5 Ways to Use Facebook for Music Promotion
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While Facebook is a useful tool for gaining exposure if you’re a budding musician, it’s not enough to put your career over the edge. If you’re serious about playing bigger gigs, getting your music on the radio, and ultimately getting a record deal, you need help from an experienced music promotion company.
Call Planetary Group at (323) 952-5050 to talk about how our indie music promoters can boost your career and help get you the exposure you need to succeed. We work with hip hop artists, DJs, singer-songwriters, folk musicians, punk bands, electronic musicians, international performers from around the world, and more.
5 Facebook Music Page Tips for Bands and Solo Artists
If you don’t have a Facebook page for your band (or yourself, if you’re a solo performer), you need to make one right away. We understand that some people simply don’t like using Facebook, but if you’re a performing artist, it’s a critical tool in your social media kit. Even if you never use Facebook for your personal life, you need to have an active Facebook page for your professional career. Facebook is the undisputed ruler of social media, so ignoring Facebook means ignoring the bulk of your potential traffic – and exposure to more listeners.
That being said, it’s not enough to slap a low-effort page together and simply hope for the best. For maximum success and peak visibility, make sure you meet these five criteria for your Facebook band profile.
Post with the perfect frequency. One goal of your page is to entice visitors without overwhelming them. Facebook takes care of making navigation simple, but you can make your page even more readable by sticking to a consistent posting schedule. However, this can be a tricky balance to achieve.
So, how often should you post on Facebook for your business (or in this case, your band)? While two posts per day is the conventional wisdom for pages with large followings (10,000+), a recent study by Hubspot found that posting twice daily actually resulted in roughly 50% fewer clicks for pages with less than 10,000 followers. You’ll probably have to do some experimenting to find that sweet spot, but according to a Forbes article from 2016, “[I]f you post a mere 1-5 times a month, your clicks per post will almost double.”
Forbes may not be the most obvious choice for career advice if you’re an up-and-coming musician, but it isn’t the only source to claim that lower posting frequency yields better results. For example, in 2014, DIY Musician published an infographic stating “Top brands average 1 post per day.”
Offer special promos as a reward. Offering exclusive incentives is an excellent way to reward your fans, make yourself more memorable, and boost their excitement – which makes them more likely to come to your shows, talk about you with their friends, and buy your music.
The incentives don’t need to be complicated or costly – and in fact, the simpler the better. Something as simple as a post that offers a free download in exchange for liking your band’s page is a quick, easy, and cost-effective way to encourage more people to start following you on Facebook. But feel free to get creative, and experiment with different rewards.
As a final word of caution on this subject: people don’t like to feel pressured, even if it’s just to click on that “Like” button, so the bulk of your content should be available to casual browsers. Remember, there’s a fine line between making people feel like they’re part of an exclusive club, and annoying potential fans by begging for likes in exchange for access.
Create a budget for Facebook advertising. Facebook has well over a billion users — that’s a lot of pages you’re competing against. In the ever-growing sea of profiles, you need to do everything you possibly can to increase your visibility. One of the best ways to do this is to use paid Facebook ads, which can cost as little as a few dollars per day depending on what you’re willing to spend.
Facebook even lets you choose a target goal for your campaign, like “raise attendance at your event,” “send people to your website,” “promote your page,” or “boost your posts.” Promoting your page is the most common objective musicians usually choose, but if you’ve got an upcoming DJ set or gig coming up, it might make more sense to focus on increasing attendance at your event. If you’re opting to send people to your website, think about where you’d ideally want fans to end up visiting. Your YouTube channel? The iTunes store? Think carefully about what specific objective you’d like to prioritize with your ad campaign, and use the Ads Manager tool strategically.
On a side note, make sure to download the other apps in Facebook’s advertising family, like Atlas and Audience Network, to get even more information about how your Facebook page is performing.
Make your page interesting. This one sounds like a generic no-brainer, but it really can’t be overstated. After the fifth post in a row that says, “Hey guys, check out our new single!” people are going to tune out (or possibly, long before then). If you want to attract – and keep – the attention of Facebook users, you need to mix it up and keep things fresh, which means introducing some variety into your content.
You can post just about anything that’s relevant to the music, so feel free to get creative. Post a pic of your favorite piece of gear, and explain why you love it so much. Upload a photo of your first-ever song lyrics side-by-side with your latest effort to show how much you’re growing as an artist. Use hashtags to keep a weekly running series, like your favorite album of the week, weekly snapshots from your time touring, or weekly #tbt posts featuring music that inspired you or helped you get where you are today.
Whatever you do, always follow two rules: keep it personal, and stay sincere. That makes it easier for people to relate, connect, and remember you. In short, it makes you seem less like a “page” and more like an actual human. Fan interaction is a huge part of being a professional musician, and social media like Facebook is the perfect platform to make memorable, productive connections with people. You never know where a networking opportunity is going to come from.
On a related note, the language or tone you use is almost as important as the actual content of your posts. Make sure you use a natural tone that sounds genuine – not spammy. (We know you want people to buy your music, but one or two exclamation points are probably more than enough.)
Make sure you include your contact information. Our last tip is simple yet crucial, because all the exposure in the world can’t help you if no one knows how to reach you! Make sure your Facebook page includes links to all of your other music websites (such as Bandcamp, SoundCloud, or Instagram), and be sure to include a phone number and email address where people can easily reach you.
Music Promotion Services for Indie Musicians, DJs, and Hip Hop Artists
Established as an artist development firm in 1996, today Planetary Group is one of the hottest, most sought-after music promotion services for up-and-coming musicians in the U.S. and abroad. While our offices are based in L.A., our music promoters routinely work with international artists and musicians from all over the United States, including New York City, Chicago, Atlanta, Seattle, Philadelphia, Boston, New Orleans, Nashville, Austin, Houston, Memphis, Minneapolis, and more.
Over the years, we’ve worked with musicians ranging from Beastie Boys to David Bowie. Will you become the next big name in our client portfolio? Whether you’re looking for online publicity, radio promotion, consulting for musicians, event promotion, music festival promotion, international music promotion, or all of the above, we’re here to help develop clear strategies to achieve your dreams. Give us a call at (323) 952-5050 to learn more about our music promotion services for independent solo artists and bands today.
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