[Editors Note: This article was written by Alpert Tuzcu.]
Spotify recently announced that it will add livestream events to its ‘events’ tab. With this addition, livestream events can now be displayed on your Spotify artist profile. Moreover, now your followers get notified about livestream events, which is wonderful if you’re building up your following on Spotify.
These days, artists can make up some of their losses from concerts by connecting with fans online through livestream events. As most tours are cancelled and postponed late into 2021, musicians have to find a way to make live events happen. So in this way, live streaming is very useful as it provides live music experience in the digital realm with much lower costs and at the comfort of your home! Granted, it’s nowhere near like playing on the stage, but it is a start and it is only a growing part of the music industry from now on.
So in this post, I would like to explain how you can promote your livestream events better on Spotify and utilize the advantages the platform brings.
Add your event on Songkick
To get started with livestreaming, the first step is to find a good day/time to do your livestream concert.
Then, set up a PayPal.Me link as well, so you can get paid! The PayPal.me link can be pinned up to your performance and you can charge viewers based on an amount you think is best.
Then, select the platform you prefer to host your livestream. You can livestream pretty much on any platform, including Instagram, Twitch, YouTube or Facebook.
The next step is to go to Songkick and add your event date and time, just like always. You can list your events hosted on any platform here.
Just like concerts, the information on Songkick will appear in the Spotify ‘Concerts’ section.
Add your event on ‘Artist’s Pick’
The other neat part of the new Spotify feature is that livestream events can be listed under ‘Artist’s Pick’. This is the tool where we typically use to promote a new single or a playlist that shows up on the front part of the profile. Anyone who visits your Spotify profile can easily see ‘Artist’s Pick’, so it’s great that now livestream events can be listed on Artist’s Pick as well.
Followers get Emails
I think one of the best parts about this new feature of Spotify is that fans are getting notified through emails. Unfortunately Spotify does not allow artists to directly connect individually with their fans, nor provides information about them. All we know is the total number of your followers.
The only three points of contact with your followers is when you release new music, through Artist’s Pick and through notification emails.
Spotify will now notify your followers about your livestream event via email.
Notification emails go with the subject line “Virtual events for you: [Insert Artist Name], so people are personally aware of such an event. In the body of the email, you get the artist photo, artist name, date, and a link that says “Find Event”, which directs to the Songkick page where you can access the event link.
Get more followers
As you might have guessed from the previous paragraph, the more followers you have on Spotify means the more emails get sent out.
Normally, if you play in New York, let’s say 500 emails gets sent out. But if you have 10k, followers, that means 10k people could show up on your livestream event! This is huge in terms of the opportunity it presents, both for fan engagement and for financial gain. A regular livestream schedule could even create a solid income stream if you have a good follower base.
Getting more Spotify followers could be very beneficial for making a successful livestream concert. I highly recommend you to use your social media accounts and to promote your music as much as possible to drive as many people to your Spotify account. The more people place your songs in playlists and the more they share your music, the more fans you will get and the more income you can generate!
Final Words
Since livestreaming has considerably increased since last March, most social networks have seen a big traffic growth in terms of live performances. It is very likely that livestreaming will continue to thrive after the pandemic ends, as it offers a new experience of intimate concerts that some fans really like. The music industry has also embraced livestreaming and we’ve seen artists like BTS make $20 million from a single show and Mellise Etheridge is making $50k a month from her livestream subscriptions service. So I think that livestreaming can be very useful for artists in the end.
To set up Spotify and Songkick, first verify your Spotify for Artists account if you haven’t yet. Then, enter go to Songkick and create the event, with the link attached to the page. Then, connect Songlick to your Spotify account and you should be all set now! Have fun and enjoy performing again!
Tags: artist tips featuring live performance livestream spotify