Hey I thought it would be useful to look at what you did with your last release, what lessons you have learned and and what issues remain outstanding, ie you are still looking for a solution. Please reply in the format below: Release Title: Release Date: Promotion Strategy: Aims and Goals: Chart Pos, Plays, Streams, Music Platform Followers, Socials, Email Subs Promotion Tools: Post Drippers, Manual Social Engagement, Email Autoresponder, Chat bot, Reviews, Back Catalog Plays, Interviews, Performances + Livestreams, Promo Vids Problems Encountered: Non-integrated tools, lack of data, Social rules, poor engagement Key Performance Indicators (KPI): Visitors, Link Clicks, Plays, Streams, Likes, Comments, Shares Lessons Learned: Solutions Identified: Outstanding Issues:

Hey This is an interesting topic, potentially revolutionary for the standard indie artist. Managing your image need not be a deep dark art. After all, it is primarily about taking control over how you are perceived, moving as much perception of you to be based on what information you want someone to know about you versus what information about you is available to others accidentally. Sure there is more to it than that, but fundamentally that is the core of image management. The first thing I would highlight is that you become aware of the impression you give intentionally and unintentionally. Secondly, you need to understand that you have different audiences, and not all information is for all audiences. Thirdly, you largely control the majority of information they will encounter until YOU accidentally tell them something. Friends, family and colleagues leak info, but they mostly get that info from us. So, manage your own info. Work out what audiences are where. Make it easy on yourself. Talk to specific audiences in specific locations. Stay aware of who you are talking to, and who is in your audience. Be aware: Different information is for different audiences. Before you open your mouth, before you attend events, before you go on any stage (including internet platforms), make sure you are audience aware, then edit your message and how you plan to deliver it, accordingly. You can still be very open. Being open does not mean sharing everything. Be smart. Otherwise please post your bank details, debit and credit card numbers along with your PIN numbers. No? Good. You already accept the principle! Even when you let someone see “behind the scenes” that does not mean “warts and all”. Everything we let people see is stage managed to some extent. With video, that is one of the main uses for your edit button. There’s a reason for writing scripts, for multiple cameras, for rehearsal of absolutely anything! The biggest distinction in audiences are making sure to distinguish between front of house and backstage. Do not mix the two especially backstage, unless it is exceptional, highly managed circumstances. Indie Artists mix these audiences online, all the time! Especially on social media. Especially on Twitter. I am not saying these are bad platforms. However, we use them very poorly. What do you do (if anything) to manage your image? Indies are responsible for all aspects of being an artist. Unfortunately this is often by neglect as indies almost always focus on the immediate fun bit and are unaware of the importance of different aspects of their career (amateur or professional) and that the buck stops with them. If they can’t be bothered, then massively important aspects of being an artist are being left to chance and luck. I haven’t even touched on branding. Next time maybe. I hope this helps someone. I’d love to talk it over with you. I created this club to help indies with growing their fan base and the quality of the relationship they have with their fans. It’s a place for engaged artists to help each other. A group of like minded people willing to work together… onwards and upwards!

I recently became instagram famous after reaching over 11 Million viewers and 52k+ followers. Follow Hunned Kay on Instagram!

Enjoy my channel and lets grow together! The song is an uptempo urban record and very different from what we’ve heard from other artists in the rap industry. Hunned Kay - Sleep Walking

Hi Martial Sorry, I’ve been really busy this last few weeks. It’s a huge topic area. There are several sites that offer free release plans but in my experience they are very basic and relate more to the functional steps that dovetail with their products. Most are cookie-cut plans but realistically there are many factors when it come to effective plans. Starting point plans are only useful for simple, early stage plans, unless they are backed up with a load of info, tools and time. We do have quite detailed release plans, particularly for the pre-release phase, but the details are contained in our own upcoming products. We have been thinking about a free version but as it would be simpler and of limited use, it hasn’t been our highest priority. That said, we are a friendly bunch and where we can help, we will try to. Perhaps you can share what your current plan is and we can go from there? Cheers John

Hi, I don't know if that forum is still active, but I try to find ressources to plan future release. How to well organise several social media, when / what to post ? ... put several ads tactic. If you have something to share, you're welcome. Thanks

While I'm not gonna go courting blogs and stuff with past releases, I do commonly through them up on Instagram stories every now and then (especially if they're season specific). I'm also fairly active on Repost Exchange and I'll throw them up there as my newer releases start to go stale just to freshen things up a bit. Old songs still have their uses.

