“I need to market this…”, “How am I marketing myself?”, “What is music marketing?” many think. Artists often push ideas back and forth on what their marketing tactics are, how they go viral, and how they push their tracks. Artists often want to see results quickly, but are scared to have someone think they paid for their views.
Instead of going the traditional advertising route, artists are often left grasping at thin air trying to get their music pushed, often resulting in a spiraling cascade of social media antics. However, the thought that ad buying in music should be frowned upon should be tossed out the window. While artists criticize each other for apparently gaming the system, this is what major advertising, marketing, and music agencies, as well as record labels, do to promote their artists.
In this article, we’ll discuss some options and best practices independent artists have for advertising their music.
Google Ads
Google offers a spectacular advertising suite in the recently rebranded Google Ads. You may have heard of this before as Adwords. Google Ads are spectacular for the reason that Google owns YouTube, and YouTube ads, as well as your monetized video content, if you are working with a distributor, can have advertisements ran to it directly on platform. You are able to create custom targeted audiences based on factors such as age, gender, location, interest, income rate, and more.
Among many other features, Google Ads allows you to limit how much you want to pay per view, allowing you to get as close to your goal for your budget as possible. Google Ads also allows you to advertise on Google.com, as opposed to directly on YouTube. We do not support this strategy for advertising, as we recommend using an advertising platform related to the platform you are advertising your music on. For instance, we highly suggest Google Ads for promoting new singles as well as music videos.
Spotify Ad Studio
Spotify recently debuted their official ad platform, the Ad Studio. While the Ad Studio had initially required a $250 minimum campaign, that cap has recently been removed. Ad Studio allows you can target custom audiences based on favorite genre, style of music, if they are fans of another artist, and more. Ad Studio is unique as it requires a voice-over ad. Fortunately, if you do not want to record your own voice, a member of the Spotify team can record your voice-over for you.
Spotify Ad Studio also provides an in depth break down on listeners that find your music from the ad, including how many of them have heard your music before, and how many of your tracks they streamed on average after hearing your ad. As Spotify is one of the major paid streaming platforms, using its branded platform is a great place to get your music on that platform moving from. For new albums, and singles, Spotify Ad Studio is the place to start your marketing launch.
SoundCloud Advertising
While SoundCloud offers advertising options, they are not available to all users. As a result, we cannot recommend them to the general independent artist audience. To check your availability for SoundCloud advertising, head over to https://promote.soundcloud.com
Conclusion
Does this sound like too much of a time commitment, or too complex? Have you tried out these methods and received lower than expected results? Our world-class marketing team has years of experience in the digital marketing space. Let’s chat about how we can take your career to the next level. Head over to our marketing services page for more information, to purchase a package, or to get in contact with a team member.