Email marketing is vital for your success as a music artist in the new music industry.
But how exactly do you get started building a mailing list?
Why Do Musicians Need A Mailing List
The email list is the foundation for any online business, as any digital marketer worth their salt will tell you.
Yet, music artists are still behind the times when it comes to email marketing.
The reality is that having an email list is far more valuable than a social media following for several reasons:
1. Organic Reach Is Pathetic
Organic reach on social platforms is shrinking every day. This means the only way to really reach your fans and followers is to pay for advertising.
Social platforms are holding your fans hostage for ransom.
In fact, the average organic reach for a Facebook post is 6.4% of the page's likes, and that's if you're posting engaging content.
This means if you have 1,000 followers on Facebook, only about 60 of them will see anything you post.
Compare that email marketing, where 100% of your audience will see your email in their inbox, even if they don't open it, you are still staying top of mind.
Sure, only 30-35% of people might open your email, but that's still 300-350 fans seeing your message, verses 60 on Facebook.
If you have your fans on an email list, you can contact them at any time, and direct them anywhere you want, whether that's to buy your album, or stream your music on Spotify.
2. Email Subscribers Are More Engaged
People who actually consent to give you their email address are by default going to be more engaged, and therefore, more likely to buy.
In fact, people are just far more likely to buy something through email than social media.
So if you're looking to actually make income from your fanbase, and not just gain vanity metrics, then you need to nurture an email list.
3. You Can Lose Your Social Followers Overnight
An email list is an asset that you own and control. This is not the case with social media.
In our increasingly polarized world, you can easily get your posts blocked, or even your entire account shut down, just for sharing an opinion or a post that social platform doesn't agree with.
You don't want to lose your entire following overnight.
If you have an email list, your fans are protected, and you can always direct them to a new platform.
1. Choose An Email Marketing Platform To Set Up Your Mailing List
To get started with email marketing, you need a dedicated email marketing autoresponder tool.
You can't just cc a bunch of people through your gmail, as
- That's terribly clunky and impractical
- It violates anti-spam laws and can get you in trouble
People need to be able to voluntarily unsubscribe from your email list at any time, and using an email autoresponder tool allows you to do this.
Not to mention you can send automated email sequences, and must make a lot more money from your list.
So, you NEED an autoresponder tool.
What Makes A Email Autoresponder Great For A Music Artist?
I've used a lot of different tools, including Mailchimp, Aweber, Active Campaign, Constant Contact, and ConvertKit
Most email tools aren't made with music artists in mind, and there are really 3 key features you need your email tool to have.
Low Tech; High Functionality
If the Cyberpunk literary genre can be described as "high tech; low life", then you will want your email autoresponder to be the exact opposite of that. Let's face it, we're artists. We don't like getting bogged down in tech and monotony. We need a tool that is simple and easy to use, while not sacrificing features such as automation, segmentation, and more.
Created With Artists & Creatives In-Mind
Most email newsletter tools out there just aren't build with creatives in mind, and as a result, it can sometimes feel like you're trying to fit a square peg into a round hole. We need an autoresponder tool that's on our side!
Fits With The Musician's Budget
If you're an indie artist, you're probably not rolling in the dough, so you'll need an email service provider that is affordable.
Free Challenge:
Get Your First 100 Email List Subscribers In 3 Days
I'll email you a new strategy each day, for 3 days, to help you get your first 100 email list subscribers. These strategies don't cost anything, and you can easily implement them in just 3 days.
What Is The Best Email Marketing Platform For Music Artists?
With these three features in mind, what makes best email platform for music artists?
I'm a firm believer in ConvertKit, and you can get started with a free account by clicking the button below and signing up through my affiliate link.
Start Your Email List
Get started with ConvertKit for free and start building your email list.
ConvertKit has a lot of amazing features, but is simple to use.
It's created with musicians and creators in-mind, and it's extremely affordable, as you can get started for free.
If you want to be able to send automated email sequences, then that plan starts at just $9/month for up to 300 email list subscribers.
If you want a full explanation of what makes ConvertKit great, then check out my article here.
2. Create An Opt-in Incentive (Fan Magnet)
Next, you need to create an opt-in incentive, or what I call a "fan magnet".
This is something that will get people to actually WANT to join your list.
After all, no one really wants to just "sign-up for a mailing list".
You have to give your fans a reason to sign up.
First off, you want your email list to be valuable on it's own.
You can tell your fans they'll get exclusive music, behind-the-scenes content, and discounts.
That's all great, but you want to give them something of value immediately after signing up.
This will get your fans to sign up now, rather than "later", which inevitably becomes "never".
You want to give them a tangible "fan magnet".
One of the best "fan magnets" is just a free song, or songs.
If they opt-in for your email list, you'll send them a free song or group of songs.
It's that simple.
And convertKit makes this really easy to do with their opt-in pages.
By the way, if you want my list of 24 different great lead magnet ideas for musicians, read my article here.
How To Create An Opt-In Page
In ConvertKit, you can easily create what they call a "landing page".
This is a webpage that you can share on social media and with fans that allow them to sign-up for your free song.
This also allows you to send the free song automatically after signing up, so it's completely automated and no extra work for you.
You can can even connect an automated sequence of emails to this form so that everyone who opts-in gets a series of emails from you to help nurture that relationship.
You can even sell your music, merch, or ask your fans to stream your music on Spotify...
All automatically...
To everyone who signs up for your email list.
That's powerful.
How To Create An Opt-In Form
If you already have your own website, and you want to embed email list opt-in forms on your site, ConvertKit allows you to do this as well.
Just watch my video below for how to do this:
3. Start Collecting Email Addresses
Now that you have your email platform, and a fan magnet to start growing your list, you now need to promote that fan magnet so you can get subscribers.
There are a lot of different places where you can promote your fan magnet to grow your list, but you can get started by sharing it regularly on social media.
Make the link in your bio on Instagram promote your free song that fans can sign-up for your email list to get.
If you want to jumpstart your email list growth, and get your first 100 email list subscribers in the next 3 days, then click the button below to sign-up for my free challenge.
I'll send you one new task/challenge each day for three days that you can follow to grow your email list.
At the end of three days, if you followed the plan, you should have 100 subscribers.
Free Challenge:
Get Your First 100 Email List Subscribers In 3 Days
I'll email you a new strategy each day, for 3 days, to help you get your first 100 email list subscribers. These strategies don't cost anything, and you can easily implement them in just 3 days.
This challenge is especially great for you if you currently have 0 subscribers, or not a lot of social media followers, and don't want to spend money on ads.
I hope you got value from this post on how to get started with email marketing and growing your email list!
If so, feel free to share, and let me know in the comments below...
