How to Gain a Following on YouTube as an Artist: The Free Way to Promote on YouTube
With 2.2 Billion users, YouTube is the largest streaming platform by far and can help jumpstart your career by getting you the most exposure, and eventually a decent paycheck. Building a following for free on YouTube takes a lot of work and time on your part. While the YouTube algorithm helps the discovery of new creators and videos, you have to put in the initial work of making your videos discoverable to the algorithm. This can take time but if you take the steps listed below, and your content is worth watching, then you are guaranteed to pick up steam.
Build Out Channel
The first step is to apply to have an Official Artist Channel, or connect the channel you already have to an OAC. This gives you access to more personalization (choosing the name of your YouTube link) and gives you the music note by your name, so when you comment people will know that you’re an artist. It also allows YouTube to categorize your channel better.
Set up a bio, channel keywords, channel trailer, channel layout, contact information, banner links, and banner and profile photos, so that your channel looks complete and “professional”.
When releasing a video, make sure that the link to streaming sites are in the description so that people can listen to it without the visual. This also shows that you care about your craft enough to have at least invested in distribution.
Make sure to download YouTube Studio and connect your account so that you can view analytics (which video people like and what part of the video they don’t like) as well as respond to comments when notified.
This gives the impression that you aren’t lazy and showcases your personal style, as well as makes you more accessible in case someone wants to work with you.
If your goal is to get signed to a label, in this era, you have to do the grunt work to show that you’re dedicated (as well as prove you can get a following, but if you can get a following, you don’t need a label). So devoting time dedicated to your visuals is a must whether you want to be independent or not.
Prioritize Visuals
YouTube is a visual platform so it’s ideal to have “videos” with visuals when uploading music.
This includes lyric videos, music visualizers, and music videos.
You can come up with a marketing strategy leading up to your music video using lyric videos and visualizers, so that by the time the video drops, your consistent listeners will have learned the words to the song.
This also serves to keep your song in a marketing cycle so that you can also introduce it to new listeners.
The proper way to title a video with music is “Artist Name - Song Name (Type of Video)”. For example, “kevkov - Moving On (Official Visualizer)”.
Don’t forget about YouTube shorts. These allow you to post a tiktok, snapchat style video with music as your backdrop. You can do shorts letting people know you have a video coming, and if you have two channels, you can make a short of the music video that’s already released.
Make the Algorithms Work for You
How Franklin Stone Recorded a Music Video for Free!
When setting up a video, make sure you utilize the title, description, hashtags, tags, and category to display the most accurate and descriptive information possible. Also pick the most eye catching screenshot of your video to use as the thumbnail so that it makes people curious about the video.
Proper titles, descriptions, hashtags, category and tags help to optimize videos for YouTube’s (and Google’s) search engine, allowing your video to appear when someone searches for it.
Also, algorithms are all about engagement and you can increase it by encouraging listeners to comment and replying to their comments. Make sure that you reply in a way that encourages the conversation to keep going.
Another way of increasing engagement is by using playlists. Use playlists to rope other channels and artists into yours so that you can use their fanbase and encourage them to do the same. Make sure to describe the playlist so that it helps with search and gives potential listeners an idea what the playlists are about.
The last important factor to YouTube algorithms is consistency, so it is better to post frequently so that the algorithm and your fans know that they can rely on you to give them content. As an artist, creating songs for music videos every week is impractical, so the best way to get around that is to post weekly (or daily) vlogs and behind the scene videos, as well as the strategy mentioned in the Prioritize Visuals section.
Enlist the Help of Curators
Just like Spotify, YouTube has an audience for playlists and curators that run and modify them.
You can use this to your advantage by searching playlists that relate to your video/song and emailing the curators, pitching your video to be placed. You can find users’ emails in the about section on their channel.
You can filter playlists by date modified and view count to make sure that the curator is actually changing up the playlist and that the playlist gets engagement.
Filter playlist search to see which playlists are popular and are being modified.
Get Active
Generally, people aren’t on YouTube just to listen to music, they watch videos, for many different types of videos.
One trick that I’ve learned is to comment on videos of things related to your music in any capacity, and subtly promote your own videos and music with comments about whatever is the subject of the video you’re watching.
For example, if you use a certain type of mic, go to a video that’s reviewing that mic and comment, “I used this mic to record this song (link your video), and I found that while it’s capable, I feel that it lacks in these areas (insert what could be better).”
Contribute something to the conversation worth discussing and people will check your video out, if only to see what you’re talking about.
Don’t stop at subjects related to your music though, comment on every type of video you watch, because maybe there is someone in the comments that is looking for new artists in which to listen. If you have an OAC, then they will know you make and release music.
Post about your Video/Music on Social Media
If you’re just starting out and don’t have a social media presence, then this won’t be much help at first, but if you can get one person to watch your video, then eventually you can get a million (maybe an exaggeration) to watch your video.
You have to be creative how you interact with people on social media, just as creative as making an enticing video.
Try running a contest with prizes that have value to the people you’re interacting with, or create a Tik Tok with an interesting caption.
Adapt to the Trends
An easy way to hack into the algorithm is by doing covers and remixes of songs that are already popular. When people search that song, your video will appear (if you’ve labeled it and tagged it right.
Link your original music (videos) using cards and end screens in the cover or remix so that if someone is interested after hearing your version of the song, they won’t have to do much digging to find your original music.
Justin Bieber got his start from covering songs on YouTube.
Give More Than Just Music
Do promotional campaigns outside of just asking people to watch the video. For example, record a podcast (with video) about the creation of the video or an educational video on how to make a music video, or how you made your video.
Then link your music video in the cards and end screens so that whoever is curious will check the video out.
In fact, if you record enough informational videos about your process or educational videos about what you’ve learned, you can even build a career as a YouTuber, occupying a different category.
I would advise that you create a different channel for these types of videos so that the algorithm isn’t confused and limit your exposure. Then you can cross promote using playlists on each channel, as well as cards and end screens.
