How To Create A Personalised Music Release Plan 2024 (Full Breakdown)

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Releasing music today has never been so easy…

Or at least that’s what it looks like on paper.

There are lots of artists today showing us that all you need is a great song and a bunch of great content, and you can get millions of streams.

And for some artists, this is true—that’s all they need.

The fact that that’s possible nowadays is amazing, and if you’re someone who can find success by doing that, awesome.

But this doesn’t work for everyone.

The reality is many artists don’t see success this way.

It’s not uncommon to see great artists posting endlessly and getting next to nothing back for their efforts.

And there are different reasons for this.

It could be that their content isn’t objectively great yet.

But it also could be their stuff just isn’t getting pushed out.

And this is a thing—relying on algorithms is not safe.

It is not always a case of ‘just make better stuff’.

And even when that is the case… is it the best path for all artists? Is that the most effective way of getting their music heard?

No.

Although content is powerful, and I think it should be a big part of your release plans…

It’s not going to work the same for everyone.

Some artists can and do benefit from a different approach.

One that includes content but also factors in their strengths and circumstances and advantages and disadvantages.

And so today I’d like to take you through a 5-step process to create your own solid release plan.

Instead of me telling you what you should do, I’d like to show you how to tell yourself what to do.

This is a framework designed for flexibility.

It allows you to create a plan based on your situation and preferences, while ‘keeping you in the lines’ with a solid structure.

I’ve taken a bunch of artists through this myself—or something very close to this—and it’s helped them get great realistic and lasting results.

And I say realistic because how ‘big’ your results are depends on a whole bunch of stuff.

If you’ve never released anything before and you have no fan base, you’ll probably end up with different results than an artist who’s released a ton of stuff and has a big fan base, right?

And although there have been cases where this has helped artists hit hundreds of thousands of streams and grow their fan base by thousands… even with debut releases…

You’ve got to start where you are, be patient, and manage expectations.

It’s not always going to go that way for you right away, but that doesn’t automatically mean you’re doing something wrong.

You’re playing the long game, right?

So, here’s a glimpse at the five steps we’ll be going through to help you create a powerful and personalised release plan—we start broad and get more specific as we go:

• Step 1 is defining the your ‘release markers’—when your releases will come out over an extended period.

• Step 2 is defining the main promotion periods for those releases.

• Step 3 is defining the marketing channels you’ll use to promote your release.

• Step 4 is setting specific dates and tasks you’ll need to do to promote your release.

• And step 5 is diving into those specific tasks in more detail.

If this doesn’t make total sense to you right now, don’t worry, it will.

So a few notes before we dive in:

#1:

First, even though today I want to show you the process of putting your own plan together, to help you properly understand how this works I’ll be taking you through an example plan using this process.

It’s quite a full plan—it’s not something you have to copy, and it may not be necessary or possible for you to do everything I’ll mention.

You might want to drastically simplify it and that’s fine.

But this example plan is modelled off real release plans I’ve helped artists create.

So if you have no idea where to start with creating a release plan and just posting to social media consistently isn’t really working for you, you could follow this and then tweak it to better suit your situation.

#2:

Ok second note: To make this widely applicable, the plan I’ll take you through is built with Spotify in mind.

Although 99% of it could apply no matter where you’re releasing your music, the way it’s laid out is designed to leverage the power of the Spotify algorithm.

All that means is—once your release is out:

• We try to get a whole lot of quality listener engagement in a condensed time
• If we get enough, it will ‘wake up’ Spotify—basically we’ll get Spotify’s attention
• And then hopefully it starts pushing your music out across the platform through various playlists

So everything we do will be prepping you to make a splash on Spotify in the early stages of your release.

If you’re not using Spotify or you don’t care about ‘waking up the algorithm’, that’s fine.

This plan could be pretty much exactly the same… just maybe with a bit less pressure to achieve a certain result in a shorter time frame.

#3:

Ok and final note before we jump in:

We’re going to use this release plan builder template I’ve made to show you visually how putting a plan together can work.

If you like, you could build a template like this for yourself, or just write out the steps in your notes.

Or if you read this and you like the way this template is laid out, I have this available (click here). It also comes with a simple content planner template as well.

Ok, let’s get into it.

Step #1: The Big Picture (Release Markers)

In step #1, we’re looking at the big picture.

Although nothing is mandatory, I think it’s a really good idea to plan out multiple releases in advance—ideally over 6 months or maybe a year.

As I’m sure you know, being an artist is a lot of work.

Doing this can keep you on track, help you build momentum, and keep your head clear.

So in this first step, all you have to do is decide on:

• How many releases you’re going to put out over the next 6-12 months
• And when each of those releases will come out over that time period.

You can see on this release plan builder I’ve got this set by default to having a release come out every month for at least 6 months—and in this plan they would be singles.

How often you release is totally up to you.

Roughly one new song a month is common for high performing artists.

This seems to be good for keeping fans engaged and the algorithmic benefits.

But it’s ambitious.

And that might not be right or possible for you.

You might like to release a new song every 6, 8, or 12 weeks—or maybe less frequently.

Or maybe you want to do the song a week thing if you’re good at smashing out tunes like that.

If you’re releasing super frequently, your plan will probably be a lot more simplified.

You won’t have time to make a huge deal of every release, and you don’t necessarily have to because you’re putting less pressure on any one song.

If you’re releasing less often, you’ll want to put more emphasis on each release.

So, your plan will probably be fuller.

What’s ideal is you’re consistently promoting your music.

So as a rough guide:

More frequent releases = Less promo of each song

Less frequent releases = More promo of each song

You can decide what to do based on what you’re good at and what you’re willing and able to do.

But for this example plan, we’re going with a new release every 4 weeks, which is ambitious but can be really effective.

What if you’re releasing an EP or album?

If you’d prefer to release EPs or albums, you can do one of two things:

• You can just release them as EPs or albums—and not play into Spotify’s game, which is totally fair.
• Or you can split them up into single song releases, then bring them together at the end.

You’ve probably heard of waterfall releases at this point.

