Are you a musician working hard toward making a name for yourself in the music industry? Have a new song you’re about to release? Then you probably know that there’s a lot more that goes into a hit song than good lyrics and a catchy tune. To make sure your new single is a hit, you need to make sure your fans know about it before you even release it. To ensure that your single is popular, you need to come up with the perfect strategy to promote a single release.
Music promotion is absolutely necessary for any artist looking to make it big in the industry. According to statistics on the industry, music record labels spend about $5.8 billion on marketing efforts annually, to make sure that their artists get the recognition they deserve.
Music that’s marketed well is much more likely to have more listeners and views than a song that hasn’t been promoted well enough for anybody to anticipate its release. Which is why, to make it big in the industry, you don’t just need to be a good musician, you need to be a good marketer as well.
Luckily, we’re here to help you out with that. Here are some great marketing strategies to help you promote a single release in style.
Design an on-brand song cover
One strategy that must never be underestimated is the power of good, attention-grabbing visuals to represent your music. Every single you release should have its own customized song cover, and should be represented by a personalized visual that accurately portrays what each song is about.
If you’re worried about where to find the talent or resources for an aesthetic song cover design, look no further. With PosterMyWall, you can get easy access to a wide range of song cover templates that you scroll through to find inspiration. All you have to do is log onto PosterMyWall, find the song cover template that resonates with you the most, and hop onto the editor to personalize it to your own needs.
To make sure your song cover matches the theme of your brand new single, change up the color scheme and imagery to match the vibe of your song. For instance, if your song has more of a slow, serene vibe, some warm, sunset-based colors would work great for your cover.
If you’re going for a louder, more hyped up sound, go for louder, brighter pops of color with more defined imagery. Use this song cover as the official image for your single, and have it become the face of your single release strategy.
Release an exclusive audio clip
One of the best single release strategies is to make sure your song gets heard before it even comes out. And how do you do that without revealing too much of your work before its official release? That’s where an official exclusive audio clip comes in.
Fans love a sneak peak of what’s about to come out. It helps increase anticipation for your upcoming single release and is a great way to build hype for your song. There are a ton of ways in which you can do this. Schedule an interview or radio show where you can announce to all current listeners and viewers that you’ll be performing a 10-15 second snippet of your upcoming single. This is similar to what Taylor Swift did on Good Morning America with her new version of Fearless, a moment that all Swift fans remember to this date.
You can also go about it in a different way and use Facebook or Instagram live to sing or play a small snippet from your new single to your online audience.
Another way is to host an exclusive live show filled with old hits where you can cleverly insert a small snippet of your brand new song for the fans to ponder over. Giving fans a small preview of what you have to offer is a great way to not only increase excitement over your single release strategy, but also gives you a chance to see how well received your new single will be by your fanbase.
Create a music or lyric video to accompany your single release
People love listening to music, it’s true. But you can’t deny that a vibrant, good quality visual has the power to uplift your music even more in the eyes of your audience. Especially when that visual is a lyric or music video that accompanies your song. If you can, create a music video and release it along with your single.
You can stage a visual story around the lyrics in your song and have it acted out in the video, so people can view your single as a story.
An alternative way to go about this is to release a lyric video with your song. So many people create their own versions of lyric videos once a song comes out, and a lot of times, they tend to get the lyrics wrong, especially if your song is a bit difficult to understand just through the audio.
You can produce an aesthetic lyric video of your own and release it with the song. The lyric video for the song, The Days, by Avicii got millions of views because of the creative way in which it mixed live movement with lyrics. This way, not only will people listen to your song through the video, but every time someone needs to refer to the lyrics, they can go straight back to your original video instead of a fan-made version on YouTube.
Add a personal narrative to your single
The only thing fans love more than new music is new music with a narrative behind it. As an artist, you always have a story behind each song you write and record. Which is why one of the most important things you need to add to your single release checklist is a personal narrative to connect to your new single.
To get started on this, ask yourself some of the questions listed below:
- What was your inspiration when creating this song?
- What are the main themes of the song, and do they connect to your life in any way?
- Does the song relate to a specific life event or personal feeling that you want to share?
Once you have all the answers you need, it’s time to formulate your story and figure out how to share it with the world. There are many great artists out there who have used this technique to bring attention to specific songs that they’ve released.
Taylor Swift used the extended 10-minute version of the song “All Too Well” to tell her story about her relationship with ex-boyfriend, Jake Gyllenhaal. The famous band, Queen, went about this in a different way when they recorded their all-time-hit song, “We Will Rock You”. In an interview, the band members once explained that the song was born out of a desire to connect with their audience, and have their fans be a part of their music.
The band was first taken aback by audience participation in their music in a closing concert within their 1977 tour, and the premise behind “We Will Rock You” was the desire to see fans sing and play along with the musician. Not only was this an emotional tale that truly brought meaning to even the loudest of songs, this was also seen as a clever marketing ploy to increase engagement and build hype around the band’s hit song.
You can also use your life stories to add a personal touch to your album and continue to tell this story through interviews, social media, and radio shows in small tidbits to promote your single releases until the album itself is released.
5. Create and promote merchandise related to your single
Fans love owning merchandise. Not only does it act as a super-fun collectible, it’s also a great way to feel more connected to your musical idol and show your support publicly.
Use this fan support to create merchandise for your single and make it publicly available for fans to purchase. You can even give out merchandise for free as part of a special contest. And if you’re worried that customized merchandise costs too much time and money, you don’t need to fret too much. With PosterMyWall, you can create graphics related to both your band and your new single and use them as the key image for all your merchandise.
One great way to create easy merchandise is to use the song cover you created and convert it into laptop stickers that people can print out on their own with ease, or that you can have printed out and sell on your own. You can also give a free sticker pack with every purchase of your single.
Selling merchandise not only helps you promote your music, it also encourages your fans to engage more with your brand image, and plays a key role in helping develop your brand as a musician.
6. Spread the news about your single release on social media
If you’re promoting music, you have to add social media to your single promotion checklist. Everybody who’s anybody is on social media these days, and that includes a good chunk of your fanbase. Which is why you need to make sure you don’t miss out on those super important social media posts hyping up your upcoming single.
Spread the word about the release on Facebook and Instagram through a variety of methods. You can start off by creating special social media posts to announce the date of your single release. Go to PosterMyWall and browse through the range of band poster templates available to find one you like and then customize it to fit your own needs. Add details of your single release to your poster and resize it to fit the social media platform you want to post on. Post regularly until the day of the official release.
Another great social media strategy is to introduce a special hashtag related to your upcoming single. Use the hashtag in all the posts and stories you make about your single release, and request your followers to do the same. Encourage fans to use your hashtag whenever they listen to or post about your music. This will help build up hype for your upcoming release and bring more traffic towards your social media.
Create incredible content for your single release strategy now
We’ve gone through all the reasons why music promotion is essential for a successful music career. You know by now that, to make sure your song is a hit, you need to increase awareness about your song through fabulous content, out-of-the-box strategies, and consistent fan engagement methods. If you’re looking for a way to start your music marketing, log onto PosterMyWall to use our concert poster templates, videos, social media templates to create content for that upcoming single and get ready to have a hit on your hands.
Senior editor at PosterMyWall.
