How To Create Hype For Your Next Music Release
You are ready to release your next track but you don’t know how to create the hype that your release deserves? The good news is, we have created a list of top tips to help you learn how to create hype, for not just your next music release, but tips you can use time and time again. Are you ready to send off your next music release into the ears of your fans?
Let’s get straight into it.
SET A RELEASE DATE IN ADVANCE
This is the only way that you can get your fans excited for your release! You won’t be able to promote your release in any way shape or form if you don’t UPLOAD YOUR MUSIC EARLY. Nothing is worse than seeing an artist’s amazing track flop because they rushed it out to fans without getting the right traction behind it first.
By uploading your music to your distributor early, you give yourself more time to make the most of building up excitement with an effective music marketing campaign. Try uploading a month in advance of the planned release date. We know plenty of artists who upload in this time frame, or even several months before, in order to create a content and marketing plan. By planning out your releases and making sure that they are up and ready to go, you can really drive that music promotion.
TIP: Update your Bios with your Pre-save Link the moment it is uploaded with your distributor!
An effective way to create some hype around your upcoming track is through utilising pre-saves. Pre-save and pre-orders can make a major difference to your streaming and download numbers on release day.
At Identity Music, we offer Spotify pre-saves free of charge as part of our promotion support service.
As well as this, we offer smart-links that couple up nicely with pre-saves and pre-orders. A smart link acts as a one-stop shop, where your fans can see every platform your music is available on.
Want to know more about getting a Spotify Pre-Save? CLICK HERE
When listeners pre-save your music, the platforms notice! It triggers algorithmic alerts and signals which suggests to the streaming platforms such as Spotify and Apple Music, that your music is popular and in-demand.
This boosts your chances of landing a spot on algorithmic playlists like Release Radar and Discover Weekly.
TEASE YOUR NEW RELEASE
One of the most effective ways to build hype for your release is by teasing your track to your current fans. The key is to give enough information to your fans to intrigue them without giving everything away.
Here is some sneak peeks that you can provide to your fans to raise hype:
- Photos of you in the recording studio with an ambiguous caption.
- Share a 10-15 second snippet of the track. (Maybe the hook)
- Release a photo with you next to the collaborator on your track.
- Announce the artwork for your release.
- Reveal some of the music video.
What you tease your fans with will depend on your release. You might have a music video, you might not. Your release might be to promote a charity, or to promote an event, no matter what you are working with, there is always something to shout about.
The optimum time to start teasing your fans is up to 6 weeks prior to the release.
UPDATE YOUR PROFILES
You have the opportunity to make your music profile looks as professional as you want. Make use of your music platforms when building the enthusiasm for your release. Update your banners and cover images to highlight to your fans a new release is dropping soon.
This will mean, when your fans go onto your profiles such as Spotify, SoundCloud and YouTube they will see your upcoming release and start their anticipation. Make sure that you are letting every profile visitor know when your music is coming, where it is coming and how they can listen to it.
THINK BIGGER THAN YOUR FANS
Your fans are your saving grace in the music industry, they are the ones who keep your music going. BUT how did they become your fans? If you can, putting some money into Instagram and Facebook ads will help your music release get to more ears and generate new fans.
Tips to get ads to benefit you as a musician the most:
- Target the right users in the right locations
- Use High-quality Images
- Give people a good reason to click on your call to action.
Only invest your money in Promotion where you know it is legit streams – https://blog.identitymusic.com/2020/07/09/spotify-playlist-scams/
SOCIAL MEDIA
As a Musician, Social Media should be entwined with every single release you distribute. Your social media presence has a high impact on your music career. This means it will come as no surprise when you see it is one of the ways to build hype for your upcoming music release.
If for any reason you don’t currently use social media to build your fan base here is an article for you:
https://blog.identitymusic.com/2021/02/12/research-plan-engage-social-media/.
A great start to using social media to build your upcoming release would be with competitions. You can start a competition to get your fans to pre-save your release (which, if you remember helps your playlisting) and then encourage more shares when your track goes live. Some artists have found it very useful to offer free merch to their fans or a few tickets to their next gig.
PITCH FOR PLAYLISTS
Once your release is distributed, you are able to start pitching. This is a further benefit of uploading your track early. Spotify’s playlist team reviews thousands of tracks every week. With early uploads, you give a longer window of time for your track to be heard and considered.
The team at Identity Music are experts at playlist pitching. We have successfully got our artists on a number of Spotify curated and high profile Spotify playlists and this service is provided at no charge to our music distribution clients.
GET PRESS COVERAGE
Marketing your music can only get you so far. Focus some of your effort on outreaching to bloggers and media contacts in the run-up to your release. A good PR campaign could achieve more momentum by introducing you to an audience you haven’t yet tapped into.
Bloggers have specific audiences. They will only share your content if they think it will be of interest to their audience. This can make it challenging to get featured on a blog, but a lot more rewarding when you do!
Be sure to enable them access to your track prior to its release, so that they can actually help you to build up that hype!
By setting up your music distribution with Identity Music, you can take full advantage of our music promotion support services and get your music out to all corners of the globe. You can get in touch with our team to discuss your options here!
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