In case you haven’t, here’s how a waterfall release would work with a 4-song EP:

• You release song #1 from the EP
• Then, say a month later, you release song #2 from the EP and attach song #1 to that release
• Then you release song #3 and attach songs 1 and 2 to that release
• Then you release song #4 and attach songs 1, 2, and 3 to that release—making it a full EP.

It looks a bit messy on Spotify but it’s beneficial to do this as it can get you more attention on each song.

Because every time you release a new song and attach an older song to that release, that older song gets more exposure, right?

And you could do this for an entire album if you wanted—you could release one song at a time and then bring it all together under one release.

You don’t have to do it like this though.

What I see heaps with the bands I love is:

• They release a handful of singles from an upcoming album
• Then release the rest of the album all at once and attach those singles to it.

It’s still the waterfall strategy (technically), but they’re not doing every single song.

If you want to release an album and you’re not sure what to do, I would look at what’s typical in your genre.

I’m talking about metal here where albums are super common.

But if you’re an electronic music producer or a pop artist, you might prioritise singles and EPs.

If you want to release an EP or album all at once:

That’s fine.

You don’t have to play the Spotify algorithm game if you don’t want.

What I would do in this situation is treat the promotion side of things like you’re releasing singles.

So even though you’ve released an entire 10-song album at once, you could promote each song from that album for a period of time (like it’s a single).

This could look like promoting song #1 from the album for a month, then song #2 for a month and so on…

Or it could be that you cycle between all the songs on the album more frequently, for example:

• Put out a few videos for song #1
• Then a few for song #2, etc. etc.
• Then once you’ve been through all 10 songs, go back to promoting song #1 for a few videos and start the cycle again.

There really are no rules here.

As long as you’re always promoting music and it’s not just the exact same thing for like 2 years straight, you’re good.

Of course, you’ll want to pay attention to how your audience responds and adjust accordingly, but you have options here.

Anyway, to bring it back and wrap up step #1, again you just want to define:

• How many releases you’re going to put out over the next 6-12 months
• And when each of those releases will come out over that time period.

And that’s it for this step—we’re keeping it big picture for now.

So let’s move on to step 2, which is…

Step #2: Defining the main promotional period for each release

In this next step we’re figuring out:

• How long you’ll promote each release for
• And how much pre vs post release promotion you’ll do for each

So how long you promote each release will depend on how frequently you’re releasing.

If you’re releasing once every 12 weeks, you’ll be promoting for a lot longer than if you’re releasing every 2 weeks.

But let’s get a little more specific.

First, when I say we’re defining the main promotion period for each release, I’m talking about the initial promo around that release.

You may end up promoting a release for much longer than the main period you’ve defined.

If a song is doing really well, why not just keep promoting it?

There’s no rule that says you can’t, and it’s usually what high performing artists will do if they see a song is doing well.

But I think it helps to define a main promo period as a baseline.

This is good for your head, for structure, and for planning.

So first you’ll want to look at how often you’re releasing, and then you’ll want to strategically fill in that space with promotion.

On the release plan builder here, I’ve got a new release set to come out every month.

And then I’ve got the main promotion period set to start one week before the release comes out and continue on for three weeks after the release is out.

So this main promo period would lead me up to one week before the next release comes out, at which point I would start promoting that next release.

And this leads us into the next point:

How much pre vs post promotion for each song?

This is my opinion based on the artists I’ve worked with, and the artists whose releases and promo strategies I’ve studied:

Generally speaking—

• The bigger and more dedicated your fan base, the more pre-release promo is worth it
• And the smaller your fan base, the less it’s worth it.

This is not a hard and fast rule at all, and I’ve seen the reverse work well in some cases.

But if you need a general guide, I would think about it like this.

Here’s my reasoning for this, and it’s only based on what I’ve seen, so take it with a grain of salt:

When you’ve got a bigger fan base, you’re more likely to reap the benefits of pre-release promo.

• You’ll be much more likely to actually create buzz around your release before it’s out, because people already care about you.
• Your fans will get excited about your upcoming release and actually stick around until it’s out, ideally rushing on day one to listen.
• And the energy you put into things like getting pre-saves is more worth it, because you can get enough that they’ll really help give you that push on Spotify.

When you’ve got a smaller fan base (or no fan base), you’re more likely to waste your energy on pre-release promo.

• Even if you do manage to generate some buzz, it’s less likely everyone will wait around until the release is out, because they don’t care about you as much (yet).
• So even though some people might stick around and rush to listen on day one, you’re likely to lose some of that initial interest… whether due to the algorithm not showing those same people your posts, or due to them just not being that committed to you.
• And putting energy into things like pre-saves often won’t be worth it, because you can’t get enough for them to really do much.

Basically, you want to be careful about how you use your energy here.

If you have no fan base, you’re not likely going to get the same results from the same efforts as an artist who has a big fan base.

So if you’re not sure:

Bigger fan base = More pre-release promo is probably ok.

Smaller fan base = Less pre-release promo is probably better.

If you have no fan base at all or a really small one, I would recommend you just start promoting publicly once the release is out.

That way you at least know that anytime someone discovers your release through your promotion, they’ll be able to hear it immediately, and you’re less likely to ‘lose’ that potential fan.

Regardless of how big your fan base is though, I would definitely prioritise post-release promo.

This is almost definitely going to be where most of the attention comes from.

So in most cases you’ll want your promotion to be heavily skewed towards post-release.

And you’ll want that main post-release promo to last for a good chunk of time.

Unless you’re releasing really frequently, you don’t want to release a song, post about it for a week, then stop.

That severely limits the potential attention it could get.

If an artist is releasing roughly once a month, it’s much more common to see them pushing each song for at least that whole month.

And often they’ll continue to push it well after that.

They might start to taper off the promotion as their next release comes into the spotlight…

But if the first song is doing well, they’ll continue to sprinkle in promotion for that while also pushing the newest release.

Here’s a visual representation of what it could look like:

This is, of course, not set in stone.

Again, there are no rules here.

But you worked too hard on these songs to talk about them for just a moment and then disappear.

Ok, so to recap this step, you want to define:

• How long you’ll promote each release for
• And how much pre vs post release promotion you’ll do for each

I hope what we’ve talked about here will give you some more direction on what could work for you.

But remember: This is flexible, not a rigid rule.

