I hope your summer festival plans are in full swing! It's so exciting to see live music coming back to life.
I also hope this pandemic provided some much-needed time to rest and rejuvenate. We've all been forced to look at our industry in a new way — a data-driven way — that will ultimately help us grow and scale our music to bigger audiences.
Last time, we talked about setting the right goals for your band. And now, we're going to break down what kind of data can help support those goals and how to understand the insights behind the metrics...
If you're trying to get your music out to the online world, data is your best friend. Whether you're measuring organic or paid efforts, the metrics will help you determine what works and what doesn't.
Data tells a story, and to uncover what that story is, it's important to know how to look beneath the numbers and see what the metrics are saying about your content, strategy, and audience.
It's also worth noting that what's valuable for you may not be as valuable to another band. Your audience, content, and strategy are different, so the metrics you need to understand your story may not say as much about another band.
If you're not sure where to start (you're not alone), let's start with the basics:
Instead of measuring followers, wouldn't you rather know how many of those followers are actually listening to your music?
Instead of measuring impressions, wouldn't you rather know how many of those impressions turn into actual engagements with your content?
Look at metrics like engagement rate and click-through rate over followers and impressions. These will tell you what percentage of your followers are taking action and investing in your music, either by liking, commenting, or sharing (indicating that they want more or they want to connect with you), or by clicking on the links in your post (indicating that they want to hear your music, watch your video, buy your merch, etc.).
From this data, you'll be able to start deducing which content is getting the most engagement, so you can implement more of those tactics in your strategy. You'll also be able to determine which links are most inviting, so you can better understand what your audience wants.
Some other metrics to consider:
If you're running paid ads, another metric to track is cost per click. This will help you understand if your ads are converting. If your CPC is too high, it may mean that you need to adjust something bout your ad — the creative, the copy, or the song.
If you're looking to understand what kind of content you should be putting out, take a look at your audience insights. Are your fans most male, female, or an even combination of both? How old are they? What are their interests? This information will tell you more about what type of content your fans want to see, what platforms you should be on (I see you, TikTok), and how you can connect with them.
This is a lot to take in, and it's easy to look at a bunch of numbers as just that — a bunch of numbers. But remember, the data you collect represents human beings. It's valuable insight into their behavior, their likes and dislikes, and their investment in your brand. When you feel overwhelmed, take a step back and ask yourself:
What's the bigger picture here? What can I learn about my listeners, and how can I respond to that? Am I willing to? How does this impact my bottom line as an artist? How does this help me reach my goals?
Dig into the data and find the story. I promise it's there.
To your success,
Naø 🖤
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