3-Easy Steps To Promote Your Mixtape Online
It seems like everyone has a new mixtape out nowadays. Everywhere you look the internet is flooded with people trying to promote and advertise their latest and greatest mixtape. However, there are actually very few “successful” mixtapes due in part to the lack of proper promotion and advertisement. If you are promoting a mixtape, there are 3 very simple steps to follow.
1. CREATE A HIGH QUALITY MIXTAPE This may seem like a no-brainer to most people but you would be surprised at the number of mixtapes lacking quality music production and audio engineering. If you are sharing a song or mixtape with someone, it needs to immediately grab their attention. You have about 10 seconds from the time someone pushes play to make your first impression. When a person plays your music, it should immediately inspire an emotion. If your mixtape could talk it should say “listen up! I have something important to say!” No matter what the genre, if your music doesn’t grab people’s attention you will potentially miss out on fans. Carefully choose the song order of your mixtape. You want your mixtape to have a good flow. Take your listeners on a journey through sound! It is critical that you do this to keep your listeners from getting bored. If listeners get bored, they typically forget about what they were listening to. This means your music will likely end up hitting the digital trash can.
2. CHOOSE 1 SONG FOR FREE DOWNLOAD After choosing your mixtape’s song order, choose 1 single representative of you and make it available to the public as a free download. Make sure that this is a song you feel strongly about and that you’d be comfortable performing. Make the song available for free via all your social networks like MB Mixtapes, Facebook, Twitter, Soundcloud, YouTube, Distro Kid, etc. Be sure to upload your music to free mixtape websites such as Datpiff and Audiomack.com, if you are making your entire mixtape available for free. Provide links to all your contact information wherever you can. Be sure to have your digital/electronic press kit available for online viewing in case someone wants to hear more of your work.
3. Target Prospective Fans, Promote the Mixtape Here is where the tire meets the road. After completing the first two steps you will need to find out who your fans are AND promote to them. To do this you will need to begin building relationships with potential fans. please do not spam! This is one of the worst ways to damage your name and brand. It will usually get you blocked, banned, unfriended, etc.
Free Ways to Promote Your Mixtape Online: Blog about your mixtape and encourage people to subscribe to your blog If your mixtape is free, upload it to the top free mixtape websites Ask fans or friends to write a mixtape review for you to post on a blog or website Have fans or friends recommend your mixtape via their social networks (e.g. Have someone tweet: @mixxbiz My friend @mixxbiz makes some really great music. I think you’d like The Network MB Mixtapes.
Note: This method of promotion is WAY better than you randomly hitting someone up saying “hey check this out…” Why? because someone is referring your music and edifying you at the same time! That equals a win-win situation for you! Create a mailing list for your fans to keep them updated on your latest work Write an article on Wikipedia about yourself and your mixtape(s) Create promotional videos of yourself with your mixtape music playing in the background Preview your mixtape live via Youtube and hold a Q&A session afterward Create fan pages on social networks or on music websites such as the MB Mixtapes Network with Djs online and see if they’ll spin your records.
Track your internet spins, plays, downloads, etc. and use that in your promotion information (i.e. This is Hot -mixtape downloaded 3,000 times in 1 hour! Drop your link.) Offer a 2nd, 3rd, or 4th song for free download Do promotion exchanges via your social networks (i.e promote someone else in exchange for promoting your mixtape) The suggestions listed above are just a few of the ways you can begin to increase exposure and advertise your mixtape online. Ultimately, you will need to begin building strong relationships with each of your potential fans in order to gain the support needed to have a successful mixtape release.
Good Luck!