You may want to adjust your main promotional period for each release as your fan base grows.

Maybe over time doing more pre-release promo makes more sense.

And you also may want to go off plan a little depending on how different releases are doing.

If a release is getting a ton of attention, I would not stop promoting it—because why would you?

So get something solid down that makes sense for where you’re at, but also stay flexible.

Ok, let’s move on.

Step #3: Marketing channels.

Step 3 is where you’ll define the marketing “channels” you’ll be using to promote your releases.

You’ve already figured out when you’ll release things and the periods you’ll promote each release for…

Now it’s about deciding the ways in which you’ll promote them.

This is where we really start to move away from the “just post lots of content” thing and start putting something more personalised together.

It’s super common nowadays to hear that everything but content is a waste of time, only taking you away from what really matters (more content).

And if your content is amazing and it’s actually driving great results for you… maybe you shouldn’t put time or energy into other stuff.

But as we’ve talked about, this is not always the case.

And it’s not even often the case.

If you’re one of those artists who—despite your best efforts— just cannot get any traction on social media with ‘organic’ content…

That’s where this step comes in.

I’ve seen plenty of cases where artists stop relying just on content, introduce other ‘channels’ of promotion, and completely turn a release around.

You do have options.

You are not doomed if the organic social media game is not your strong suit.

Ok, so on this release plan builder template you can see I’ve got some potential marketing channels you can use.

In the “Using” section I’ve got some things I recommend more often.

The things in the “Maybe” and “Not Using” sections may be more suitable for you and that’s fine…

But I’m going to focus on the “Using” ones today, because that’s what I typically recommend you consider.

So now I’ll go through what each of these “Using” ones are, then I’ll talk about choosing the right ones for you.

Social Media Content

The first thing is social media content.

I do recommend you include this as a major part of your release plan if you can.

Because even if your content doesn’t perform all that well or drive much traffic right now…

Having authentic content on your profiles that—

• Showcases your music
• Shows people what you’re all about
• And shows that you’re active…

Can still do a lot for you once you start getting traffic to your profiles.

This is something I have to drive into musicians all the time: Just because you’re not getting the views, doesn’t mean your content efforts are going to waste…

As long as you’re driving traffic another way.

Posting on social media can still lead to listeners and/or fans and other opportunities like shows, interviews, and more.

And ultimately, social media is going to be a great place for you to get closer with your fans and build a great relationship with them.

We’ll come back to content soon, but for now just know I highly recommend it as at least a part of your release plan.

Ad Campaign

The next thing on the list is “Ad campaign” which is running an ad campaign for your release.

This is something I also highly recommend to drive traffic and build your fan base—both on Spotify and social media if organic content alone isn’t doing much.

Although ads obviously cost money, I’ve found these are often a saviour for artists who are struggling with the organic social media game.

That is, of course, if they’ve got great music.

The only ads I feel confident recommending are the ones you set up through Meta’s Ads Manager.

I don’t want to go into too much detail about them in this letter, but it’ll help you to know roughly how they work because we’ll be talking more about them in the coming steps.

So, here’s a quick rundown:

• You set up the ad campaign through Meta Ads Manager.
• The ad(s) show up for people on Instagram and maybe Facebook.
• When they click on the ad, it takes them to a landing page / smartlink which looks something like this…

• This page will have your Meta pixel on it, which is like a little code thing that tracks who lands on this page and clicks over to the DSP behind the scenes.
• So when people click over to, say, Spotify, Meta will say “ok algorithm, we just got a ‘conversion’ (a listener)—now let’s go find more people like that and get this artist some more listeners”

There’s a bit of a learning curve with this specific type of ad campaign, but it’s totally worth it if you’re considering going down the paid promotion route.

So we’ll talk more about the different stages of these ads in the next steps, but let’s keep moving for now.

Playlists

Next on the list I’ve got playlists.

I definitely wouldn’t rely solely on playlists as a promotional strategy because:

• 1: Heaps of them are dodgy, and
• 2: They’re not always reliable for getting people from discovery > listener > long term fan.

But they can play a decent part in you achieving your goals, so they’ve made the list.

There are different kinds of playlists, and if you don’t know what they are, just google the difference—you’ll find heaps of articles or videos explaining this.

Here’s a super quick rundown of what you might want to pay attention to though:

• You can pitch to Spotify’s editorial playlists through Spotify For Artists if you upload your song early enough (I think at least 7 days before the release). There’s really no reason why not to do this—it can only help. These are playlists like New Music Friday or Fresh Finds.
• You may want to pitch to user playlists, which are playlists created by users on Spotify. This can help boost your streams, but make sure you don’t end up on a bunch of dodgy ones.
• And both the editorial and user playlists may help you get enough quality listener engagement that Spotify tries you out on its algorithmic playlists. These are things like Release Radar, Discover Weekly, Radio, etc.

There are endless videos out there on the details of these if you want to know more.

So, playlists in my opinion are not a standalone strategy.

But they can help get your music out to more people, so I think it’s worth considering them as part of your plan.

Word of Mouth / Social Spreading

Ok next we’ve got word of mouth / social spreading.

This is basically getting other people to talk about or share your release.

There is nothing more powerful than someone else recommending you.

It does wonders for your credibility, and a recommendation usually carries more weight than, say, someone discovering you on a random playlist.

Even though this isn’t necessarily a way to get tons and tons of streams on its own…

The listeners you do get through this will most likely be higher quality—which is better, right?

So, you’ll want to think about ways you can get people to help spread the word about you.

You can do this on social media, online, and in real life.

I helped a pop artist release a debut EP about a year ago and he heavily lent into this.

It was really effective; when he started out he had no fan base, so he enlisted the help of as many people as he could (including his parents) to spread the word about the release.

He had parents show their teenagers and friends and family share it with everyone they knew who’d be interested.

Combine that with some social media work, a bit of an ad budget, and a few other things, and he ended up with something like 150,000 streams and a few thousand followers across his platforms.

These aren’t mind-blowing numbers, but they’re realistic and impressive for someone who started literally from scratch.

The word of mouth / social spreading part of that plan made no small difference.

Don’t underestimate the power of it.

