How to build a fan base: best tips for musicians
Each and every musician creates music because of their fan base. You make music so that others can enjoy it rather than just hear it. Fans will not fall in love with your music and the artist instantly; it takes patience and loyalty.
Throughout an artist's career, building a fan base is a gradual, ongoing process. We'll walk you through how to gain a fan base, how to develop an audience, and how to steadily increase that fan base in this article.
What is a fan base, and why is it so important to build one?
Fans of a public figure make up a fan base. A fan base for an artist refers to the people who will listen to their music frequently and follow their musical career.
A fandom may be considered the group of individuals who often engage with your content and follow you across many platforms in the era of social media and online presence.
The foundation of every musician's musical career is their fan base. They are the ones who will purchase, stream, and download your music, go to your gigs, purchase your merchandise, spread the word about you to their friends, like, comment on, and share your social media postings.
They are the ones who are eager to find out about your most recent musical success or to hear your next release.
Your fan base is a big source of income in addition to being important for following your musical journey. Your fans directly influence some of the major revenue streams for artists today, such as album sales, ticket sales, merch sales, and streaming money.
How to build a fan base, step by step
Choose your unique style of music
Selecting your distinctive musical genre is the first step in developing a fan base. If you don't stand out from the crowd, nobody will follow you.
What sets your voice apart from that of other musicians? How do you want your followers to sum it up? Do they need an explanation, or are they content to simply hear it to know the kind of artist you are?
If there is no connection with the audience, music composition and performance will be mediocre. People won't be interested in what you have to say if they disagree with your viewpoint or don't enjoy music as much as you do.
You must take an action that no one else is currently taking! It ought to be unique enough that others who are unfamiliar with that style would believe that only you could create this kind of music at this time.
Make great music
Good music is the foundation of a successful career. That doesn't mean that you have to be a virtuoso or even a great singer, but it does mean that you will need to put some effort into creating high-quality songs.
Don't get us wrong—it's possible for an artist with incredible talent and/or voice to become famous with just one song, but more often than not, it takes multiple songs for fans and producers to notice your talent.
Understand your target audience
You need to know who your audience is. What age range are they? Are they male or female? Do they have kids or not? What do they do on the weekends, and who do they hang out with? How much money do they make annually? And what are their goals in life (if any)?
If you can answer all of these questions, then you’re halfway there! Take a look at the competition in your niche and see how each one differentiates themselves from the others.
On which platforms does this artist have the highest engagement rate (YouTube, Instagram, TikTok)? What kind of content gets shared among fans most frequently (videos/music/photos)?
Finding listeners who will appreciate your music is important. People that appreciate listening to music similar to your style will probably be among your fan base.
Use different social media platforms
Social networking is one of your biggest resources as an artist for expanding your fan base. Choosing which social media networks to use should be one of your first priorities. Facebook, TikTok, and Twitter are likely your best options if all you want to do is communicate with as many people as you can.
However, if you want more targeted exposure and engagement with your audience, Instagram may be a better choice, especially since there's a lot of overlap in terms of who uses each platform (i.e., lots of young people use all of them).
What about having a video music session where your super fans may interact live with you while listening together to some of your songs? This is exactly what CalypsoRoom allows you to do.
Of course, there are also plenty of other choices out there; some musicians prefer YouTube, Reddit, or Snapchat. Whatever route you decide to take, make sure that it makes sense for where your audience lives online: if they're more likely to be on Tumblr than Instagram (or vice versa), then make your choices accordingly!
Always including a call-to-action when sharing posts about your music is good advice. Share more than a link. Tell people what you are sharing with them (and perhaps explain why), then make it clear what you want them to do or how you want them to react.
Create awareness around your music
Increasing awareness of your music is the best way to grow an audience. You may do this in a variety of ways, including:
- Create a blog
- Use a mailing list
- Building a website
- Get your music on local radio
- Setting up social media accounts and spending money on paid advertisements
Email Promotion
Email is still one of the best ways to inform your audience about future events like concerts, releases, and contests. Because of this, be sure to explicitly offer an email sign-up for those interested as you grow your fan following.
