5 Musician Branding Tips To Attract and Connect With Your Audience
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5 Musician Branding Tips To Attract and Connect With Your Audience
This month at the Mastermind for my Artist Sanctuary Monthly Membership for Musicians, I crafted a presentation detailing how to build a brand archetype and craft a message that resonates with and builds an audience of dedicated listeners and followers.
The goal for independent music is to not only make music that resonates, but carve a message that speaks to your audience. The way you talk about your music will either draw people in or you’ll hear crickets. Learning how to write copy that conveys your message is an art. Ever hired a copywriter? Now you know why the best ones make the big bucks.
1. Identifying your artist archetype
The key to branding as a musician is to first identify your brand archetype. Swiss Psychiatrist Carl Jung coined the term “Archetypes” in the context of personality. He said we all have a “collective unconscious” that channel experiences and emotions, resulting in typical patterns of behavior. He created the 12 “Jungian Archetypes”. All major brands live by them.
You have 1 Dominant Archetype and 2 Sub-Archetypes. All 3 Archetypes will give you:
- The keys to the underlying themes in your brand
- Will better inform the words you use to communicate
- Will better position you for your ideal fan
- Will guide you to making the right pricing, experiences, products, and merchandise
To find out more about the brand archetypes get access to my entire presentation- The Art of Storybranding + Archetype Alignment for Musicians that is laid out in a full 80 slide deck recorded on video for the full outline and links to get your archetype and more! Click here to learn more.
Use the COUPON: ASMSPECIAL. Once inside, visit the Content Hub for immediate access.
2. How to speak to your audience in a way that takes them somewhere
First off many musicians hope that the music speaks for itself. And yes your music has the power to totally sweep people off of their feet. However, the time has past that music sells itself (hint: it never really did). Today we still have to promote or “sell” our music to attract fans and nurture an existing audience.
In “Building a Story Branding” Donald Miller talks about the #1 mistake most marketers (musicians listen up you’re a marketer) that keeps them from connecting.
“The first mistake brands make is they fail to focus on aspects of their offer that will help people survive and thrive. All great stories are about survival—either physical, emotional, relational or spiritual. A story about anything else won’t work to captivate an audience. Nobody’s interested. This means if we position our offerings as anything but an aid in helping people survive, thrive, be accepted, find love, achieve an aspirational goal, or bond with a tribe that will defend them physically and socially, good luck selling anything to anybody.“
People want to be taken somewhere. “Without knowing it, every potential fan is asking us where we can take them.”
*Excerpts from “Building a Story Branding” by Donald Miller
Think of the hero’s journey your fans are on? Where are they? Where do they long to go? What’s in their way? Then they meet you, and you show them a new world.
Where is your music taking folks? Make a list.
- Are you taking them to feeling better about themselves?
- To hope?
- To freedom from their problems?
- To step into a world outside of the mundane day-to-day?
- To a fun weekend with friends?
- To more joy?
- To contemplation?
- To healing?
- To break free from something restricting them?
3. How to speak to your audience through story
Another mistake in marketing is to try to convince a potential listener to listen to your music rather than painting or spinning a story that draws them in. Story is the playbook for copywriting.
How do you increase your potential fans’ interest in your music/ brand? You borrow another play from the storyteller’s playbook; you start talking about the problems your fans face.
Identifying our potential fan/customer’s problems deepens their interest in the story you are telling. Every story is about somebody who is trying to solve a problem, so when we identify our customer’s problems, they recognize us as a brand that understands them. The “problem” is the “hook” of the story and if we don’t identify it the story we are telling will fall flat.
What is the story you are telling them?
Write out your own story. What challenges have you had in your life? How did you deal with it? What have you overcome? What are you overcoming?
Look for the themes. Look for the “hero’s journey”. Now write about it from the perspective of a “guide.” Remember your listener is the hero and you are the guide to take them somewhere – to a better tomorrow? etc…
4. How to bond with your followers and fans
“In one of the most powerful marketing campaigns in history Apple Computers exploded in popularity and became a household name.”
“After near collapse, Apple didn’t find their footing until Steve Jobs understood that people felt intimidated (internal problem) by computers and wanted a simpler interface with technology. In one of the most POWERFUL campaigns in history, Apple showed a simple, hip, fun character who just wanted to take photos, listen to music and write books next to a not-so-hip tech nerd who wanted to talk about the inner workings of his operating system. The campaign positioned Apple Computers as the company to go to if you wanted to enjoy life and express yourself but felt intimidated by all the tech talk.
“The only reason our customers buy from us is because the external problem we solve is frustrating them. If we can identify that frustration and put it into words, and offer to resolve it along with the original external problem, something special happens. We bond with our customers because we’ve positioned ourselves more deeply in their narrative.”
*Excerpts from “Building a Story Branding” by Donald Miller
So how does that relate to you as a musician?
Start by answering these questions. You can use yourself as a profile of your follower as it is common that you will share similar challenges:
- What is the Fan (Hero’s) Villain*:
- What is the External need?
- What is the Internal need?
- What is Philosophical need is fulfilled?
*Example: Tesla Motors
- Villain: Gas guzzling, inferior technology
- External: I need a car.
- Internal: I want to be an early adopter of new technology.
- Philosophical: My car of choice should save the environment.
*Excerpts from “Building a Story Branding” by Donald Miller
To grow your followers you should position your music as the resolution to an external, internal, philosophical problem and frame the action a customer must take to create closure in their story.
5. The power of an artist mission statement
Did you know that your artist mission statement sets the tone and stage for your artist brand? It’s a great way to gain clarity on the reason why you do music, help to solidify your artist brand voice and hit reset for your next project. Gaining clarity here will help you to set the tone for your artist identity making it easier for an audience to self-select as a fan and turn fans into true fans.
Try this to get started writing your mission.
My mission as an artist is to: _________________ (fill in the blank.)
My music is about: _________________ (fill in the blank.)
Music helped me to: _________________ (fill in the blank.)
I hope to help others xxx with my music and community: _________________ (fill in the blank.)
I want other people to know: _________________ (fill in the blank.)
After you’ve answered the question, formulate it into a well written paragraph. Use your mission statement to inform all of the copy on your website, and social content as a baseline for the main points.
JOIN ME EVERY WEDNESDAY AT 12 pm Eastern for my Weekly Livestream: Join me on YouTube (and Instagram, Facebook)– where I discuss the Blog of the Week followed by a short Q&A where you can ask me questions.
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About Cari Cole
Cari Cole is the CEO / Founder of caricole.com and CCVM: Label Without Walls. She is a Holistic Vocal Coach, Artist Development Expert, A&R Director, and Songwriter based in New York City helping artists for the past 38 years. She is a mentor for Women in Music and The Association of Independent Music Publishers.
Her latest venture, CCVM a label services company, provides artists with a seamless path from creation to completion. After 30+ years of observing the overwhelm and challenges that artists face, Cari pulled together the best top creative professionals and designed a new approach to supporting our artists.
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