IOTM Blog
Posted: Oct 8, 2025
Category: Marketing
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**Guest post written by Jason Lekberg, a musician with 20+ years of experience in the industry and creator of Hard Target.
"As indie artists, marketing can feel overwhelming. There is no shortage of companies promoting “shortcuts”, including the social networks themselves. Whether or not you’ve ever executed a campaign before, you are likely skeptical of them all. And rightly so. Between AI, bots and trolls, the internet is more toxic and crowded than ever. There are few better examples of a necessary evil. How do you focus? How do you know which path is right, and which is essentially setting your money on fire."
View Full ArticlePosted: Jan 22, 2025
Category: The Musician Business
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**Summarized from a guest post by One Submit, music promotion for independent artists.
"Are you curious about your music's performance on Spotify? Whether you're a new artist just starting out or an experienced artist looking to monitor streaming stats and grow your online presence, Spotify provides features to help you explore your music's performance and presence across different platforms."
Posted: Dec 3, 2024
Category: The Musician Business
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**Guest post written by Xander Rushie of School of Sync.
"1. The Best Song Wins 2. Don’t write in the first person 3. Don’t Bore Us - Get To The Chorus! 4. Treat Each Section As a New Scene 5. Don’t Be Explicit..."
Posted: Nov 27, 2024
Category: The Musician Business
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**Guest post by Kristen Ford, LA based indie rock act with a passion for music business.
"Happy Thanksgiving! A time for awkward chats around the dinner table, carbs with a side of carbs, sweater weather, and Black Friday Sales! This is that unique time of the year when all the retailers, life coaches, and memberships flex their marketing muscles and slash prices. For annual memberships, this can be the BEST time to purchase."
View Full ArticlePosted: Sep 10, 2024
Category: Marketing
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**Guest post written by Modern Musician.
"If you're serious about making a full-time career out of your passion for music, you've likely invested countless hours, energy, and money into honing your craft. But the big question remains—how do you build a loyal fanbase, make a sustainable income, and keep your artistic identity intact in today’s saturated industry? The good news is, it’s possible to achieve all this without relying on luck or record labels."
View Full ArticlePosted: Jul 9, 2024
Category: Marketing
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**Guest post written by Mariami of Sungate Records.
"In an age where the internet and international communities are on display 24/7, independent artists have an enormous opportunity to invite a larger audience into their world. By sharing aspects of their culture—whether it's through food, clothing, lyrics, or images of their hometowns—artists can create a deeply personal and engaging narrative...Here are five ways our Sungate Records artists are tapping into their cultural individuality to build unique platforms online..."
View Full ArticlePosted: Sep 12, 2023
Category: Marketing
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**Guest post originally featured in CS Discos' e-book Cover Your Way Up, a guide to leveraging music covers on YouTube.
"Understanding YouTube’s algorithm can be your ticket to shining amidst so many creators. With millions of videos uploaded daily, the algorithm’s effort is directed towards tailoring content to viewers’ preferences, ensuring they get a satisfying experience. As artists, understanding this system can amplify your online presence."
View Full ArticlePosted: Sep 6, 2023
Category: Fans
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**Guest post written by Sarah Beth Perry of With the Band, originally featured in Soundfly's Flypaper blog.
"All artists want to get their music into the hands of more fans, but the real challenge lies in how to properly target potential fans with your marketing campaigns. With the rise of social media, fans are spread out all over the world, and they want to feel seen and recognized by their favorite artists. I want to help you better understand your fanbase by analyzing the demographics of fans who you interact with both online and in person...We use the following methods to help create marketing campaigns for major artists like the Jonas Brothers and Kacey Musgraves." View Full Article
Posted: Aug 23, 2023
Category: Fans
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**Guest post written by Jubran Haddad, originally posted on Chartmetric's blog.
"Discover the key stages, real-life examples, and essential tips for artists to navigate the fan journey from discovery to advocacy." View Full Article
Posted: Aug 15, 2023
Category: Merch
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**Guest post written by Janelle Borg, originally posted on AmplifyYou's blog.
