aspects of digital advertising.

Tap into your creative juices

Advertising your song release is not simply telling people to listen to your new song. Unless your name is Rihanna, Drake, or some other popular artist, this strategy is unlikely to give you the results you seek. Achieving your objectives from online advertising campaigns requires you to be a bit more creative. Try to tell a story or appeal to the curiosity of your fans. Find out what kind of messages they tend to share and react to and try to replicate them in your ads. 

For example, video content is highly popular on social media, as are live streamed content. Consider setting up watch parties for your song launch and creating short lyric videos to show off snippets of your song. Conduct polls and ask fans to give feedback on your music. Include relevant hashtags in your posts (#NewMusicFriday, for example) to ensure your release is being mentioned in large conversations online. Tie these tactics in with your advertising campaigns and you will likely get more fruitful reactions and results.

Spend time understanding your target audience

Getting maximum results from your online ads is dependent on how well you target the people who are truly interested in your music. This requires you to have in-depth knowledge about your fan base. What ideal age range are they in? Where are they located? What times are they most likely to be active online? It might seem impossible to know these and other details about your target listeners, but there are plenty of tools you can use to find the information you need for advertising ammunition. Social media resources such as Sprout Social, for example, allows you to “listen” to you your audience to know what conversations they are participating in. 

Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram allow you to use their analytical tools to find out the gender and location of visitors to your pages. YouTube also provides data about people’s viewing habits. The more time you spend learning about your target audience, the better you will be able to create strong ads that get the right people interested in your new releases. 

If you are just starting out, getting information on your target audience can be tough initially. But there are paths you can take to start. Some streaming platforms make it possible for you to look at the profiles of artists who may be similar to you in style. You can look at the people who follow and listen to their music to start getting an idea of the general demographic you need to go after.

Be willing to ask for help

One way to extend the reach of your advertising dollar is to ask for help in spreading the word about your latest release. Simply asking for a like and share can reel in new listeners that were not aware of your work before. But you can get even more creative to improve the results. There are numerous music blogs and podcasts that may be willing to feature your music or add your new release to new song playlists. The trick is to find ones that are relevant to your type of music and audience type and size.

Final thoughts

Getting the right kind of traction for your new song releases is pivotal if you are to get the exposure you want in terms of streams, sales, radio play, etc. Online advertising has somewhat leveled the playing field when it comes on to professionals musicians getting exposure for their music. It has been particularly helpful for premiering new song releases and announcements related to advancing your music career. Implementing the above best practices will, hopefully, help you achieve the results you seek.