How to get more followers ?

driftPill

New member
I wanna know how to get listened by more people? preferably a free way, and if not tell me the best paid option as a beginner.
Thank you!
 
Last edited:
Driftpill,

I wrote a solid article here on how to build connections on Soundcloud.

It costs nothing and is mos def worth a read.

If you are going to go the paid route I suggest researching the popular advertising platforms (Youtube ads, FB ads, Adwords, etc) before you blindly buy ads (or pay for some sketchy boosting service) so you can better understand how to best approach your target audience.

This way you can build a strategic approach and won't be just throwing your money away.

YouTube is an excellent free resource (as I'm sure you know) and has tons of videos on all the popular ad networks.

I'd start there.

--

That said, what really helps the most is having good music.

If it truly is good, it will start gaining followers and fans naturally..

If you add targeted, paid advertising to the good music equation your audience will grow even faster.

The free route may take a bit longer...

Good luck.
 
2 be honest i wouldnt use a paid service until you figure out a formula for getting followers that works for you because paid promos only work for getting plays getting followers is up to u plus wit a good following u are not relying on the sevice its just something extra
 
2 be honest i wouldnt use a paid service until you figure out a formula for getting followers that works for you because paid promos only work for getting plays getting followers is up to u plus wit a good following u are not relying on the sevice its just something extra

Yes and no.

I agree that reckless spending is a no-no but investing in properly targeted paid advertising can put you in front of people who are into the music you offer, which is exactly what you want and how you can gain new fans and followers.

Paid promo (if its a boosting service) will only inflate plays as there is no real traffic. Just bot 'hits'.And since most people are aware of these services you are probably doing yourself a disservice by going this route.

It looks super obvious when you have 100k plays and no engagement.

~ coming from someone who has spent $$$$ on ads in the past - and will probably be running a new campaign soon....
 
I couldn't agree more with SFTRAXX. I used a pay for plays service once and it looks mad sketchy to have a track with 5k+ plays, 100+ likes, and like 1 comment.

Additionally, although these are promoted as legit plays they are clearly bot plays, and soundcloud will treat them as such. For example, you'll be grouped with other artists who similarly paid for tracks on the discover page (thousands of plays but no engagement) so you're really never reaching many more people even though intuitively you'd think more plays = people more likely to listen.

The best way outside of having dope music is to genuinely engage with fellow users on soundcloud. I can't speak to adwords but I plan on looking into that in the near future. Best of luck.
 
Soundcloud alone didn't seem to do much. I've been posting on Youtube, HearThis.at & Bandcamp as well. I get the occasionally play here & there, but even then.. not getting the plays/followers I'd hoped for. Would like to start putting together the occasional mix & posting on Mixcloud.
 
You have to connect with promotional organizations. Don't try to connect with fans one by one. Posting links on facebook are only going to get *new* fans one by one, that's too slow. You should focus on making connections with larger youtube channels and groups that push out music to already established audiences. This way, you'll start to see *new* fans pour in, rather come one by one.

The key is new fans. Already stablished fans will check back every week or 2 to see if you have anything new. They're your lifeblood, but you have to obtain new ones, and the faster the better. Also don't attempt any marketing until your music is marketable. If you market a bad song, it'll actually backfire and do more harm than good.

So make really good songs, and market to larger organizations instead of individual fans. Somebody posted a list of YouTube Music Promotion Channel with their contact info, ...but they're charging some money for it.

I'll work on making a database like that that collects this information and make it available on my website for free. Until then, TheUntz.com does a pretty good job organizing the promotion channels by genre and label.
 
Last edited:
You have to connect with promotional organizations. Don't try to connect with fans one by one. Posting links on facebook are only going to get *new* fans one by one, that's too slow. You should focus on making connections with larger youtube channels and groups that push out music to already established audiences. This way, you'll start to see *new* fans pour in, rather come one by one.

The key is new fans. Already stablished fans will check back every week or 2 to see if you have anything new. They're your lifeblood, but you have to obtain new ones, and the faster the better. Also don't attempt any marketing until your music is marketable. If you market a bad song, it'll actually backfire and do more harm than good.

So make really good songs, and market to larger organizations instead of individual fans. Somebody posted a list of YouTube Music Promotion Channel with their contact info, ...but they're charging some money for it.

I'll work on making a database like that that collects this information and make it available on my website for free. Until then, TheUntz.com does a pretty good job organizing the promotion channels by genre and label.


interesting.
 
yup, teamwork with promoters. It's annoying at times, but it's something you have to do until you can use your own fanbase independently. Once you have a large enough fanbase, new songs will just promote themselves as people see them and share them, but until then you have to ask larger channels to promote your song for you and the fans will start to trickle in.
 