Special Advantages

‘Special advantages’ refers to any special connections or advantages you might have that can help your release do better.

• Maybe you know someone who can get you an interview somewhere cool, or on a podcast
• Or maybe you have a way to get on the radio more easily than others
• Or you know an influencer who can promote your song or something.

It could be anything.

And don’t be afraid to get creative here.

I worked with an artist once who lived in New York, but he had connections in China, and he was able to spread the world about his release there more than usual.

He also had a big WeChat list he leveraged to get more listeners, which helped get his release pushed out more on Spotify too.

I’ve found maybe half the time artists have some kind of advantage they didn’t think to lean into—so have a think about any special advantages you might have that you could use.

1:1 List

Ok next is the 1:1 list.

This could very well be a part of the ‘word of mouth / social spreading’ thing, but I think it’s worth including separately for clarity.

If you don’t have a dedicated email or text list (which you should), it can be handy to make a list of all the people you could connect with 1:1 who would support your release.

Every bit of support counts, and just like word of mouth, this can be so much more powerful than you think.

Even if you’ve got 50 people on that list and you ask each of them to support the release in a meaningful way, such as:

• Listening to your release all the way through
• Saving it
• Adding it to a playlist
• Following you on Spotify (and social media)
• And recommending the release to one other person they know…

That can do a lot for you, especially if you’re just starting out.

So, these people could be online or in the real world.

And ideally these people are relevant.

It’s good to get support from all angles—and you never know what kind of opportunities you could get from weak ties…

But ideally, you’re getting support from people who are actually into your art, or who know someone who would love it.

Email List

Preferably, though, you have an email list.

If you haven’t started one yet, do it now.

The longer you put it off, the more you’ll regret it later, I promise.

Having a list with contact info that you own, that keeps everything together, and allows you to easily send messages out to a bunch of people at once is essential.

And generally, the people you can get onto your list are into you.

They’ll typically support you in deeper ways than people who follow you casually on social media or engage with your music casually on Spotify.

You’ll want to send at least one email to this list around each release.

Ideally more, but we’ll talk a little more about that soon.

So let’s keep moving, but if you don’t have an email list, get one, and use it for your next release.

Engagement / Re-engagement

And last in this ‘Using’ section is engagement / re-engagement.

I’m referring to engaging with people on social media, both new people and people in your existing audience.

When you interact with other (relevant) people on social media, it can draw attention back to your profile and your music.

There are two major things you can do that will help you here:

• One is finding new relevant people to interact with. This could be—
  • Similar artists and/or their fans
  • People who are following and/or commenting on relevant pages
  • Or people who are sharing stuff that clearly shows they’re interested in the kind of thing you do.
• The other thing is re-engaging your existing audience. You might have some people following you already who are or could be fans, but they’ve forgotten you exist (because the algorithm).

You can get their attention again by interacting with their posts, stories, or by sending them a DM.

This will wake them up again, and hopefully get them checking out what you’ve been up to.

And it will hopefully mean your posts start showing up for them again.

This kind of engagement is something I highly recommend you do if you’re starting out building a fan base on social media.

Yes, it can be a little time consuming.

Yes, it can be a little difficult to find the right kinds of people to interact with initially.

But if you don’t have any money and posting content alone isn’t doing much, this is a powerful and free way to get more attention on you.

Even though you won’t pull huge numbers by doing just this, if you engage meaningfully, these connections could lead to high quality listener engagement.

And that is more important than the highest number possible.

Ok, so how do you choose which marketing ‘channels’ to include in your plan?

What I’ve laid out here are just some suggestions.

You absolutely don’t have to use all of these, and you absolutely can add in different ones.

But you’ve got options.

I can’t give you the perfect plan because I don’t know you.

Ideally, you could do everything in this ‘Using’ section.

But you’re a human and you might have limited time, energy, or money.

So, if push came to shove and you could only commit to, say, a couple of these…

Scenario #1: I would go for social media content and ads if you have at least a couple hundred bucks for a marketing budget.

Scenario #2: And I would probably go for social media content and playlists if money is limited.

This is a super rough recommendation so take it with a grain of salt.

But a combination of content and then ads/playlists will probably get you closest to ‘waking up’ the Spotify algorithm, which remember is what we’re trying to do.

This, of course, assumes your content is great, your ads are set up correctly, and the playlists you submit to are real and relevant.

So, if you’re completely lost and you don’t know what to do, you could start there.

But don’t just blindly go for that, because you may have certain advantages that others don’t.

For example:

• If you have more free time than most people, you could potentially do more than others.
• If you have a much bigger budget than most people, you could maybe invest in more stuff to help you get your release heard (although personally I would probably go for more ads)
• If you have connections that others don’t, you maybe want to prioritise them to help you get ahead.

And just make sure you’re being smart.

If you choose content and ads but you’ve only got $50 to put towards the ads and you’re only able to make a handful of videos… maybe that’s not the go.

If you choose the engagement / re-engagement route as one of the main things but you’re planning on doing that for 5 minutes every few days… that’s not going to get you far.

It’s important that whatever you choose will help you drive enough traffic.

Again, I can’t tell you what this is for you, but keep that in mind as you choose.

So now let’s move onto step 4 + 5 now—and we can tackle these both at the same time.

Steps #4 + #5: Specific dates & tasks (and details)

We’re now into the sections where we dig into the details.

We’ve defined the big picture stuff:

• When your releases will come out over a year / 6 months
• The main promotion period for each
• And also the different marketing channels you’ll be focused on to promote the releases.

Now it’s about laying out the actual tasks you’ll need to do (which is step 4), and then going into the details of those specific tasks (which is step 5).

What’s on your plan here will depend largely on what you’ve picked for the previous three steps.

The example tasks I’ve got on the release plan builder are aligned with the stuff I have in the ‘Using’ section in Step 3.

That’s why you can see things about content, pitching to playlists, scheduling ads, etc.

If you’re only able to do a few things for your release, or if your promotion periods are really short, this section for you will probably look a lot less intense than what I’ve got here.

But for the sake of showing you how this all works, I’ve filled it up.

