Marketing is a very significant factor for the music industry, as it allows artists to reach wider audiences and bring more attention to their music, allowing them to grow as creators and become more successful. It is vital that artists make use of it in order to achieve this, aiming to create a continuous increase in their listeners in order to sustain their career; without it they could end up losing appeal, as they may miss out on massive groups of potential listeners, fans will not be made excited for any new releases. Thankfully, as digital media becomes increasingly available and capable for more people it’s becoming easier for DIY artists to harness this and market themselves, as well as providing a much wider range of options and approaches to make their campaigns stand out in the competitive music scene. This marketing can be done within three main areas; viral marketing, traditional marketing and cross media convergence/synergy, I aim to cover examples of all of these and show how different artists gained success through them and successfully increased their publicity.
One example of a viral marketing method used by the industry is guerilla marketing, wherein unconventional and surprising methods are used to grab the potential audience’s attention, often involving attention-grabbing, stand-out public displays and including interactive elements. For example, the band Two Door Cinema Club launched a 2019 viral marketing campaign to promote their upcoming album which included guerilla marketing in the form of a large billboard with a giant, functional fire extinguisher, encouraging the public to interact with this by pressing a button to release smoke. This unconventional display immediately stands out to the public, not only as a three dimensional billboard but also though it’s interactivity. Overall, this undoubtedly contributed to the success of their release as they saw 131k more Spotify listeners after the full run of campaign, just showing how substantial of an impact the marketing had for this band and the promotion of their album. This exemplifies how successful such a bold display can be, despite the obvious costs of setting up such an extravagant piece.
Another example of how viral marketing has been used by musicians is online. There have been multiple instances of different bands encouraging their audience to engage through online codes, puzzles and treasure hunts, often referred to as “ARGs” (alternate reality games); in 2015 the band Creeper launched a paranormal investigation hunting down a man named James Scythe for the promotion of their first record release. Considering this, the campaign proved a massive success for them in gaining so much attention for their entry into the industry, giving them a massive advantage for the future as it gained them many more fans than other bands would begin with.
Traditional marketing follows more conventional methods than viral, including tv advertisements, posters, etc, all the formats that typically come to mind when hearing the word “advert”. But just because they are typical does not make them any less important or impactful, even if not consciously engaging with these examples, their placement within our everyday life can leave a subconscious impact, if you’ve recently seen traditional music marketing at some point in the day then later on when you’re browsing music you’re more likely to choose something you recognise from an advert as it’s more familiar and comfortable to the listener than something entirely new. This form of marketing has also been impacted by the growth of online platforms, as it provides more areas for artists to publish their advertisements; an example of this can be seen in 2017 when Taylor Swift chose to promote her release exclusively through social media, completely independently, and without interacting with journalists or giving interviews. This limitation to only traditional marketing online and in magazines proved as a success for her, standing out from the busy advertising scene for it’s exclusivity and rewarding her with 1.2 million copies sold in the first week of release. Showing how not only is traditional advertising important as a standard for a marketing campaign but is easily accessible, giving more opportunity to independant DIY artists who may not be able to afford more extravagant viral campaigns.
Artists can also get their music out there by working together with other creators, cross media convergence describes when a musician may come together to have their music featured in other media forms such as tv, film or radio. By making this connection they are able to spread their music to a much wider audience, as they gain attention from not only their pre-existing listeners but fans from other media projects, this also goes the other way for the producers of the other media platform, gaining attention from the musicians fans. This combined effort is referred to as synergy, benefiting both parties as they work together to create a stand-out, multimodal project. This can be seen in the BBC’s tv adaptation of Watership Down in 2018 which featured Sam Smith’s single Fire on Fire. Already guaranteed to gain attention as a show based on an iconic story, as well as featuring an all star cast this convergence was sure to be a success for Sam Smith and bring plenty of attention to his music. This also reflects well on the producers of the show as Sam Smith himself is already a popular and well-known musician, bringing even more attention and viewers for them. Overall this exemplifies how powerful synergy can be in benefitting all creators involved, and how, by sharing audiences and merging together, artists can gain a much larger net following by utilising cross media convergence and gain much success from this.
To conclude, the examples given here show just a few examples of how impactful marketing can be for both an artist and their audience, creating a connection between them. Even if an artist chose not to market their music and gained some followers they would undoubtedly benefit from it in order to expand their following further, even by simply encouraging that they be spread by word of mouth from their current supporters. On the flipside however, it should also be considered that launching a marketing campaign is not without its risks; many ambitious viral campaigns will often be very expensive to pull off, and if not done to a certain standard they could easily flop, leaving the artist at a loss. However if done successfully and efficiently marketing is still a vital consideration for any artists in the music industry wanting to gain more attention for their music and releases, especially with how easily music is shared and distributed with modern online technologies. Overall, in order to make money and earn a living in the music industry you want people to listen to your music, in order for more people to listen to your music you want your music to be known, in order for it to be known you need to market it and get it out there.