Instagram for Musicians: How to Make It Big on the Gram
What if you already had access to the best musical marketing tool in the world?
It’s easy for musicians to throw a ton of resources at their promotional marketing. However, Instagram provides a cheap, easy, and intuitive to help even the smallest bands make it to the big time.
Wondering how to make Instagram for musicians work for you? Keep reading to discover the answer!
The Story
It can be difficult to choose content for your personal Instagram. Some folks focus on serious life updates while others devote their entire account to cute cat pictures.
For your band’s Instagram, things are a bit simpler: everything you post helps to craft the brand of your group and your music.
Are you someone who grew up on the streets and found success? Or maybe someone with a privileged past who decided to throw in with the rockers and the rebels?
Whatever your brand, this will be your identity in the eyes of the public. Make it a good one, and make every post on brand!
Rock the Bio
It’s fun to imagine dedicated fans poring through every post your group has ever made. First, though, you need to get their attention with your bio.
Good bios are short and sweet. At the same time, they must quickly grab a stranger’s attention and make them curious about your band.
Maybe the bio is tongue-in-cheek, or maybe it openly describes your musical influences. Anything that gets someone to start following your account moves them one step closer to being your biggest fans!
Jazzy Handle
You now know how important your Instagram bio is. But what will potential fans see before that bio? That’s right: your online handle.
Many bands and musicians try to get a handle that incorporates the name of their band. While this sounds easy, it can sometimes be difficult to find an Instagram account name that isn’t already taken.
You may need to add something to get the handle you want. For example, making “official” or “music” part of the name.
Alternatively, you can choose a handle simply because it is memorable. Even if it doesn’t include the musician name or a band name, there is truly no such thing as bad publicity.
Steady Content
How often should you post content to your Instagram account? Many musicians are nervous at first that they are going to annoy their fans with “too much” content.
While it is good to space out your major updates, fans generally respond well to a steady stream of content. If you post every day, it keeps people coming back for more.
Thanks to streaming, you have potential fans all over the world. While you can’t match everybody’s schedule, you can try to post morning, noon, and night.
Such a strategy will keep the truly faithful glued to your account each day. And for casual fans, spacing out your content increases the odds that they see at least one of your posts.
Lighting Is Everything
Pictures are a major part of social media. And when it comes to Instagram, pictures are the most important thing you can post!
Fans love to see behind-the-scenes pictures of you and the band. And if you are traveling as part of a tour, photos of new cities and venues are always a big hit.
Don’t forget the most important part of taking and posting pictures: the lighting. Good lighting is the difference between an epic picture and something barely worth posting.
For best results, try to take pictures in indirect sunlight (such as through a window). This provides consistent lighting for just about any daytime pictures. As for evening pics, experiment with different interior lighting setups until your picture game is on point!
Turn Fans Into Ambassadors
Your Instagram posts are about more than cool pics and stories about your music. It’s also important that you create multiple opportunities for fan engagement.
Sometimes, this is as simple as asking a question or conducting a poll. Such an action encourages multiple fans to reply and to interact with each other, creating the feeling of an online community.
Other times, you can encourage fans to take pictures and videos from your performances and post them online. Such posts, along with the right hashtags, can help build your brand and find new fans.
Your ultimate goal is to transform your biggest fans into brand ambassadors. This creates word-of-mouth marketing that is highly convincing to other potential fans.
The Hashtag Game
Every platform has its own language. When it comes to social media, that language is hashtags.
Hashtags are a great way to reach more fans and create buzz for your music. However, getting the most out of hashtag marketing is harder than you may think!
For example, you can create a new hashtag for your fans to use. But you need to make sure that it is both unique and descriptive.
You can also use the hashtags that your fans like to use. To do this, you may need to use various analytics tools to discover the “magic words” you should use.
Live Videos
Instagram is a social media platform built on images. However, images now take a backseat because the new king of content is video!
Video creates immersive and engaging content marketing for things like your Instagram stories. However, what your fans will really love are live videos.
Live videos bring some of the fun of a concert directly to your followers. That’s because they can watch and even interact with you in realtime.
These videos may be as simple as an update about your morning or as a complex as an impromptu concert. The latter may take more work, but it will generate serious online buzz!
Instagram for Musicians: Party On, Dude
Now you know how Instagram for musicians can really change the game. But do you know who can help you change up your music?
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