Hey How we market new releases is a fairly common topic on music boards.... but what do you do to promote your past releases? Cheers John

Yes I do! There is a total of 6 videos so far: "The Swan & the Ram" and "Ring Out" official music videos "Progression of a Song: The Swan & the Ram" bonus video 1 Interview and 2 Shout-Out videos Please check it out if you like hard rock and singer/songwriter music!

Kono was founded in 2020 as an art collective led by eponymous frontman. From California, Kono is sharing a new brand of Santa Barbara hard rock music to the world. The brainchild of frontman Logan Kono, Kono sets out on their promised assault on sonic complacency.

Hey I posted up a new article on Social Media Comment Pods. Please read and take part in any discussion here. The article link is in that post too. Cheers John

I addressed this topic a couple of months ago, and posted a downloadable breakdown of the things I've done. I've given costs and metrics wherever possible, the key being that all was done ultra cheap!!

Thanks for your advice about Spotify promotion. My single, Sing got to number 1 on the UK Talk Radio station charts for three weeks in October last year. This lead to being signed to a VIP Recording Services Record label on June 7th. They have distributed music for Missy Elliott and Robin Thicke. I released my single Patience on July 8th. Paying the UK Talk Radio station via www.fiverr.com for radio airplay has helped me to achieve a lifetime ambition to get signed to a record label. Their prices are not cheap, so message them first with a link to your music to find out if they think it's radio read

Engagement I thought a post dealing with engagement would be a good idea. Yes engagement is important. Ideally, engagement with the right people, at the right time, with the right message is even more important. The opposite is also true. Engagement with the wrong people, at the wrong time, with the wrong message is completely useless at best, critically dangerous sometimes. Engagement should not be aimless. It also should not burn valuable content for no obvious, large gain. Here’s the thing: Thinking in terms of who has heard any of your songs or watched any of your songs and comparing that with people who have never heard any of your songs or watched any of your videos… which group is larger? Those have heard/watched you or those who haven’t? What sort of percentages are we talking? Thinking in terms of how many times you were exposed to the last trending song, was it more than once? Was it always in the same way? Was it always in the same place? Do you know what “reach” is? Do you have a good understanding of it and what aspects of reach are important For 1, I’d be hugely surprised if in truth Those who haven’t heard your music or watched your video wasn’t by far the largest group. I’d be surprised if that group wasn’t of the order 99.999% haven’t heard your music. Yet the majority of artists focus 99% of their effort into talking to the same people, in the same place? For 2, I’d be very surprised if you were not exposed to the latest trending song many times, in many ways, in many contexts. Yet many artists post only a couple of times, sometimes only once, to tell people about their releases and other news? For 3. There’s a good chance you have some understanding of reach, but at the same time have done very little to apply it to your own marketing efforts. Yet the majority of artists spend 99% of their time talking to the same crowd. Not just the same crowd but struggling to engage them with interesting content. The language they use, the content they promote… is all geared towards people who have already encountered their music. Not just that, people who are familiar with them. I’ll let that sit for a while before I post part 2…

I would avoid boosting posts. As paid Facebook advertising goes it is by far the least effective, mainly because it is the least accurate or flexible audience targeting. I can see paying on fiverr gives you a measurable on plays of videos… how do you know talk radio plays are effective? Going past raw first stage results like paid promotion generates plays, do you follow it to “this promotion generated a purchase/download” etc? Quite wise regarding Spotify though it comes down to reputation of the service. Promotion by reputable companies can be effective. In many ways better promotion to Spotify playlist curators and music bloggers on Facebook. Get your music in front of them can result in a much larger reach and high conversion as the audience tends to be more on-target.

