Hkmk (left) and Garey Godson (right) — Independent Artists and Label managers Room Of Understanding.

Decades ago musicians were completely dependent on record label structures in order to break it in the music business. Today with the internet creatives in all fields stand an equal chance of getting their products or ideas to millions of people across the globe. About a year ago I conducted research on Independent artists. It included several interviews with unsigned musicians and close monitoring of my personal musical career as an Independent artist Garey Godson. In embedding these interesting results, I have been able to accrue over 1 million streams from Spotify and over 1 million YouTube views from my records in one year of active releases and promotion.

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Today the Independent artist does not necessarily need record label structures to be successful in the music industry. From streaming music, artists can derive monies which accrue over time and with this, they are capable of financing future projects. Nowadays there are multiple streams of revenues for the Independent artists they include merchandising, royalties, touring and live appearances. As one might already imagine having one’s music distributed through digital aggregators is just one part of the whole process. Time management, self-branding, networking, and effective social media usages are equally important aspects which have to be taken into cognizance.

The 21st-century Independent artist has to find creative ways of marketing his/herself on social media in this fast-paced technological environment. A great deal of this entails Influence marketing, constant interaction with the audience, paying close attention to analytics, algorithms and understanding how these tools work. It also includes self-education, learning and mastering creative skills like basic recording, video & graphics editing. Nowadays musicians need finances to pay for certain services like link videos, ad-promotions, and high-quality graphics. Networking is an integral part of the game which can sometimes be more valuable than spending actual money. To this effect, the musician should be able to build and sustain long-term relationships with certain journalists and bloggers who can get one's music in front of the right audiences. It’s literally a combination of all these things.

In summary, we can begin to see that some Independent musicians are interacting with the available tools in new ways. Aspiring creatives are no longer just consuming; rather they are creating new ideas, promoting them and steadily searching for unique ways to disseminate them. In the next series, I would like to give some more insight into practical ways Musicians fields can employ proper social media marketing strategies into building and sustaining their careers.