Once you have their email addresses, don't continually spam them like you would on social networking sites. Keep things short and sweet, get right to the point, and don't ramble on about stuff no one cares about! Keep it simple. The more succinct, the better.
A good strategy is to offer thoughtful newsletters once or twice a month. This will prevent your admirers from unsubscribing as a result of receiving too many emails.
On social media, you can promote your email list and offer incentives for people to join up, such as a free download of your most recent album or access to exclusive video updates, for example.
Networking
People that are successful in the music business use it all the time, so if you're really committed to having your music career pay off for you, you should utilize it too.
Learning from others, whether they be producers, managers, or artists, is another aspect of networking that helps us all get better at what we do as a collective.
There are many interactions between musicians and other creatives online. Meet, network, and engage with other people working in the music industry online.
Play live shows
If you want to build a fan base and make money, you'll have to play live shows. Whether you're playing in front of five people or five thousand, there's no better way to get your music out there than by playing live shows.
It will create buzz and excitement among those who were able to catch some of the performances. If they hear something good but aren't sure what it was called or where they can find more from the artist, they will likely search online for answers after leaving your venue so that they can find more of what you just played.
Don't just leave right after the performance, converse with others! Interact with the audience, the bartender, and the sound engineer. Use this as a chance to strengthen your relationship with your current fans and create new connections with potential new fans.
Collaborate with other artists
Working with other artists is a wise move for increasing your popularity and recognition. Working with another artist and gaining access to their fans can help you expand the audience for your music.
For example: if you collaborate with someone who has a large following on social media (like Instagram), then it’s likely that many of their followers will see you as well. If they like what they hear, they’ll follow along too!
Look for bands and artists in your genre who, in terms of message, disposition, and identity, are comparable to you. Create something that both fan bases would enjoy, then promote it across all of your platforms.
Don’t forget about your family and friends
Your inner circle is a wonderful place to start when developing your fan base. Your earliest supporters will probably be close friends, family, and acquaintances.
People who know you are likely to hear your music before you reach out to random strangers who may not have any incentive to take the time and listen. When they actually pay attention and enjoy what they hear, you've got your first admirers! Encourage them to spread the word by sharing it with their network.
Make supporting you funny
To build your fan base, you have to make it fun and easy for them to support you. Make your content easy to share so that people can spread the word about you. You also have to give them something in return for their support by making it easy for them and rewarding their involvement with small perks.
By providing incentives, you can increase the number of people who listen to your music. Giveaways and competitions are excellent methods to accomplish this. Everyone enjoys getting prizes.
This would encourage them to listen to your music more regularly and return for more. Give fans a free download of a song in exchange for their email addresses. You can hold contests on a regular basis and give prizes to the winners.
You may also offer your most devoted supporters free music or items or the chance to meet you in a 1 to 1 Video Music Session in CalypsoRoom.
How to build a fan base - Conclusion
It takes time and perseverance to build a fan base, but once you do, there are many benefits that can last a lifetime. Building a devoted following requires consistency and perseverance. Setting goals and targets for what you want to accomplish with each project or within a specific time frame would be an excellent way to go about it.
If you liked this post and would want to read more tips for your music career and general information about the music industry, please visit our blog section.
You're here because you love music, so please try to listen to it together with your friends or strangers, at the same time, connected by webcam in CalypsoRoom.
In CalypsoRoom we believe music is the most powerful tool to bring people together, and for this reason, we developed an online music social network where you can connect with friends or strangers while listening to music simultaneously, connected via webcam. Check it out.
Thanks for reading,
CalypsoRoom Team
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Written by CalypsoRoom Editorial Team
The CalypsoRoom Editorial Team is a skilled and diverse group of writers, researchers, and industry specialists who have access to Calypso's data and information in order to give you broad knowledge about the music industry as well as helpful advice to help you manage your music and dancing career.
Updated January 2023
