How Do You Get Downloads?!?

[LemonCrush]

So, I've got myself a bandcamp page. And it's linked via my twitter and YouTube and all that.And I get a lot of hits (at least a lot for me), and even a lot of plays. But I can't ever get any downloads.

I also upload material to newgrounds.com and I have over 200 combined downloads...but on my bandcamp, I can't get any. I know my music is good (as evidenced by the amount of downloads elsewhere and listens, etc), but why don't people download it?

[LemonCrush]

Hey, Bro. I downloaded your stuff!!!!!

Now, stop whining.

Thanks

But seriously, how does one turn traffic into downloads?

[john]

It is an art form in itself, and much of it depends on an understanding of psychology. True some can be achieved just by going through the motions without that understanding, but applying psychology with understanding will get you much further.

Visitors to your page need to be conditioned from their first encounter. It starts with how they find your artist page and their expectation when they get there. On many occasions you will not have control of exactly how fans find you, but you should take advantage of how your music is found where you can. The language on your page,

Overall, the answer to your question is a huge topic. Some practical steps to increase downloads would perhaps be a good start lol

I would ask if your fans are used to getting free downloads or paid?

As mentioned many factors need to be considered. The language and images used on your artist pages, focused on encouraging downloads, using "action statements" which is a fancy way of giving your visitors instructions in a way that they are more likely to be followed (a standard method of marketing and promotion).

On the internet, or for that matter on mobile phones, one of the key assets in your internet marketing campaign is your mailing list. How you run your mailing list is key to success of the whole venture, though I would now also add social media, as both are ways for you to communicate directly with your fans. The perception of your products, your music, is set via your website, social media, media and the most direct of methods, your mailing list. By being direct you can completely control what you tell your fans, and when you tell your fans. This is exactly how and where you start to condition visitors and fans to be more likely to buy your music or other product. The product has to be framed in a way that makes it highly desirable, with a degree of urgency to their actions.

When you release a product of any kind, you do not want to start by selling to a "cold" audience. You want to sell in what is termed a "warm" market, ie the audience are interested in what you say, what you are talking about. It is up to you to heat the market up and GIVE them a strong appetite for your music. In any marketing and promotion this can be enhanced by using PR effectively to attract people already interested in your music, who have already gone to the effort of visiting your website and encouraged to join your mailing list. You can see that each step back in the chain we go we have more to consider, more things to do, in order to effectively convert someone from a listener to a paid downloader.

The basic flow is simple:

1. In the first place, talk to people who are more likely to be converted into your fans
   
2. Get them on your mailing list <- KEY
   
3. Talk directly to your fans and at all stages encourage their appetite for your music, for you.
   
4. Coordinate your song releases
   
5. Build the appetite and expectation weeks before song release, using PR, mail outs, press releases, reviews etc.
   
6. Highlight previous releases and encourage fans building upon your back catalog, if you have one
   
7. Release your song to key press agencies to get those reviews
   
8. Mark the release, with perhaps a launch party
   
9. Follow up the release with more publicity and PR, interviews, special offers and, of course, gigs.
   

On that point, it is likely that Songstuff will be bringing out a range of products to help with all this, giving both background psychology of music marketing and detailed individual steps you can follow, covering the entire process.

One other thing I will mention, is the lessons of preparation, and that of patience. Prepare, prepare, prepare. Get all your graphics, mailing list messages, web text, press releases, song registrations and more put in place BEFORE you even start the warm up. Why? Timing is everything. The lesson of patience is exactly that, your capacity to wait until everything is prepared before you start your public campaign.

The whole point in all this is:

1. To attract people likely to buy your music
   
2. To give them a strong appetite to do so by every means you can
   
3. To motivate them to buy
   
4. To actually increase your sales
   

I don't have time to expand further just now, but hopefully you can get something useful from this rambling message.

[LemonCrush]

Visitors to your page need to be conditioned from their first encounter. It starts with how they find your artist page and their expectation when they get there. On many occasions you will not have control of exactly how fans find you, but you should take advantage of how your music is found where you can. The language on your page,

Language on the page? Most of my fans find me because of my Youtube channel. But when they get to my bandcamp page, they just play the songs and don't download them

I would ask if your fans are used to getting free downloads or paid?

I offer everything for free...for the time being. I feel like charging people to enjoy your art and putting your name out there isn't a good idea.

As mentioned many factors need to be considered. The language and images used on your artist pages, focused on encouraging downloads, using "action statements" which is a fancy way of giving your visitors instructions in a way that they are more likely to be followed (a standard method of marketing and promotion).

How could I do this? Like, what "action statements"?

