Digital communication can be separated into three areas: online, social media, and mobile. Although they often coincide with one another, they can be seen as discrete mechanisms used in transmitting content electronically. In order to properly market products in this age of information, it is imperative to utilize each one of these platforms as part of a marketing strategy. This is particularly true when it comes to music, an important type of media found in each of the three areas listed above.
Record labels have the task of producing and promoting the artists that they represent. This promotion has evolved from radio, magazines and newspaper ads to television, movies and videos, and now to the internet, social networks and mobile applications. With the advent of cyberspace, information is literally available at one’s fingertips. Adding the smartphone to this mix allows information to be accessible anywhere a wireless network connection can be established. This widens the scope from the limitations found in the days of radio, and even television. Media is now available on demand, whenever and wherever the consumer desires it.
The first way that record labels should use the internet to promote their music is by having a website of their own developed. The domain name should be the name of the label, or as close it to as possible. For instance, Grace and Peace Records uses www.graceandpeace.com and Atlantic Records utilizes www.atlanticrecords.com. These websites should include information about each artist, as well as links to music and calendar dates for tours. Some sites are designed to be more interactive than others by including forums, chat rooms, and social media feeds. After creating their own website, record labels should also establish their presence on other websites. There are a plethora of entertainment websites and album review sites seeking attractive content to include on their pages.
Social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and YouTube each have their own unique benefits. Being actively engaged on all of these networks will serve to inform current fans, as well as attracting new ones. Through these sites people are also able to share record labels’ posts, which may increase views and result in free advertising. There are also many lesser known social media sites that record labels can use to market their music, including Tumblr, ReverbNation, TikTok and Pinterest, each serving different demographics of users.
Many record labels are developing their own apps that can be used by the public to get information about artists, listen to music and obtain exclusive content. In addition to having an app available for download, it is a must that they have music available on streaming applications such as Spotify, Pandora, Apple Music and Tidal. Some of these apps, such as SoundCloud, allow people to listen to the music for free, while others charge consumers a monthly fee and pay record labels a small amount per listen for each track. Many labels have been against this practice in the past, but it has increasingly become the trend. Consumers no longer want to take up storage space with MP3’s when they can free it up by streaming music whenever they want. This has been a topic of dispute among artists because of the compensation issue, since artists earn anywhere from “$0.006 to $0.0084 per stream.” (TimesInternational.net) Radiohead’s Thom Yorke refused to have his music on Spotify, before eventually giving in, as did multi-platinum recording artist Taylor Swift. (NME.com)
Lastly, advertisements can be designed for each of these platforms. Whether displayed as a banner ad on RollingStone.com (Links to an external site.), or as an Instagram ad containing a snippet of the latest single, such forms of managing digital communications have become important factors that should not be overlooked by any record label with the hope of establishing longevity.