Creative ways to engage and build your audience during quarantine
It all begins with an idea.
In the midst of Covid-19, performers have moved online in droves to offer performances, chats, guest interviews, cooking and makeup demos, and so much more. Online offers the chance to connect with audiences all over the world right from the comfort of their home (and that won’t change after the crisis is over!) For some artists, this is a great time to engage current audiences, re-engage fans who may have lost interest temporarily, and attract new followers. But beyond just hitting the “Go Live” button, what else can you do to continue building excitement, loyalty and goodwill? Here, a few ideas, plus examples of how I or other artists are using them successfully.
Instagram Co-Lives
Instagram is one of the only major social platforms that allows you to natively invite a guest into your stream. When you share the stage and the screen, the combined audiences can see and hear both of you. A few ideas for using Insta co-lives:
Invite fellow artists to do a mini concert with you. Artists you like, have collaborated with, or even ones you haven’t yet met - they may be receptive to an invite to go live with you, as co-lives can help increase both artists’ exposure and reach. While artists with a much higher following or engagement may not be as easy to score for a co-live show, artists around your follower numbers and level of development will likely be very interested. This works best if you set it up and promote it together beforehand so fans are aware the show will be happening.
You can do concerts (you’ll have to trade off on singing songs, as the latency/lag time in audio on Instagram between parties makes it veeeery wonky to try to sing together at the same time and not your best impression for the audience.) You could do interviews (or combine an interview with live music). You can do demos, merch sales marathons, really anything you both can come up with. I’ve done co-lives with Avanti Nagral in India, Tobi Ibitoye in Romania, Bianca Sings in the US, and others, and have seen a modest increase in followers from these co-lives. And Pat Monahan of Train, plus Miley Cyrus, each have weekly shows they do on Insta Live where they interview invited guests.
If you’re looking to build audience, an extra tip is to scroll through the Live feed after (make sure you save it to your Story after it’s done) and write down all the handles of viewers who commented- then Direct Message each with a thank you for watching, and an invitation to follow you (some info about why they should/ what cool stuff you have coming up will help).
Takeovers and Shows for other organizations
Many organizations, groups, brands, and businesses cannot interact with their audiences and fans in real life, and would love a way to do that. Additionally, businesses and brands are looking to show customers and audiences that they are contributing positively, that they care, that they are doing something good for the community during this time.
So it’s a great time to identify businesses, brands, organizations etc that are a natural fit for your music (AKA if you’re a heavy metal artist who curses a lot, a wholesome family bakery is not a great business to offer a takeover- your music should match the audience of the business). Then, reach out to offer a live takeover show. This means that you’d perform live on their Page for their audience (they’ll have to give you login details, or a Stream Key to their Page if you are using software like OBS or VMix to stream). Remember that the key to a successful pitch for a takeover concert is to make it all about serving the business’s audience, and giving them a chance to offer entertainment to their audiences.
Pros: Many businesses are not doing any live programming on their Pages and will find this idea delightful and interesting as a way to engage their audiences.
You and the business can work together to identify what the show will be like, what types of music you’ll play, if there will be live chat, if a rep from the business can be on the show, if you will set up a method to accept tips (or if they will pay you for your performance). The possibilities are unlimited, but should serve both parties’ goals.
You will reach a brand new audience, many of whom have not heard of you, and can use the concert and post-concert messaging to further share your music, gain followers, have people sign up for your email list, collect tips- whatever you and the business determine works.
An example of a Takeover Show: I worked with iHeartDogs.com, a brand who premiered my music video for You Get Me, to create a Concert for Dogs and the People Who Love Them. The show reached over 60,000 people (so far), with 750+ viewers on at peak time. It was a terrific way to expose my music and introduce myself to new audiences, who were all connected by their love of dogs/pets. I made sure to play only songs that were fun, charming, or silly when in the context of singing to dogs, like How Sweet It Is to Be Loved By You, Brown Eyed Girl, and I Wanna Dance with SomePuppy ;) I also played some of my originals that made sense, given the theme. See the Show Here.
Cons: If you don’t have prior connections with businesses, groups, organizations etc, you may have to write a well crafted pitch letter that you can send via email, or Facebook or Insta direct message. This pitch letter should outline who you are, your accomplishments, why you are contacting them, and what they might get out of it if you work together on a takeover show. Remember: all businesses are interested in engaging THEIR customers as much as you are about engaging new fans.
You may have to do a few live shows on your own first to ensure you can work out the tech side of delivering a live show. You need a fast internet connection. While most everyone is a little more lenient about digital quality of entertainment these days, you don’t want the feed dropping, pixelating, or the sound botched during your performance on a brand’s Page. Make sure you can show them examples of a clean, engaging online show you did (even if it’s only to a few fans).
Comfort and Familiarity.
Right now, humans are craving connection and many are feeling lost, scared, and uncertain about the future. Comfort and familiarity can soothe those nerves and fears...so it’s a great time to dive into offering covers, clips of covers, and cover songs done in unexpected ways (so that the familiar becomes new). You could do a weekly cover video and take requests from your fans across socials for which one you’ll do. If you play a certain instrument, playing a song that would be very unexpected on that instrument can be a delightful surprise (I did “Here Comes the Sun” on kazoo and got a much higher response than my usual rate). The point is, even if you pride yourself on writing original music, it’s a good time to bring comfort to your fans with songs they know..but done in your unique style.
What strategies have YOU deployed that successfully engaged or built your audience during this time? I’d love to hear, and to learn from you!
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