On the internet, or for that matter on mobile phones, one of the key assets in your internet marketing campaign is your mailing list. How you run your mailing list is key to success of the whole venture, though I would now also add social media, as both are ways for you to communicate directly with your fans. The perception of your products, your music, is set via your website, social media, media and the most direct of methods, your mailing list. By being direct you can completely control what you tell your fans, and when you tell your fans. This is exactly how and where you start to condition visitors and fans to be more likely to buy your music or other product. The product has to be framed in a way that makes it highly desirable, with a degree of urgency to their actions.

Well, how do I get people to sign up for a mailing list? I mean, if they won't download my music enough to download it, why would they care enough to sign up for a mailing list?

Also, I kinda feel like my Twitter and other sites act as the same thing. My followers see updates and stuff, so it serves the same purpose, right?

When you release a product of any kind, you do not want to start by selling to a "cold" audience. You want to sell in what is termed a "warm" market, ie the audience are interested in what you say, what you are talking about. It is up to you to heat the market up and GIVE them a strong appetite for your music. In any marketing and promotion this can be enhanced by using PR effectively to attract people already interested in your music, who have already gone to the effort of visiting your website and encouraged to join your mailing list. You can see that each step back in the chain we go we have more to consider, more things to do, in order to effectively convert someone from a listener to a paid downloader.

I can't get a warm market though. I don't have any fans, and the ones I do "have" don't download anything. Like, I kind of get what I need to do once I HAVE fans, but how do I get them in the first place?

On that point, it is likely that Songstuff will be bringing out a range of products to help with all this, giving both background psychology of music marketing and detailed individual steps you can follow, covering the entire process.

Looking forward to it!!

[Ravi Kumar]

Mostly tracks are free to download from their official website. We can download it from mozilla plugin, they are original tracks but not full track, for listening full track, we have to purchase it first from the music store or online website.

[Just1L]

I think that music should be free from all cost...Becuase it is the one of the thing where you can feel peace, motivation, love and all other good things that are helpful for our behaviour.

 

While I almost get what you're saying, would you be willing to drop a quarter in the poor homeless musician's cup as you pass him or her on the street? It takes time and money to be able to provide music in digital form, in good quality, for others to share on the web.

 

Also, I don't think gangsta rap is really helpful to anyones behavior so maybe only the "positive vibe" songs should be free?

Edited March 20, 2013 by just1l

[Just1L]

I think we can blame the internet for people's accidental ignorance when it comes to these laws. I'm not sure how old this poster is, but there are a lot of young adults out there who have gotten music online for free since they were old enough to go online and do it. Over a decade now. You say the rightful owners are the only ones who can legally make the decision to give it away yet for over a decade all music has been online and free via various sources. YouTube to name one. Taking money straight out of the pockets of musicians.

 

The second line I quoted below (not sure why I can't type below that) is musical frustration in a nutshell. No, it doesn't make sense to give away something that's not theirs. Ask Metallica, they've known that forever and were lambasted, lost fans and called assholes just to protect that most basic, total common sense, law that for some reason doesn't exist on the Job Killing machine that is the Internet. And why the hell everyone expects everything to be free and easy all the time is beyond me. It's turning people into a bunch of whine-bag crybabies, I can tell you that. NOTE to Davidaddicted: No offense to you in this rant. My rant is based on more than just music. Which is why I will now stop.

 

Holy Shit! Where's the Tylenol?

 

 

The rightful owners are the only ones who can legally make the decision to give it away. Honestly, I'm amazed at the number of people who don't seem to know that. 

 

Think about it for a second....does it even make sense for someone to think they can give away something that's not theirs? Of course it doesn't. Why would it?

Edited March 20, 2013 by just1l

[NihilisticHorrorShow]

Holy Shit! Where's the Tylenol?

Sweet Christmas Vacation Ref!

[LayneGreene]

Since I can just stream your complete songs at Bandcamp for free to hear them in their entirety, why would I go to the trouble of actually downloading one of your songs to my computer and risk a possible virus?  I would only actually download a song if I wanted it for my collection to listen to more than once.  Otherwise, I'll just stream from the web to listen to new music.  So, if an actual download is so important to you, and I don't know why it is, then I'd suggest you only provide streams of like 30-second snippets of each song to possibly whet full downloading appetites.  But, I would still expect that most people are like me, and they won't download a full song unless that's the only way they can listen to the whole thing it (i.e., no free stream of the entire song is provided, but a snippet is provided that makes them want to hear the whole thing), and/or they really like it and want it for their music collection.

Bingo

[edison]

Hey bro!! I have downloaded your stuff,it really awesome and goin to join your Twitter page to for further update.As I am also related to a band so it will be nice to share our experience about music.