So a super quick overview of how I’ve got this section laid out so you know what’s going on:

• On the left of the image above we’ve got the tasks.
• Then to the right of the “Status” column we’ve got when you’ll start working on those tasks relative to whatever your release day is.
• Next to that is the actual date you’ll start working on it.
• Next to that is “Unleash it” which applies to things that you start working on earlier but ‘unleash’ later—for example, you might want to set up your ads a couple weeks before the release goes live, but you’ll want to actually ‘unleash them’ on the day of release, right? So that’s what that is.
• And then next to that we’ve just got the unleash date, which is the actual date you’ll be ‘unleashing’ that thing.

Ok, so let’s go through the tasks week by week.

The tasks in this example plan start at 6 weeks before the release comes out, and I’ve only got things so spaced out so you’re not overloaded on any one week.

But this is super flexible.

You could condense everything into a lot less time—especially if you have a simpler plan than this.

So if you’d like to move these first few tasks to start at 4 weeks out instead, that’s fine.

6 weeks out.

So let’s start right at the top with artwork.

I’ve got that you should start working on it “6 weeks before release”.

But really what I mean is ideally it’s ready to go by roughly 6 weeks before the release comes out.

5 weeks out.

Task #1: Upload To Distributor

This is so that roughly 5 weeks before release, you can get your song uploaded to whatever distributor you’re using.

We’re getting it uploaded early so it’s out of the way, and also so we can pitch to the Spotify playlists early (which I’ll talk about in a moment).

This is kind of overkill—it’s probably not necessary to do this stuff so early, but it’s up the top here because in this example there’s a lot of other stuff to do.

Task #2: Define Message

After this, still 5 weeks out from release day, we’ve got “Define message”.

This is about defining the story or message or selling point of your release—if it makes sense for you to do that.

I don’t know what kind of music you make, but I think it’s generally a good idea to define some kind of ‘angle’ or direction with the release for promotion.

We want to do this early on to give us direction with content.

We’ll also start working on content early to prep it in advance. More on that in a second.

Task #3: Engagement

Under this I’ve got engagement.

And this could really be at the very top because I recommend everyone be doing this right now.

As a refresher, this is interacting with other accounts on your platform(s), with the intention of directing people back to your profile.

Ideally, we want this to be an everyday thing, essentially forever if possible.

I know a lot of musicians don’t like this and many don’t have a whole lot of time for it—totally understand.

Again, this is optional, but recommended because of all the good it can do.

4 weeks out.

Task #1: Social Media Content

Ok now we’re on to social media content, and I’ve got here to start working on it about 4 weeks out.

This may well be the single biggest part of your release plan.

Ideally, we prep enough content to at least last us the entire main promotion period for the release.

This is why we’re starting so early: so we don’t have to make so much stuff on the go once the release is out.

As an example, let’s say you’ve decided to do a week of pre-release promo and then three weeks of post-release promo (at least for the main promotion period).

If you’re aiming to show up 4x a week, you’d want to try and prep about 20 pieces of content for that.

Then when your pre-release promo starts, you can start firing them off (or “unleashing” them).

Again, you do not want to get caught in the middle of your release with no content prepared—it could be a nightmare.

So that’s why we’re prepping in advance.

Ok, let’s take a little detour here and talk a bit more about content.

What Should Your Content Be?

This could be a whole other conversation.

There are lots of different types of content you could choose and then put your spin on.

I even have an in-depth course that dives deep into social media content for musicians (plus branding, releasing, social media growth and more).

But here I’ll give you some basic guidelines to get you started.

First, if you’ve got the kind of release that has a clear message, story or selling point, I would build your content strategy around that.

For example:

• If your release is about a heartbreak, your content could focus on storytelling around that.
• If your release is a high energy dance tune, you could just make high energy ‘performance’ content, or you could still use storytelling techniques to paint a picture of a scene or setting that suits the energy of your tune.
• Or if your release is super technically impressive, maybe you could keep it simple and just show off your technical skills in your videos—I’m thinking like highly skilled guitar work or drumming.

This is extremely rough, and there’s much more you can do than this.

But it’s a good start.

So with your message/story/selling point in mind, I would choose a handful of content types you like, then make some videos.

You don’t have to overcomplicate this.

It could be you have only 2 or 3 different content types, but you just make a bunch of variations on them.

As for which content types you choose, there are no hard and fast rules.

But I would try to at least include one or two types that:

1. Directly draw attention to your music (not just have it hiding in the background of the video), and
2. Make sense with the platform you’re on.

If you want your release to do well, you can’t be afraid of directly promoting it.

At the time of recording this, we’re in an era where people value what I call ‘soft-direct marketing’.

This basically means your marketing is direct and transparent, but still valuable to an audience.

So, videos that…

• Have your music as the main feature
• Are not hiding away from the fact that you’re trying to promote your music
• But that still provide immediate and obvious value for others

…should be at least a part of your strategy.

If you don’t know what to do here, here are some great content types that have been shown to work really well:

• Performance videos—especially when there’s clear visual and written storytelling hooks
• Straight up introduction text-based videos
• Storytelling videos
• Reaction videos (filming others’ reactions to your music)
• Skits (high effort but can be high reward)
• Talking head videos or text-based storytelling videos that draw attention to you and the release.

Of course nothing is guaranteed, but these are a good start.

People are definitely becoming desensitised to this stuff though.

So, I would choose a few of these types and do your best to put a creative spin on them.

It’s not likely generic versions of these content types will work super well for you—you’ve got to push yourself creatively to make them stand out.

I know you probably still have a lot of questions around this stuff.

Again, please don’t overcomplicate this.

Just choose a few types, start experimenting, and go from there.

And if you’re really stuck, like I said I have a course that dives deep into all of this stuff. So if you’re interested, you can check that out here.

How Do You Put This Content Out?

Ok, so let’s say you’ve got three different main types of content, and you’ve made a bunch of videos based on each type.

I would just keep it simple and alternate between each of them.

So for an easy example, let’s say you’ve got:

• 10x performance videos
• 10x introduction style videos
• 10x storytelling videos

On day 1, I would post a performance video.

On day 2, I would post an introduction video.

On day 3, I would post a storytelling video.

And then from day 4 onwards, I would repeat the cycle again: Performance, introduction video, storytelling video, etc.