"For gigging artists like you, music merch should be an integral part of your brand-building strategy. It’s not only a great way to project your musical identity through a tangible item, but also serves as a much-needed financial lifeline. Best of all, music fans love merch, and are ready to spend money on quality pieces they truly like. If you need convincing, here are 5 reasons why you should start selling merch now rather than later." View Full Article
Posted: Aug 8, 2023
Category: Live Performance
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**Guest post written by Frankie Barclay of Sugar Studios, originally featured in Soundfly's Flypaper blog.
"Choosing the ideal music venue can be tricky. You need the right acoustics, size, location, and more to really get things right. Whether you’re an aspiring artist planning a gig or a devoted music lover seeking the ultimate sonic escape, finding the perfect venue is crucial...Here’s what you need to consider and why. Are you ready? Let’s go!" View Full Article
Posted: Aug 2, 2023
Category: Live Performance
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**Guest post written by Katherine Dvoskin, Co-Founder & Piano Teacher for K&M Music School, San Diego.
"In the enthralling journey of morphing from a classroom maestro to a virtuoso on the concert stage, there's a symphony of skills that every musician ought to master. These skills are the crescendo to your performance, and like the meticulous tuning of an instrument, they prime you for the ebbs and flows of a life spent on the road. In this post, we will explore three key skills that music education helps cultivate: stage presence, repertoire selection, and audience engagement." View Full Article
Posted: Jun 20, 2023
Category: Promotion
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**Guest post written by Cyber PR, originally featured on the Cyber PR Blog.
"Capturing your fans’ email is only the first step of a successful email marketing campaign. Now that you’ve got them, and they’re eager to hear from you, how do you make sure you land in their inbox (and not the dreaded “promo” folder ?) and get them to actually open it? We explore the 9 hacks we have found to be the most useful in getting your subscribers to open your emails." View Full Article
Posted: Apr 19, 2023
Category: The Musician Business
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**Guest post by Musician Indie Coalition, Business-Based Artist Development Experts who help DIY Musicians develop, launch and scale their music careers.
"When it comes to pursuing a music career, we’ve all been brought up to believe that becoming a professional artist or band is just one lucky encounter or chance meeting away – that if an artist focuses all their efforts and resources on creating great music, they just need to get it in front of the right industry professional and they’ll get signed to a record label. From there, a manager or label rep will take care of the business side of their career and the artist can go on doing what they know and love: writing and recording music, playing shows and interacting with fans. This is what we call ‘The Getting Discovered Mindset’ and it is all too pervasive among aspiring artists...I’m here to tell you this is NOT the correct way to approach your music career."
Posted: Mar 28, 2023
Category: The Musician Business
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**Guest post written by Just Rijna, a guitar player based in Rotterdam, the Netherlands. In addition to teaching private students, he is also the founder of a guitar educational site, www.stringkick.com.
If you make original music, you know how difficult this question is to answer ["So what kind of music do you make?"]. You’re right in the middle of the project and familiar with all the influences, contrasting genres, and subtleties that have made their way into the music. How do you summarize all that in a couple of sentences? What’s more, as musicians we have trained ears that simply hear different things than the average listener. This makes it even more tricky to communicate what your music is about. So in this article, I’ll share a few tips that will help you nail down your pitch.
View Full ArticlePosted: Aug 16, 2022
Category: Promotion
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**Guest post by One Submit, the ultimate music submission platform.
"How to avoid this kind of fraud? 1. Use Chartmetric and SpotOnTrack 2. Curators have multiple playlists that all roughly have the same number of followers 3. Curators have large playlists but hardly any followers for themselves 4. The curators' playlist followers have very often no profile pictures and similar names 5. Curators sell playlist placements for money 6. Playlists do not appear on the ‘Discovered On’ section on the profile of an artist..."
Posted: May 17, 2022
Category: Marketing
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**Guest post written by Feature.fm, an all-in-one music marketing solution to get more fans, boost streams, and grow your sales.
