As an independent artist, you’re probably always on the lookout for new tools to help you promote your music and connect with your fans.
Outside of Digital Streaming Platforms and traditional social media platforms (Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter), you may be looking for an alternative platform that could help you stand out from the crowd.
This is where TikTok could help you! It’s an essential platform for promoting your music, connecting with potential fans, and creating the soundtrack to the next viral sensation.
If you’d like to distribute your music to TikTok and global music streaming platforms, get in touch with one of our team on 0116 253 0203, or create a free account here.
Should I use Tiktok, what is it?
TikTok is an entertainment-based social media platform tailored for each user, based on the content they interact with and engage with the most. As it’s algorithmic, this means that no user’s ‘For You’ page will be the same, making it easier for users to discover new trends, music, and creators.
As an independent artist, you can harness this power and curate content that puts your music in front of new audiences, allowing you to tell your musical stories in a creative environment.
What is TikTok for Artists?
TikTok for Artists is a platform, much like Spotify for Artists or Apple Music for Artists, that gives artists and their teams the tools and insights into how their music is performing on the platform.
Not only this, but TikTok for Artists gives artists the tools needed to help them connect and engage with their audiences, drive success, and promote their music to worldwide audiences.
TikTok has stated that the platform is designed to help artists boost engagement from their fans and help optimise their promotional strategies.
Some of the features of TikTok for Artists include:
- Performance: You’ll get detailed insights on the number of views, posts, creator engagements per song, and the views, likes, comments, and shares on posts.
- Follower insights: These include the age, gender, and location of the followers.
- Support in using the platforms and resources to get the most out of TikTok for Artists.
Should I sign up for TikTok for Artists?
Ultimately, yes. TikTok for Artists has features that will help you grow and develop as an artist. Not only will your music be out in front of new listeners, but it gives you the perfect opportunity to connect with your listeners and broaden your reach.
Aside from growing your listeners , TikTok for Artists gives you access to tools that will help you determine how your content is performing, such as:
Tracking insights
TikTok for Artists will provide you with daily insights and follower insights. These will tell you how your music is performing and how listeners are engaging and using it in their own content.
Not only this, is your insights you will get detailed demographics on your audience. This information will allow you to adjust and optimise your strategy by taking into consideration your audience’s age, gender, locations, and languages. This will allow you to create an informed strategy to help curate content that would appeal to your audience.
Pre-release tools
Within the platform, you will have access to TikTok’s pre-release tool, which will allow you to add your pre-save links to your music and create an easy funnel for your listeners to follow when they save your music to either Spotify or Apple Music.
Utilising this tool is a fantastic opportunity to organically create hype around your track, particularly if you have visualisers that you can share along with a snippet of your track.
It’s worth noting that at present, artists will only be able to connect Apple Music and Spotify to TikTok for Artists.
How to join TikTok for Artists?
Head over to TikTok for Artists, click the ‘Get Started’ button. If you already have an account, you have the option to log in here. If you don’t have an account, you will be directed through the process and will need to select a role.
- Artists – This uses your artist account to gain access to your data.
- Label team member – This gives you access to your artists analytics with a media match account, or invite your label as an admin.
- Artist team member – here you can add your team members, once you have invited them, they should receive an email outlining how they can connect their profile.
Once you’ve created your account and input your details, it will then go to TikTok to verify that you are the artist (or representative). They will look into information, such as your Spotify account that’s linked to your profile, or at the music that is distributed to TikTok under your name.
After your profile has been approved, you will have access to TikTok for Artists, you can tab through the different sections (posts, songs, and followers) to view analytics of how each one is performing, you’ll also be able to find the pre-release campaigns and tools.
What makes TikTok different from existing platforms
TikTok as a platform, is different to how other platforms work; instead of content being presented chronologically, it’s algorithm-based. Meaning that each user will have a different page for you. Whereas on Instagram and Facebook, you will typically only see content as it’s posted. On TikTok, your older content could be presented to new users. In a sense, no content will go to waste, and it allows your content to have a longer life span than what it would on more traditional platforms.
Not only is this the longer your content is live, the more engagement it’s likely to receive in its lifetime. This will inadvertently help push your other content to audiences.
TikTok is also unique in the sense that it can make sounds and songs go viral at any time for any reason, if the song resonates with audiences. There are no end of Artists who have had their careers take off after having one song on the app go viral (think Alex Warren with Ordinary), or artists who have a career resurgence after their song was used in a viral video (think Kate Bush with Running up the Hill).
Distribute your music worldwide!
There are numerous benefits to using Titkok for Artists to promote your music, and the list is constantly growing. If you’d like to start distributing your music to TikTok, get in touch with the team on 0116 253 0203 or make an account here.