This is not a rule, but it’s easy to follow and there’s no reason why you can’t do this.

I honestly don’t think it matters all that much how you disperse them… this just makes sense to me.

And as for what to post before the release is out vs after it’s out (if you’re doing any pre-release promo):

From what I’ve seen, you don’t need to have different types of content before vs after.

I haven’t seen any evidence that posting a certain thing pre-release and a different thing post-release makes a noticeable difference.

Of course this is nuance to this: Different circumstances require different strategies.

But as a general guide, I think your pre-release promo can be pretty much the same as your post-release promo.

Except with the pre-release stuff you’ll want to mention that your song is coming out, and with your post-release stuff you’ll say your song is actually out.

You may also want to include other types of content in your strategy that I haven’t mentioned. Things like:

• Reposting user generated content.
• Reacting to stuff that other people say or post about your music.
• Or just any clever ideas that come up as you’re going through this whole process.

These are things you can’t really plan for in advance, so you’d probably create these on the go.

But it really helps to have prepped a bunch of stuff beforehand, so you’re not completely overloaded when release time comes.

And that’s why we prep the main stuff in advance.

You don’t have to make all your content in week 4, but it’s good to get started on it as early as you can.

Ok, let’s get back to the plan.

Task #2: User Generated Content

So under social media content—still at 4 weeks out—I’ve got user generated content.

We just talked about this, but so it’s clear: User generated content is content created about you by other people.

If you have a fan base already or people who are willing to support you in this way, you might want to reach out to them early and create a plan together.

Maybe they could make some content of them…

• Reacting to your song
• Dancing to it
• Listening to it in a setting that perfectly suits your music, so it paints a picture for other people
• Or even just talking about how great it is.

This can help spread the word about your release, and it’s great for social proof.

I would probably have them start posting this once the release is out, but maybe you could prep some of it early.

It won’t always work like this, but if you’re close with some fans, maybe they could become a part of your release plan and help you push it out. Worth thinking about.

Task #3: Pitch To Editorial Playlists

Ok next in this week we’ve got pitching to Spotify’s editorial playlists.

You don’t have to do this so early, but you may as well get it out of the way.

And if you’ve uploaded your song already, which according to this plan you have…

Then you should be able to do it at this point.

I think Spotify wants you to do it at least 7 days prior to the release coming out.

So it’s not urgent, but why not get it out the way?

You pitch to these playlists through Spotify For Artists.

The option to do so will become available shortly after you upload your song.

If you don’t know how to do it, just google it—it’s super simple.

3 weeks out.

Ok now we’re at 3 weeks out.

Task #1: Landing Page For Ads

If you’re going to be running ads, the first task we’ve got for this week is creating your landing page for your ad campaign.

Remember that landing page / smartlink I showed you back in Step 3? This is that.

Setting one of these up is a simple process that doesn’t take long.

I used to recommend ToneDen for creating this, but I’m not so sure about them after some recent problems they had with things not working.

If you don’t already have a preferred smartlink / landing page, I would just do a bit of research on the one that best suits you.

Some are paid, some are free, some have different features—so just watch a couple videos or something and you’ll find one.

Task #2: Make Ad Creative + Plan Targeting

Ok, in this same week I recommend you also make the videos you’ll need for your ad campaign and plan your targeting options.

For the videos, you could probably get away with just using some of the ones you’ve created for posting on social media…

But you might also want to try a few other things.

Sometimes weird stuff works for ads, so it’s worth experimenting.

When I say targeting options, I’m talking about the audience(s) you’ll be targeting with your ads.

This includes things like:

• Interests
• Genres
• Similar artists
• Age range
• Countries

And the reason I’m suggesting you plan this ahead of actually creating the campaign is because it can take surprisingly long to figure this stuff out.

Meta almost definitely won’t have all the specific artists and genres and interests you want to target.

And if you don’t have experience with setting up these campaigns, it could end up taking you ages to try and set them up if you haven’t planned for the worst with your targeting.

So, here’s what I’d do if you’re going to be running ads:

• First, I would write out a list of all the interests, genres, similar artists, etc. you might want to try and target in your campaign.
• Then I would start to create a pretend campaign in Meta Ads Manager, and head straight to the targeting section.
• I would then type in all the targeting options you’ve written down and see if they actually come up—because I bet a lot of them won’t.
• Then I would refine your original list, then also find and add alternative targeting options in this section.

The idea here is when it comes time to create your real ad campaign, you know exactly which targeting options you’re going for.

Otherwise, you might get stuck in the middle of it trying to figure out the targeting and end up creating a not-so-well-though-out campaign.

I know this sounds kinds of silly, but I’ve seen it heaps by this point: It really helps to plan out your targeting and ad creative in advance.

For both, I would make sure you’ve got lots of options as well:

• You want at least a couple of different videos for ads—ideally more
• And you want a bunch of alternative targeting options in case some don’t work as well as you thought—which will almost definitely be the case.

If you’re not familiar with these ads and you’re planning on using them, I would do more research than just listening to this.

There’s a learning curve here, so you could easily waste a lot of money if you don’t know what you’re doing.

If you’d like to learn the basics of how to run them, I do have that as a part of the course I mentioned earlier.

Otherwise, you can do some googling and YouTubing and you should be able to find some great stuff.

Ok, let’s move on.

Task #3: Pre-save

Next—and still 3 weeks out—I’ve got set up your pre-save (if you’re doing that).

Generally, I’m not a huge fan of pre-saves for similar reasons to why I’m not a huge fan of lots of pre-promo if you have a small fan base.

And if you do have a small or no fan base, I probably wouldn’t bother with it.

But if you are doing it, it’s on here.

It doesn’t have to be 3 weeks out—I would just shift it up or down depending on what you’re doing.

If you don’t know how to set up a pre-save link, again just google it and you’ll find tons of stuff on how to do it, which platform to use, etc.

Task #4: Find Playlists & Write Pitches

Ok, after that in this week, I’ve got “Find Playlists & Write Pitches”.

This is referring to user playlists, not the editorials we mentioned earlier.

So, if you’re using something like SubmitHub or you plan to reach out to individual curators, I recommend you start collecting contact info or playlists you’ll be pitching to ahead of time.

