Online Fan Clubs: Do You Have One?

Posted on February 21, 2012 by SongCast

Back when The Grateful Dead were touring, they had their fans sign up to a mailing list and would literally mail them things in the mail. At one point, they even sent a survey asking fans questions that helped them tailor their touring, merch and more. Not only was this a great way to gain insight, it also helped foster great relationships with their fans and converted them into fans for life – brand ambassadors.

Now that most of your interactions with your fans are online, it’s easy to forget that you need to foster relationships with them, not simply blast them with emails. And now, there are so many different channels that you interact with your fans, it’s hard to keep track.

The online fan club has changed shape. It’s less of a club and more of a 360-degree look at the ways you interact with your fans. While it might seem overwhelming, there are a number of great online services that can help you keep in touch, tailor your interactions with fans in ways that they prefer and make money.

Here are two online services worth checking out:

Topspin.com is a direct-to-fan marketing and retail software platform that helps artistsband_marketingincrease awareness, build relationships and turn fans into customers. Turn your music career into a business. With Topspin, you can:

  • Share content: Stream your audio and video anywhere from websites and blogs to Facebook feeds and mobile devices.
  • Increase fan connections: Connect with your fans through email, Facebook or Twitter and you can analyze their data to send them targeted email blasts.
  • Earn money: You can customize a pro-grade store quickly and easily (without knowledge of HTML) and share your offers with fans. You can sell digital downloads or physical discs, as well as tickets, merch, fan club memberships, and more.

FanBridge.com is the leading fan management and marketing platform for email and social media. It can help you grow your fan base, increase fan engagement, and then monetize those relationships with fans. How?

  • Email, Mobile and Social Media: It merges email, Facebook and other social networking platforms with direct-to-fan engagement tools, no matter where you are, or what platform you’re using.
  • Analytics: FanBridge offers very sophisticated and integrated analytics to help you understand your fans. You’ll know who’s opening your messages, and who’s clicking, sharing and more.
  • Targeted Marketing: FanBridge offers targeted marketing to help you reach the right audience, and increase your likes, gain more fans and more.

So, if you’re interested in gaining fans for life, it’s important that you consider a fully integrated approach. Tools like TopSpin and FanBridge will help!

Tell us what you think: How do you keep track of – and in contact with – your fans?

The SongCast Crew

Posted in Digital Distribution, Fan Clubs, Music Marketing, Promoting Your Music, Sales and Marketing | Leave a comment

Confident Performances Lead to Better Online Music Sales

Posted on February 20, 2012 by SongCast

online_music_salesConfidence during a performance can inspire a crowd.  As you rock out on stage, your audience will be watching your every move.  Most likely, at some point many people in the audience will be envious and have visions of what it would be like to be on stage.  Having a confident appearance in front of them will ensure your fans leave your show wanting tolisten to more of your music and wishing they could live the life of a rock star.  Use the strategies below to increase your confidence on stage while being able to sell music online at an increased rate.

Confidence Strategies

As a musician, if you have stage fright at any level, small or large, it is important that you discover strategies that will help you to overcome it. Having a larger sense of confidence on stage will help you in your efforts of selling music on iTunes and other places online. Personal strategies can include developing a positive response to stress and refining your self-evaluation skills. By changing your body’s response to stress, you will come to enjoy the pressure and channel the once nervous energy into creative power. It is also important for you to fully understand your strengths and weaknesses, as it will help you on and off of the stage. Task related strategies can also help to bring more confidence to the stage. You will need to know your music inside and out.  This includes choosing music that is attainable for you to play as well as many hours of practice. The less you worry about the notes you are going to hit, the more you will be able to focus on your overall performance. Use these stress relieving techniques to increase your confidence on state and better sell music online.

Marketing Efforts

Once your confidence skills have gained momentum and you are feeling more comfortable on stage, you will be able to use your stage presence to better market your online music sales. On stage remind your fans that you sell music online and that you will continue selling music on iTunes.  Talk up your tracks and CDs.  As you have them enthralled by your performance you will be able to make a pitch for them to buy your songs. Your fans can’t support your music without knowing where to find it, because of this it is your duty as a musician to inform them where they can find it.

Just remember, take a deep breath and stay confident on stage. For more tips on selling music on iTunes or online, contact SongCast today!

Posted in Music Marketing, Sales and Marketing, Selling Your Music, Selling Your Music on iTunes | Leave a comment

Crowdfunding for Musicians – Part 2

Posted on February 15, 2012 by SongCast

Interview with Brian Meece, Co-Founder and CEO of Rockethub.com

crowdfunding_musiciansWe know that money is a key factor in making your work a reality, so SongCast sat down with Brian Meece, Co-Founder and CEO of crowdfunding website Rockethub.com to get the inside scoop straight from the source. Read on to find out what advise he gives to indie artists looking to raise funds for their next project:

SongCast: What is the most important thing musicians should know before embarking on a crowdfunding campaign?

Brian Meece: The most important thing to have is a “campaign mindset”.

Crowdfunding is an online event that harnesses a community for funding, awareness and feedback. This event has a beginning, a middle and end to it. It’s very different from the standard ecommerce play where you open up a store and sell stuff online. And it’s different from a donation play where there’s an online tip jar. Crowdfunding is very much an event that galvanizes communities to participate within a very specific amount of time. The name of the game is to galvanize current supporters and gain new ones by promoting your project like mad.

Q: How should they choose what platform to use and what makes Rockethub stand out?

