Marketing 101 Ep. 6: Content Marketing and Audience Development
The proliferation of cheap, accessible content marketing in concert with social media has certainly been one of the biggest developments in marketing over the past several decades.
Why? Because in order to be successful at content marketing, you must put artistic honesty and a giving attitude right up front, and that is attractive to a lot of people. As it should be. When it comes to content, the more honest and genuine you are with what you’re doing, the better long term chances you have!
There are two big components of this style: content worth sharing, and an audience who wants to share it with you.
We’ll cover the content creation side in some of our more technical articles. Today we’re talking about the audience development side: every bit as important, and sometimes overlooked. Let’s discuss some barriers common among artists who are looking to develop an audience.
Long Term Consistency of Work
Any creative endeavour is difficult. Repeating that endeavor over and over again is even more so. The idea of an overnight success is a myth in our industry. It does happen, but it will not happen to you, no matter how good you are. The ones who make it have been putting out great work not once, but over and over and over again for many, many years consistently.
Like, 6-10 years of content releases before reaching a sustainable place isn’t at all uncommon to see. This time-to-sustainability number is vastly underestimated by many artists in their early careers. This then leads to large numbers of aspiring creatives who simply don’t give themselves the necessary time in the marketplace to have a shot at being successful. It can happen faster, for sure, but that’s just luck if it does, and not something within your control. Though I hope you get lucky and blow up!
Be consistent with the release of your work, and anticipate that release consistency to continue for many years longer than you initially think it will!
Pacing of Work
An artistic endeavor is not made more honest or real because it was released in one big chunk, right when it was done.
If you’re having trouble with creative consistency, this is an especially bad idea. Dumping the whole thing out all at once can easily turn that album you just spent three years working on into a social media flash in the pan, and that’s frustrating!
There is a reason why most label releases are: single 1, single 2, video 1, pre-release press, release, post release press, tour, video 2, remixes.
Pacing out, i.e. stretching out your your promotion schedule for a given release gives your work the best chance to be heard by more people, i.e. audience development.
And, trickling out your work also takes some of the pressure off of you to constantly be producing new stuff as the artist. Win-win!
Audience Development Numbers
The beauty of our present moment is that you don’t need a gimundo, million member audience to make it work. There are plenty of jewelry makers on Instagram with 6k followers, doing pretty darn well. Same goes for Etsy makers, etc.
Note: I do not suggest running any business exclusively on Instagram, Etsy, or any other social media platform. When your entire business is built on someone else’s property, your options narrow significantly. Use these platforms to serve your own interests, sure, but do not become dependent on them.
Thinking about audience development and having a plan on building yours is important. The actual audience numbers you need to make it work are very manageable, and reward uniqueness and honestly over generic mass appeal.
Lean into this-your marketing should be super genuine and real, and tell your honest story, all of the time!