First you have to make your profile attractive enough to attract listeners and fans to stay with you in the long term..

This is done by having PRO cover art & logos done, very good song titles & descriptions as well as profile descriptions.

Secondly you will need to some sort of promotion which can either be done for free with outreach and social media promotion or else you can do influencer marketing or Paid Social Media marketing - to avoid the hassle of doing it by yourself.

Thirdly you should try and connect with similar artists and do collaborations.

Lastly you need to keep pushing as many quality tracks as possible while doing the above.

Treat your music as a business and allocate a monthly budget(that you can afford) which you can use towards marketing & promotion.
 
The return is often never worth the expense on paid marketing. Just wait it out patiently. Let your music market itself. DO NOT use paid advertisement (ever, really) on a bad song or you'll be in a bigger mess than you've ever imagined. And stay clear of social media. Social media is crap. The platforms change too quickly as the masses migrate from one to the next lol it's like having a myspace page that useless now. Social media is too volatile and unpredictable to market anything in. I don't think its smart for the long run.

Among the artist that I started producing with, there were those who focused on social media and those who focused on music. The ones social media died off long long ago. The ones in for the music are still around.

haha it's funny, I see some ditz post something retarded on Instagram and get thousands of "likes". I go to this fools Soundcloud page and it's dead. Now which page is worth to to an musician (obviously the Soundcloud page). I then see a quality sounding artist post something on Instagram and it gets 3 "likes". I think, ha! this guy must actually have good music because his Instagram is so bad. Yup! His soundcloud has over 5k and millions of plays.

So it goes to show ya, social media is fake as hell. Don't use it.
 
Last edited:
The return is often never worth the expense on paid marketing. Just wait it out patiently. Let your music market itself. DO NOT use paid advertisement (ever, really) on a bad song or you'll be in a bigger mess than you've ever imagined. And stay clear of social media. Social media is crap. The platforms change too quickly as the masses migrate from one to the next lol it's like having a myspace page that useless now. Social media is too volatile and unpredictable to market anything in. I don't think its smart for the long run.

Among the artist that I started producing with, there were those who focused on social media and those who focused on music. The ones social media died off long long ago. The ones in for the music are still around.

haha it's funny, I see some ditz post something retarded on Instagram and get thousands of "likes". I go to this fools Soundcloud page and it's dead. Now which page is worth to to an musician (obviously the Soundcloud page). I then see a quality sounding artist post something on Instagram and it gets 3 "likes". I think, ha! this guy must actually have good music because his Instagram is so bad. Yup! His soundcloud has over 5k and millions of plays.

So it goes to show ya, social media is fake as hell. Don't use it.

Not to mention a lot of social media traffic is fake too. A lot of big advertisers are moving away from it, it was supposed to be the next big thing but they're not seeing the results.
Not sure why you'd put in the effort, not a lot of people troll around social media looking for new music. Serious labels stopped doing that years ago.
All it is now is an echo chamber. I guess in that way it can be useful, once you have a bit of hype going, to amplify it..
 
Ya, I hear you. It's kind of all falling apart. I've been developing my own real site that works on mobile too, so why use a Facebook page when you can have your own site. it's just a lot harder but much more effective, especially if you want to switch the content for mobile/pc. I wrote a perl script to figure out what device is being used and displays the content for that device (mobile phone or pc). ^.^

...anyway, this is kind of besides the point but it is a huge marketing plus! It's looks great to have a site (fans love it) and it shows that you're dedicated to your music.
 
Last edited:
First you have to make your profile attractive enough to attract listeners and fans to stay with you in the long term..

This is done by having PRO cover art & logos done, very good song titles & descriptions as well as profile descriptions.

Secondly you will need to some sort of promotion which can either be done for free with outreach and social media promotion or else you can do influencer marketing or Paid Social Media marketing - to avoid the hassle of doing it by yourself.

Thirdly you should try and connect with similar artists and do collaborations.

Lastly you need to keep pushing as many quality tracks as possible while doing the above.

Treat your music as a business and allocate a monthly budget(that you can afford) which you can use towards marketing & promotion.

Do exactly this. Really great and concise write-up. Hits all the right points.

Additionally, play as many shows as you can (unless you tire and saturate). Support other local artists. Engage in the scene. It will take you a lot further than just spamming for streams will.
 
No lame if you know what to look for and dont just go blowing your money on the 1st promo you see do your reseach then spend your money not every uses bots
 
Back
Top