I don’t want you to actually submit your pitches to them now.

I just want you to prep for them, so when the time comes you can just fire them off and get it done.

This is probably overkill again; you don’t have to do this so far out.

I’m just trying to keep it smooth, but as I keep saying you can collapse this plan into a lot less time if you want.

There are a lot of dodgy playlist services out there and people just trying to take your money, so proceed with caution.

But if you can find the right ones and get on them (maybe that’s a conversation for another time), they could give your release a boost.

2 weeks out.

Ok, now we’re at 2 weeks before release day.

Task #1: Create & Schedule Ad Campaign

First on the list from here is to create and schedule your ad campaign, if you’re doing that.

This is where you’ll actually set everything up.

You’ll already have your targeting options and ad creative ready to go, so you can just set up the campaign, schedule it to go live on release day, and you’re good.

I’ve got this at 2 weeks out for padding.

Sometimes things can go wrong, and you can’t figure out why something isn’t working.

Maybe your ads get rejected, or something weird happens with your account, or something else.

Two weeks out is probably overkill, but you can tweak it as you see fit.

Just allow yourself some time in advance.

Task #2: Re-Engage Existing Audience

Moving on, still 2 weeks out, I’ve got re-engage your existing audience.

As a quick reminder, this is to…

• ‘Wake up’ your followers who maybe have forgotten about you
• Bring more awareness to your profile
• And so hopefully have them notice your release when you start talking about it.

We already covered what to do for this in Step 3, but this is where you’d actually start doing it.

So, if you’ve got a dormant audience, now is the time to start waking and warming them up.

Task #3: 1:1 List

Next on the list this week is your 1:1 list.

Remember how we talked about making a list of all the people you can reach out to personally to support your release?

This is when you start making it.

If the people on this list are close to you already, great.

You can probably just reach out to them a day or so before the release to make sure they can help you get that listener engagement up on release day.

Ask them to do things like:

• Listen to the song all the way through, maybe multiple times
• Save the song
• Add it to a playlist
• All the stuff we mentioned earlier.

If you make a list and you haven’t been in touch with the people on it in a while, it might be a little weird for you to randomly reach out and be like “hey can you listen to my new song when it’s out?”

So, I would probably try to get reacquainted with them first.

Ideally, you’re always building great relationships with people, so this comes easily.

And ideally, your 1:1 list is either always growing, or you’re turning it into an email list.

Task #4: Special Advantages

Also, in this week we’ve got your “special advantages”.

This again is any opportunity, connection, or resource you can take advantage of to help you get eyes and ears on your release.

For you, I have no idea what this is, but I figured around 2 weeks out is probably roughly a good amount of time to get anything organised.

Feel free to move this around as necessary.

Task #5: Email List

And last thing for this week is to write and schedule any emails you may want or need to.

If you have a decent email list, I highly recommend writing at least one email to go live probably on release day.

But you could also create one or a few more leading up to that release.

And potentially even another one or two after the release as well.

How you go about it totally depends.

If you already have a regular email or newsletter that you send out, maybe you could—at minimum—just replace that with the release announcement or include the announcement in that.

There are no rules here, but if your list is bigger, it’s worth sending more emails.

If you are going to send more, I’d recommend you find an interesting angle for each email so it doesn’t get repetitive repetitive.

For example:

• Maybe one email is a direct email about the release
• Another is a story about the release
• And another dives into the lyrics for one of the songs or something.

It could really be anything you think might be interesting to your list.

Once you’ve got them written, if you can schedule them to automatically go out at certain times, awesome.

If not, at least they’re written, and you can just press send when you’re ready.

1 week out.

Task #1: Support Sharing

Ok, so a week before the release comes out, we’ve first got “Support Sharing”.

I haven’t really talked about this yet, but basically I think it’s a great idea to start and build a support group full of artists, who all support one another in various ways (such as listening to and sharing others’ new releases).

Starting and building this group is not something you’d do a week before your release comes out.

It’s more something you would slowly build up over the long term. And it’s never too late to start one.

But as this example plan is thorough, if you’ve got one, you can let them know that the release is coming out and you’d love it if they could help you give it a big push come release day.

Ideally, you can set it up so everyone in that group posts about your song on release day and you can maximise listener engagement on that day to help the Spotify algorithm wake up.

Task #2: Socials & Spotify Prep

This week we’ve also got socials and Spotify prep.

This may include updating things like:

• Your profile picture
• Your story highlights
• Your Spotify photos
• Anything like that.

It’s not always needed.

But basically, you just want to make sure that once the release is live, everything looks and feels how it’s supposed to relative to your current release.

If you’re releasing super frequently, I probably wouldn’t worry about this.

But if you’re releasing less frequently, it might be worth updating some stuff with new releases to rejuvenate your presence.

Task #3: Link(s) For Socials

Following on from this I’ve got “landing page / link for socials”.

You may want to set up a link in bio page for your socials, like for example a Beacons thing.

If you’re running ads, you might be able to duplicate the landing page you created for that and use it on your socials—if it includes everything you need.

I don’t recommend you use the same landing page for this as for your ad campaign.

It’ll make it too hard to figure out where the traffic is coming from and you won’t know if your ad is working how it’s supposed to.

So, you want something separate for your socials that’s only for your socials.

If you’ve been on social media for a while you probably already have one of these.

Just make sure that when you start promoting, your links are up to date.

Task #4: Pitch To User Playlists

Then we’ve got “pitch to user playlists”.

I’ve got ‘1 week before release’ here, but it really depends.

You might want to pitch a lot closer to release day, and different platforms or people might have different preferences for when they’d like you to pitch to them relative to your release.

You could also pitch once the release is out, which is totally fine and super common.

Just don’t wait too long if you can help it, because ideally you can maximise listener engagement early in the release.

And remember, you’ve already written your pitches at this point, so this process should be super quick and easy.

Release day

Ok, so this has kept you busy all the way up to release day.

Now it’s time for the release to go live.

So, everything you’ve prepped in advanced will switch on today:

• Your release will go live
• Your ads will go live
• A scheduled email will go out to your list
• You’ll do a big push with content
• Others will post about or share your release
• You’ll get all your 1:1 people to swarm Spotify
• You’ll change any links you need to so people can access the song

You’ll basically do everything you can to get as many relevant people listening as possible.

