Part Three of Three Part Notes for Songwriting Success: Sharing your songs publicly

Last week I talked about how to record your music and distribute it to multiple streaming services. This week I’ll talk about how to actually get your music heard by people. This is the final paper in this series, and I hope that this has helped anyone who’s trying to get their music out there.

Releasing music is one thing, but trying to get streams is something totally different—especially if you’re just starting out. Social media platforms are very important. Post about your music. It doesn’t have to be a big post, just let people know that you’ve released a song. Platforms like TikTok are a great way to get lots of people to hear your music. You can make teasers for your song(s) on TikTok. Other platforms such as Instagram and Facebook where people locally will see your posts more often, can serve as a way to get people in your community to hear your music. This will help spread the word that you’re releasing music. 

Commenting on other people’s posts and channels is a good option as well. Respond to people’s comments because there will be some people who check out your channel or profile. It’s an extremely simple thing you can do every day. 

Releasing your song(s) onto YouTube is also a great way to get listens. You can also make music videos for your songs. Another option is to play your song in front of a camera with just one instrument like a guitar, piano, MIDI controller, etc. and sing it. People can hear you singing without any pitch corrector or effects on your voice like there might be in the actual music you release. 

Ultimate Guitar is another app that I use a lot to post covers and originals. It’s an app with chord sheets and tabs for hundreds of thousands of songs, and you can post 60 second clips of you singing and/or playing music. It’s a super encouraging community and it’s an easy way to tease music and gain a following.

A great way to get people to hear your music locally or at the very least get your name heard locally is to play live. Try to book a small gig at a coffee shop and play on a Friday. Even playing in a school variety show can get people in your school acquainted with your music. Find places locally where you can play live and get your music heard. Have a little sign with your Spotify and YouTube addresses on it. Anything you can do to get people noticing your music is good. Signs, T-shirts, hats, stickers on a drum kit, etc. 

I hope this helps you get some listens on Spotify or any streaming service you release music on. Keep creating music because even if you use these tricks, you probably won’t blow up with your first song. It will probably take a while for you to build a solid fanbase, but if you keep at it, you’ll get there eventually. These are all things that I do myself to grow my fanbase. I use it to tease songs and gain a following. I’ve only been releasing videos for about six months, but I’ve sort of been able to see what works and what doesn’t for certain platforms and my channels specifically, and I hope you can too.

Here are my socials where you can find my music and covers!