We’re proud to make it free and easy for artists to get their music on all the biggest services around the world – now it’s time to get people listening!

So your music is online and available for people to hear from wherever they are on top services like Spotify and Apple Music. The next step is to get people listening so the streams start racking up and your fan-base builds across the globe.

There are lots of ways to reach fans new and old. We’re going to share some of the best methods we know so you can build your streaming presence and inspire yourself to find new ways to get your music heard.

Use Social Media

There are purists who don’t want their art represented by their Facebook profile – which is fair enough. But in this day and age one of the best things you can do to grow your fan base and music career is to have well-maintained social media pages. Embracing valuable platforms doesn’t make you a sell-out!

Being up on your social media as an artist requires more than just sharing your latest track when it’s released. You want to be posting as much as you can to keep people engaged. Depending on how you want to present yourself and what you’re doing as an artist there is lots of types of content to choose from you can share.

Here are some ideas:
  • Share your music. Especially if it’s new!
  • Hype upcoming releases. Share the artwork, post it’s release date, get people excited.
  • Share gigs and tour dates. This is especially important so people can come to your gigs and see when you’re in the area!
  • Share other artists. If you have other artists that your friends with or that work in your musical community promote them. It will create a good relationship with other artists and will likely result in other artists sharing you too.
  • Post snippets. Why not share bits of what you’re working on. Teasers that will create hype, remind people that you’re working on new music and give people to talk about.
  • Artist images. Images are one of the best things you can post to catch people’s eyes. Whether they’re new press photos or just a simple image to accompany an update – images have been proven to create more engagement online.
  • Videos. Videos of any kinds are also great and rank way higher for engagement. Videos from a gig, music videos, teaser videos, anything! Get creative.
  • Be original. Think of any kind of content you could create or post about. A lot of times just making sure you’re active without worrying too much about the content will help to keep your page active and therefore keep your music current. Though it’s probably best to keep it relevant and not spam memes…

Use Playlists

It used to be that radio made you a hit. If your new single made it onto a radio station then it was being broadcast to thousands maybe millions of people.

It’s been said many times and I’ll say it again: Playlists are the new radio.

Playlists have become massive with music streaming services. There are playlists on services like Spotify that have millions of subscribers coming back every week to see what’s new.

Playlists are curated by a range of different influencers who find the latest and greatest music that either fits a certain genre or theme and presents it to all the playlists listeners.

It’s an amazing way to get heard amongst a bunch of other similar artists.

There are a few ways you can get picked up for playlists. Simply being on streaming services is the most important as you never know who might find your music and share it when it’s there to be found.

Spotify have a tool in Spotify for Artists that lets you submit music to be considered for hundreds of their massive playlists.

Share your music as much as you can. The key to getting heard by the right person is putting it out there for them to find.

Network

Getting to know other artists and people involved in the industry is a great way to get your name out there. Communities are massively important for artists and helps them and their music scene to thrive.

Gigging with other artists will bring your separate fan-bases together which immediately puts your music in front of a bunch of potential new die-hard supporters.

The connections you make by being social within your music scene with the artists, managers, labels, tour crew, and more gives you lots of people who will talk about you to others as well as connections for reaching out further.

You never know who will be an in to a massive gig slot or your dream record label.

Don’t Be Exclusive

Put your music in as many places as you can so it has the best chances of being seen. Whilst you have the biggest audience on Spotify, there are hundreds-of-millions of other potential listeners on Apple Music, TIDAL, Deezer, Amazon, Google Play, YouTube, and many more.

Make sure everyone can listen to your music and you’re guaranteed to get more listeners.

At RouteNote we work with all of the services listed above and many more to get artists music live. We make it simple and we do it for free so that everyone has a chance. Whether you’re an artist, group or label you can sign up for free at www.routenote.com.