You want to get as much of that listener engagement as you can as early as you can and get Spotify to start paying attention.

So on top of the stuff I just mentioned, I also recommend you go extra hard on social media on this day.

• Make multiple feed posts about the release on this day—don’t be shy. Maybe one in the morning, one after lunch and one at night.
• Post a bunch of stuff in Stories, filling them up with—
  • People’s reactions to hearing your release
  • Anything they’re posting about that you can repost
  • Behind the scenes stuff
  • Anything like that.
• You might also have a bunch of people to reply to who are listening—make sure you respond to their messages if they’re complimenting your work.

Basically, this is going to be a busy day for you.

You want to try to gain as much momentum as you possibly can.

I haven’t included things like:

• Going live
• Or doing some sort of online launch party on social media
• Or any kind of release day event

But if you want to do that, you totally can.

You just really want to squeeze out as much attention and excitement as you can.

 All of it counts, all of it adds up.

If you’re super active on social media, talking to as many people as you can, engaging with people…

Plus you’ve got ads going live and you’re ideally getting streams from other sources as well…

You’ve got people sharing your stuff, reacting to your song, everything…

All of this will hopefully help you make a big splash.

But it doesn’t stop there…

Release Week & Beyond

Even after this big release day, you’re still going.

From here on out, you’re:

• Posting frequently and consistently day after day
• Constantly tweaking your ads to get them in the best place possible
• Staying on top of playlists and all the people who said they’d listen to your song
• Engaging with as many people as you can—people in your existing audience and new people.

All the stuff that’s part of your plan that you can keep doing… keep doing.

And especially for this first week or two after the release goes live, you want to be really on it.

Throughout this time, you want to repost everything that gets shared about your music.

You want to get on Stories to say a massive thanks to everyone who’s listening and supporting—multiple times.

If you have other things you want to add in to your plan, like—

• Going live
• Having like a listening party
• Doing a thing where you catch up with fans or something, whatever—go all in.

We want it to feel like your release is a big deal.

We want people to feel the excitement and feel like they have a good reason to go and listen (and to keep listening).

The last thing you want to do is be timid about it and after release day just kind of disappear.

Because if you do that, people will start to forget.

Ideally, you want to be consistently pushing this masterpiece of yours and keeping people constantly engaged.

I really want to drive this home:

Once that release goes live, it’s just the beginning.

Everything after that matters a lot.

It’s the bulk of your promotion period.

Up until this point you’ve been working super hard behind the scenes to prep stuff.

Now it’s time to work super hard “in front of the scenes”.

You want to just go and go and go.

Success is not what happens in the first day or first week.

It what happens over the entire period you promote it for, and that could include promoting well into the future.

Recap

Ok, we’ve been through a fair bit, so let’s recap the 5 steps to keep it tidy:

Step 1:

You map out the big picture, defining when each release will be coming out over a longer period (for example over 6-12 months).

This could mean you’re releasing anywhere from every 1 week to every few months, depending on you.

Step 2:

You define the main promotion period for each release.

So you’ll know how long you’ll promote your releases for and how much pre vs post release promo you’ll be doing.

Remember, you can absolutely go beyond this.

This step is to set yourself a solid baseline timeframe for each release.

But in reality, it’s often messier than this because some songs will do better than others, and therefore you might promote some more or less.

Step 3:

You define the marketing channels you’ll be using to promote your release.

These are the different ways you’ll promote, such social media content, ads, playlists, etc.

Step 4:

You lay out the specific dates and tasks you’ll need to do for your release based on the stuff you’ve defined in the previous steps.

This list could be longer (like the example plan we covered today)…

Or it could much simpler and shorter.

Remember, there is nothing wrong with just releasing a lot and posting a bunch of content—as long as it actually works for you.

Step 5:

Is about the details of those specific dates and tasks (for example, what kind of content you’ll make, the content of your emails, what your ad creative will be, etc).

So, this is a lot, I know.

And the example plan I’ve taken you through today is definitely on the more intense end.

You may very well decide you want to (or have to) make your plan a lot smaller and simpler, depending on your situation.

But I wanted to show you today that:

1. There’s more than one path here, and
2. You can personalise your plan. You are not stuck with something that doesn’t suit you just because that’s what works for someone else.

I’ve found in this music world, there aren’t many hard and fast rules.

For every example of one thing working, you can find an example of the total opposite working.

So, I think one of the best things you can do is learn to create your own path.

If you’re constantly relying on other people to tell you what to do, you might be holding yourself back.

But if you know how to take control of your own situation, you can design a path that works best for you.

I hope you’ll use what you’ve learned today to make better decisions about getting your art out there.

Again, if you don’t know where to start, you can use this example plan as a starting point—but I do recommend you tweak it to better suit you.

Please feel free to drastically simplify it, or add more to it.

What I didn’t really mention today is the creative side of a marketing campaign.

This 5-step process is about giving yourself structure…

But you might also like to think about creative ways to leverage things like…

• Culture
• The time we’re in
• Trends
• Or even other areas of life

…to create a more successful marketing campaign.

This could and probably would still be through content nowadays, but thinking like this can help you come up with better ideas.

If you have a solid structure like what we’ve gone through today and you can think about ways to leverage stuff like what I just mentioned…

You’ll probably be able to come up with something amazing.

But that does require a lot of thinking and work.

So even if you don’t do that, knowing how to create a personalised plan from the 5 steps we went through today can still get you great results.

I’m going to leave this one here. I hope it helps!

If you like the look of this release plan builder in Notion, you can grab it here.

It also comes with a simple content planner template.

I’ve been told by past students in my course that it’s really helpful, so I hope it is for you too.

And speaking of, if you’d like to go further than just creating a release plan, my course Awaken Your Fan Base On Social Media takes you through all the important stuff for building a fan base on social media.

I take you right into the details of:

• Defining your artist identity
• Social media content
• Social media growth
• Releasing music
• And more.

If you’re interested, you can check that out here.

Thanks so much and talk again soon 🙂

— Alex