"Smart links are shareable URLs that automatically route fans to your music on their preferred streaming service. You can learn more about your fans by using a smart link because it tracks engagement analytics and it allows you to customize the landing page with your own artwork or music video."
View Full ArticlePosted: May 10, 2022
Category: Marketing
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**Guest post written by Cyber PR, originally featured on the Cyber PR Blog.
"As modern technology continues to advance, more and more artists and fans become reliant on the digital realm. Social media becomes the central ground. This triggers a domino effect where one artist starts a trend and the rest follow behind as they fall into the oversaturated crowd. Due to this over-saturation, it’s nearly impossible to generate enough attention to be big. For those who wish to follow a different path, there are other ways to stand out." View Full Article
Posted: Jan 3, 2022
Category: Sponsorship
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**Guest post written by Yona Marie, originally featured in her blog.
"All types of companies sponsor musicians and creators. The trick is, not many of the companies will showcase that fact and will either reach out to you directly, or you will have to reach out to them directly. The best types of companies to sponsor your music are the companies that you genuinely enjoy and feel a connection to, and companies that are large enough to have a big budget for risks like sponsorships."
View Full ArticlePosted: Dec 20, 2021
Category: Promotion
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**Guest post written by Jessica Fender, a copywriter and blogger at Edubirdie with a background in marketing and sales. She enjoys sharing her experience with like-minded professionals who aim to provide customers with high-quality services. Previously featured on MusicGoat.com.
"If you want to get more people to attend your music event, keep reading. I'll show you how to generate more pre-show hype using an outstanding social media marketing strategy. Here are a few tips you can use to boost your event marketing efforts."
Posted: Sep 27, 2021
Category: The Musician Business
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**Guest post by Electronic Musician.
"Can you describe your music in 6 words or less? It's the first question that anyone asks you about your music: What kind of music do you make? Your answer to that question is the most important thing. It’s even more important than your story. So don’t wing it. You should prepare it ahead of time and have it at the tip of your tongue when interviewers, the media, and people you meet ask. Don't try to make a perfect and complete description: the goal is to get them curious enough to ask to want to hear your music. That's how you'll know if you've created the right description. Here are some simple ideas to help you describe your music effectively..."
View Full ArticlePosted: Aug 23, 2021
Category: Live Performance
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**Guest post written by Kristen Ford, Nashville based indie rock act with a passion for music business and a book on DIY touring in the works.
The East Room is one of 13 Nashville venues where either "Proof of a Vaccine or Negative Covid Test" is required for entry...All of New York City has this policy, as well as all NIVA (National Independent Venue Association) venues...Music festivals such as Folk Alliance and Kerrville already have similar policies for future events. This means regardless of your local rules and regulations, or your personal views on vaccinations, touring artists need to be ready for this policy change.
View Full ArticlePosted: Jun 1, 2021
Category: Merch
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**Guest post written by Desi Thorne for Bandzoogle.
"To get started, think about the different kinds of band merch you might offer. Items that can be handmade may be difficult to reproduce, but can also be offered for a significantly higher price point. Offering a good balance of custom merch and scalable merch allows you to offer unique merch for all fans at different levels of dedication."
View Full ArticlePosted: May 17, 2021
Category: Marketing
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**Guest post by Christopher Carvalho from Unlock Your Sound.
"Think of a shop. The top of the funnel is the people walking past the shop. The first layer down is the people window browsing. The next layer down is the people who enter. And then the next and final layer is the people who purchase something."
View Full ArticlePosted: Jul 20, 2020
Category: Social Media
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**Guest post written by Eddie of The Entrepreneur Drummer, an online blog/resource dedicated to teaching business education to session musicians.
"Facebook now makes the majority of its revenue through selling advertising however it's a dangerous game to get into, especially if you're a novice. A whole array of deep-diving settings and unknown terminology means that it's very easy for you to lose a LOT of money very quickly. Don't fret though, I've found a great way to find new clients on Facebook for absolutely free, all it costs you is your time."
View Full Article