Are you a music artist? You should embrace the power of music streaming to grow your business. Period.
Music streaming platforms should be your bread & butter strategy. At least when you are just starting out as a music artist, this should be your de facto way to grow your business. Ideally, over time, you’d be better off with your own website and a combination of music tracks being showcased on YouTube and all the other music streaming services.
How big is the music streaming market, you ask? Worldwide, the music streaming segment is slated to generate US$23,053 million in 2021.
Spotify, Pandora, Amazon Music, SoundCloud, and Apple Music -- these are all music streaming services (and some of these provide subscription-based access to music) for millions of people worldwide.
The UK music streaming services industry’s Revenue is projected to reach US$1,471m in 2021 and this revenue is expected to show an annual growth rate (CAGR 2021-2025) of 8.58%
Globally, according to the RIAA, revenues from streaming services grew nearly 20% in 2019 to $8.8 billion, accounting for 79.5% of all recorded music revenues.
Why bother with Music Streaming Platforms?
It’s easier to ride on the back of giant(s), especially when you are just starting out as a musician in the UK. The likes of YouTube, Spotify, and Pandora are already huge and command audiences in the millions worldwide.
With access to music streaming platforms, and ability to showcase your music artist bio (and profile), and the chance to manage your playlists (ready for the whole world to tune into), you can easily start taking your music to the next level.
Image Credit: TechCrunch
According to TechCrunch, more than 79% of the revenues of the music industry revenues now come from music streaming services alone.
Spotify is available across 178 markets and commands a 35% market share worldwide. YouTube (while it’s not just a music streaming service or platform) has more than 1 billion viewers monthly. About 23.7% of Pandora’s revenue comes from the United States and about 15.57% from the United Kingdom.
BusinessofApps statistics show that Spotify alone has over 155 million users. Meanwhile, Apple Music has a user base of 72 million and Amazon Music has a user base of 55 million users. YouTube Music and Pandora have about 30 million users and 6.3 million users respectively.
Clearly, the market demands access to music, on the go, anywhere, anytime.
By making your music artist profile, bio, and playlists available on any (or as many) of these platforms would mean that you have a chance to tap into the hundreds of millions of ardent music fans.
Potentially, a slice of this user base of music aficionados could be your fans.
Never before in the history of the music industry has there been a potential to reach so ardent music fans.
Music Streaming Platforms: The Right Approach To Follow as a Music Creator
Set yourself up as a music creator in each of the platforms below (platforms vary slightly in how you go about doing this -- from profile bio to managing your playlists and how you get paid for music).
● Youtube: Go specifically to YouTube for Artists [https://artists.youtube.com/] and set up a YouTube Artist Channel. This allows you to start a YouTube Artist Channel, organize & manage your playlists, and help start and grow your own subscribers and following.
● Spotify: Go to Spotify for Artists and start by building your profile. Then, use many of the music playlist management tools, community management features, and several other features such as Spotify Stream On.
● Apple Music: Sign up with Apple Music for Artists and get started on the platform and work with projects, milestones, playlists, statistics, geo-distribution of your listeners, and more.
● Pandora: With Pandora AMP, Pandora helps you to set up and get access to millions of music listeners on Pandora. To get started, you’d have to create an account, submit your music, claim your AMP profile, and more.
It might seem like a gargantuan task to set up music creator accounts with each of these music streaming services.
It’s not.
Compared to the traditional ways to monetize your music or to make a living from music and all of this work feels like “nothing”.
How are you going to use the combined power of the music streaming services for music artists?
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