The coronavirus makes staying at home the rule to live by. Social distancing can be exhausting, but for musicians it actually comes with possibilities, since the distractions are at an all time minimum.
Although the music industry and especially the live sector suffers a lot from the measures taken to fight the virus, we tried to come up with a few activities every artist can engage in during the pandemic.
Engage with fans
Yes, you can post pictures of yourself on Instagram, talk about upcoming releases or tell your audience how sad you’re about your cancelled gigs, but this is not the ideal way of interaction.
What most artists need to understand is, that many of their fans are in the same situation as they are. Just like you, they’re home alone and looking for social interaction. Utilize this to your advantage! Go live on Instagram an show them what your day to day life during coronavirus is like. Let them ask you question via the Instagram “ask a question” function. Ask them about their opinion on new demos that you’ve just created. Be creative!
Make new music!
This is an obvious one. Now is the time to not only come up with up dozens of new demos, but also actually finishing tracks. Many producers and artists tend to neglect that.
Also, you can use the time to look back into older songs that you always saw potential in. You’ll thank yourself later when it comes to preparing a release schedule.
This brings us right to our next pointer.
Planning and strategy
Planning your next steps in terms of releases, overall strategy or branding techniques can be quite exhausting and time consuming. Therefore we think that now is the perfect moment to get things done on the managerial ends.
What is your USP? How can you reflect that in your brand? When should you release your next music video? What should the video be all about? Who do you want to get involved? How can you diversify your revenue streams? Which festivals do you want to play in 2021 and how can you make it happen?
There are so many questions that need to be answered. Now is the time to take them on.
Virtual concerts
As already mentioned, a lot of artists had to cancel their upcoming concerts due to the coronavirus. Many of them counteract by live streaming a performance from the living room and let their fans watch via Instagram, YouTube, Facebook or even the gaming platform Twitch.
Whether you had a concert scheduled or not, doesn’t matter – fans always like to see you live, even if it’s just virtual.
Obviously we do not want to sugercoat the current situation most musicians are in, as they’re missing out on a lot of money from their cancelled live shows. Platforms like Crowdcast, Key or Patreon can come in handy now. They allow you to paywall your live streams. That way you can make up for some of the revenue lost.
In case that you’re looking to grow an audience on a new platform like Twitch, this might be the perfect time to do so. Additionally, if you’re actually into gaming, why not let your fans watch? Post Malone knows how to do it.
Show solidarity
Now is the time where artists need to help out each other. Tag your befriended artists on Instagram and tell them to do so too. Thereby you can start a chain reaction which helps to increase the reach for everyone and gain new potential listeners.
Not just artists, but also music companies know that it’s important to show solidarity during coronavirus. Bandcamp for example even waived all of their revenue share on sales for one day to boost the artists’ income from the website.
Fans are willing to support music that they love. Don’t be afraid to let them know, that now it’s more important than ever that they stream your music, buy your albums or order your merch.
Watch music documentaries
You’ll definitely spend way too much time trying to figure out which Netflix series you want to binge-watch in the next few weeks. Guess what there are tons of amazing music related documentaries out there and they’re full of something really essential –> Inspiration! So you can even be productive while you’re chilling out.
Additionally, the internet is full of educational content. All the production tutorials, marketing how-tos and music theory videos are available at your fingertips. You can always learn something new, so go for it!
Let’s all fight the coronavirus and #staythefuckhome!
0 be the first one to show some appreciation for this!