A: There a quite a few platforms out there these days. Go with a reputable company that’s responsive to your emails and gives feedback on your campaign as needed. Worth noting that with RocketHub you don’t have to reach the full funding amount in order to unlock your funds like you do on some of our competitors’ platforms. So, if a musician sets a goal of $15,000 and raises $9,000 or $10,000, they’ll be able to walk away with their hard-earned funds. We also run “LaunchPads” on RocketHub – which are opportunities for artists to get sponsorships, special gigs, or unique services to move their career forward. Submitting to a LaunchPad is completely free for artists that raise funds on our site.

Q: How important is video content to the success of a campaign?

A: Videos are important. Artists really are “selling the experience” with a RocketHub campaign. This funding model is about the relationship that these funders – we call them “fuelers” on RocketHub – have with the artist/person spearheading the project. It’s about the relationship that those fuelers have with this creative person and that they have with each other – their ability to connect and communicate. It’s really about how fans participate with the funding, how they connect with the artist and the other funders – and what they get back in exchange for the financial contribution. It’s a very different phenomenon from just going to the store or downloading something. It’s very impactful when done correctly. A video helps personalize the entire process.

Q: What is a realistic fundraising goal?

A: Most music projects raise between $2,000 to $20,000 on RocketHub depending on their fanbase. The average is about $5,000 – which is often enough to make a record, music video, or support a small tour.

Q: Any other tips you’d like to add?

A: I ran my own campaign. And I can tell you, it takes a bit of commitment and a little bit of gusto to get it together and put a project out to the world. While it can be intimidating, what I really enjoyed about it was that it gave me an excuse to reach out to people that I hadn’t talked to or seen in a while. I said, “Here’s what I’m up to, just FYI. Here’s what I’m doing and how I’m doing it. If you’re interested in this – and I hope you are – here’s how you can become a part of it. If you’re intrigued, come join the tribe.” And that communication really worked well with my audience. I have a hunch it would also work well with a lot of other artists’ audiences.

For more information about Rockethub, visit www.RocketHub.com

Posted in Crowdfunding & Fanfunding | Leave a comment

How to Create and Share Playlists on Spotify

Posted on February 14, 2012 by SongCast

spotify_for_musiciansHave you been using Spotify? If not, it’s worth checking out. It’s a music player that allows you to stream tracks on any device (PC, Mac or mobile) for free. Millions of tracks are available to you, without having to download them to your hard drive. And, it’s social- you can integrate Spotify into your Facebook account to see and hear what your friends are listening to – including their playlists. (If you’re not into sharing on Facebook, this feature can be disabled).

One of the coolest features about Spotify – especially if you find yourself listening to the same music over and over – is the playlist function. A playlist is a collection of tracks grouped together and saved for easy access. A single playlist can store up to 10,000 tracks!

Creating a Spotify playlist is very easy:

  • First, create an account
  • Then, click on ‘New playlist’ in the left column and give your playlist a name
  • Drag and drop the tracks you want included
  • Alternatively, you can right-click a track or album and select ‘Save to’ and then ‘New playlist.’

Care to share? Here’s how you share your playlist with friends:

  • Click on the playlist and drag it to your friend’s username
  • It will then appear in their inbox
  • You can even add a message if you like

Alternatively (but just as easily) you can click on the Share buttons and post playlists to Facebook, Twitter or Messenger.
Spotify_sharing

If you want to create a playlist with friends – and allow everyone to add or remove tracks – you can do that too. To create a collaborative playlist:

  • Right-click your playlist and select ‘Collaborative playlist.’
  • A green icon and text will appear– and the playlist will sync automatically between the users managing it.
  • Note: everyone that you share the playlist with will be able to edit it.
  • If you’ve created a playlist but decide you want it all to yourself, you can turn off the ‘Collaborative playlists’ option at any time.

If you want to create a playlist of songs to get you pumped up for the gym or songs for a romantic evening at home, you can do so – and share it – with Spotify playlists.

Tell us what you think: What playlists will you make?

The SongCast Crew

Posted in Digital Distribution, Spotify | Leave a comment

How to Sell Your Music on iTunes

Posted on February 10, 2012 by SongCast

itunes
So you have been able to answer one of the most difficult questions for artists, “How do I upload my music on iTunes?”  Either by partnering with Apple directly or by using an aggregator such as SongCast, you have been able to successfully upload your music to iTunes and make it available to your fans.  This is one of the first big challenges for many up and coming musicians and bands. The next challenge many artists face is learning how to sell music on iTunes and other music retail sites. To sell your music effectively, you will need to draw your fan base to iTunes and develop new fans through music marketing.

iMixes

Learning how to create and use iMixes is a great and inexpensive way to know how to sell music on iTunes.  iMixes or playlists are made by individual users and then published for the rest of the iTunes community. Use your current iTunes account to create a playlist including your own music and other songs that are in the same genre.  You are able to make four additional accounts on the same card, in order to make more playlists. Each playlist will further connect your music to like artists and help your potential fans find your songs and albums.  It will also place your music in more than one place online and gain you more exposure. In the end iMixes will help your future fans to find you because they will be able to relate your music to bands and artists they already enjoy.

Online Promotion

To further know how to sell music on iTunes, you will need to understand how to best use your online presence. On your various online sites, from MySpace to Facebook to your blog to your band’s personal website, direct traffic to iTunes and to your music. Tell the visitors of your sites that your tracks are available to purchase on iTunes through various forms of communication. The most important part is getting people to listen to your music sample on iTunes, after that your music will be able to sell itself.

After you have answered, “How do I upload my music on iTunes?” your next step will be to know how to sell music on iTunes. If you’re ready to launch your music career or have more questions about how to sell music on iTunes, or the process of uploading your music to iTunes then contact SongCast today!

Posted in Music Marketing, Sales and Marketing, Selling Your Music on iTunes | 1 Comment