I created a Facebook page, and shared videos, and links, and boosted the posts. I've shared posts on music related pages, such as Billboard A&R, and shared videos on Twitter. The most effective methods, is paying freelancers on fiverr to promote my lyrics videos, and paying the UK Talk Radio Station to play my music. I avoid paying anyone to boost my Spotify links, because if it turns out to be bots, my releases will get taken down. Always read customer reviews before making a purchase! There are some scammers on there There are also a lot of absolutely brilliant sellers on there, who have helped me to get my music discovered.

Here's my logo and some photos.....

So, I'll start by saying that I am not a very social person. It takes a great deal of energy and effort to communicate with people both online and off, so obviously promotion is extremely difficult given that a huge a proponent of promotion is communication. With my last E.P.'s and Single, I utilized Instagrams tools and also starting using the music service Musosoup. I've had some growth with both releases. My Instagram following grew from around 350 to 720 or so. My Pandora, Apple Music and Spotify plays, listeners and followers all grew. And obviously SoundCloud continues to grow with monthly SoundCloud plays increasing from about 1,000 a month to over 5,000 a month over the past year. I've found Instagram stories to be fairly useful for engaging my current listeners while maintaining my social distance. I also utilize the Reels and will post from time to time. I hired a digital artist to design a logo and also had photos shot in September. I will probably do another photoshoot in late Spring and will have more digital art done for future releases. Having a semi-professional image seems to help with attracting blogs, playlist ads, Reels, Tik Toks, and influencers. Speaking of which, I've found that Musosoup to be much more useful than Submithub (etc.). It seems it isn't without risks as even though Musosoup itself is legit, not all of its users are so.... buyer beware I guess. Blog reviews etc. are not very useful for growing listeners. But... they are good for padding the EPK and attracting more influencers so I guess that's a thing. Most of them come with a playlist placement so there's that. Playlists are just well.... playlist ads. They up listener counts and occasionally net another follow. Getting a Reel or Tik Tok influencer does hardly nothing for gaining new followers, but influencers with high follower counts can pull in some money so, I was able to make the money I spent back for the first time ever. Instagram stories on influencers pages are completely useless (at least that was my experience). I've testing running Instagram ads both turning traffic towards my website and towards my Instagram account. In my experience, turning traffic towards your Instagram page nets better results. It doesn't seem all that useful at first. But, advertising to my own followers has netted the best results out of every playlist ad and blog post ever, so growing the Instagram page doesn't seem to be that bad of an idea. It's just slow and cumbersome. On the SoundCloud side of things, I cannot reccoment RepostExchange enough. It takes a long time to gain traction using it's free services, but give it time and it will work. I'm still working with baby numbers, but the meager growth I'm enjoying is nice given my difficulties. I will obviously work on being a bit more social and will continue to throw sh*t at the walls to see what works and what doesn't. I didn't go into this expecting it to be anything more than a hobby so knowing that someone out there is listening is it's own reward and I need to keep reminding myself of that every time I get myself down with life.

I’m at work, but I’ll share my experiences later this afternoon.

This is a good chance to review what you do and evolve it into something better. Come on guys. We take knowledge, and the power of multiple motivated people, and we improve. Over to you.

Hi all As the title suggests… how do you currently go about marketing and promoting your music? I’d be interested in seeing if we can improve what you do. No cost to you. Let’s look at what you do, how you do it, and of course how successful it currently is. Then let’s work together on everyone’s marketing, promotion, design, strategy, tactics and then look at the change in stats. I am confident we can improve what you do currently! Cheers John

To be perfectly honest I’m not that worried about it. I have become quite happy being at home with my wife and dog. I’m quite content continuing in eclectic artistic obscurity. I don’t want to go back on the road, stay in Marriotts in places like Boise or Oklahoma City, and eat shitty food at Denny’s or Applebee's. The definition of glamour is the illusion of beauty where there is none. I’m leaning more toward Art than Commerce. If I sell a few tracks and create a small group of fans with minimal effort as I’m doing now my work will only improve with each release. Stranger things have happened than that eventually producing some benefit.

Hey Gang Engaging fans is a critical part of building your fan base. Neglect them or take them for granted at your peril. Please fill in the poll AND answer the questions below! What do you do to engage with your fans? In what areas do you think you have issues with engaging your fans and / or building your fan base? What are the issues? Cheers John

Thank you. I followed everyone else back also.

Thank you.