So, I came across a thread about the decreasing sales of albums and that right now the online sales are dominating on the market.
I started thinking what is the starting point for new artists right now? Can social media be used to popularize your music? Do you need to have a huge following to get noticed?
What do you guys think?

I feel that social media is deffinitely one tool that any artist should be using, but it is not the end all/be all solution. Of course having a large fan base is helpful but as a new artist it is likely you don't have one yet and you will need to build it up yourself.

There honestly is no one way to get noticed. The competition is fierce, especially online, so you need to make sure what you are creating and putting out there for potential fans is top notch. Then you need to make sure that your product is geting to the right kind of people who will want to listen. Make sure you know your intended audience and figure out how to get them interested in what you are doing. You have to get that initial play and hopefully after that get them coming back for more. Of course to do this you will want them to like/subscribe/follow you on the social media acounts you are using. If you can get them to do that you are off to a good start.

Once they are following what you are doing you have to keep them coming back for more on a regular basis. This means constantly interacting with your fans and creating more top quality product for them to consume. Always make sure you are putting out the best work that you can, and always be trying to improve what you do. If not there are other artists out there just waiting to snatch your fans away. It really is a dog eat dog industry that we are in.

OK... all that being said here are a few helpfull tips that I've found.

1. Don't just rely on one social media platform. Utilze as many as you feel comfortable with.

2. Try to keep a consistent image across all of the social media platforms so you dont confuse potential fans.

3. Cross promote your pages. Usually your fans will be members of multiple social media sites so make sure to get them following you on all your different accounts.

4. Collaborate with other artists who's fan base may like your music. This is a good way to gain new fans.

5. Find ways to get your fans actively promoting for you. This could be as simple as asking them to share a post or some kind of contest. Use your imagination.


FINALLY... I have one last tip and Ive saved this for last as it is more of a production note and I'm guilty of not utilizing it as much as I should.

Don't just create music. Create music videos to visually stimulate potential fans. Videos are the hottest and most effective tool on the internet right now. You are much more likely to get someones attention with a video than you are with just a post/link to your music.

Now go out and create, share, repeat. Good luck!

Networking is a very important tool. In the modern era, you network primarily through social media, or doing meet-ups. A lot of this is organized online nowadays, so without the power of the internet at your disposal, I can see where new voices would struggle to be heard. But it isn't just for musicians -- it's for any artist or entrepreneur. Social media and an online presence is definitely a key component for sure.

As far as sales, as long as there are sales, does it matter how they happen? And ANY exposure helps. If Joe in Boise has never heard of you, that is how he meets you.

I think Samuel brought up some worthwhile notes above. I must agree - in modern times, social media is a crucial part of music distribution and marketing. It is just so widespread, that choosing to avoid this would definitely make it harder to promote yourself.

I myself have personally found a lot of great music artists with the help of social media, so it definitely isn't a bad thing necessary. I'm interested to hear other's thoughts on this though

Can?? I'm 72 so I'm not making fun or age jokes. I'm in the SoCal area and do a lot of gigging, not a full time pro but still active musically. Most places won't even consider you for a gig without giving them all your social media contacts so they can check you out, especially the number of followers. They want to know you can bring in a crowd. And they want videos, lots of videos. Vids give them an idea of your stage presentation and how you sound live. Recordings are fake compared to live performances.

If you're not doing live gigs then sure, post stuff on Soundcloud or YouTube for a start along with oh I don't know 50 million others. Actually I think it's more than that, don't they have something like 200-300 million users? YouTube is almost a billion I think. Not sure but who's counting?

Therefore, I think the answers to these two questions are OF COURSE and YES, DEFINITELY.

Bob