Putting out an album that people will actually buy

Apr 12

It occurred to me that most serious musicians still release full albums, even if (or particularly if) they have already released a series of singles leading up to it. In fact, even the most successful pop titans who release single after single eventually combine them on a single album release.

This means that you have decided to release an album. No matter if it's your first or tenth release, this is a significant milestone. To make your new album a successful one, we're here to help you.

Before I answer that question, what is the actual effect of releasing an album on your music career?

Release of an album has many advantages

A CD's advantages simply can't be matched by singles.

You gain these benefits when you release an album:

A major event such as the release of an album increases PR options. It's common for an artist to release a single about every couple of months, but an album only once or twice every few years. Despite modern tastes bred on singles, everyone knows an album release is a big deal, so make the most of it! Your marketing efforts should be more intense when you release your album than you would when you release singles.
It's not necessary to make a single on vinyl or CD, since only some fans buy singles or CDs. Guess what fans do buy? Entire albums! The physical format of music is not dead, contrary to what you might have read. This year's 2nd quarter growth in physical music sales was 34% over the same quarter last year, as reported by Music Week. Music is still a desire people have to have. Artists spend a lot of time making music.
Another option to consider is merch. As we mentioned in our first point, releasing an album is a big deal. Considering how often they release new singles, independent artists rarely release new merchandise. However, new albums are far more rare. We can commemorate each new album with a t-shirt featuring the artwork, or a tote featuring the title, or a hoodie that has both! You could even have merchandise for each song!
A new chapter in the journey of a musician. An album represents a new direction. See any artist's discography on Wikipedia. Among the albums they have released is their career history. People can track an artist's development by looking at their albums. Especially if you had only released singles until then, your first album is a major departure from your previous era.
Getting covered by industry experts and the press: Albums aren't just how fans stay updated on your progress; they're also where music critics and other media outlets monitor your work. It's rare to find a song reviewed in depth, but there are some reviews of singles. Reviewers want to dive into an album like a shark. A musician's album is usually reviewed by journalists after he or she releases a single, not a single alone. There is a strong interest in learning how you composed all these songs.
A more prominent position on streaming platforms: Spotify, Apple Music, and other major streaming platforms rank albums higher on artist profiles than other music services. This means you can boast of your achievements immediately when your album is released.

A Guide to releasing a successful album

All those benefits are wonderful, but we aren't here to convince you that releasing an album will be valuable; instead, we are here to guide you on how to release an album people will be excited about, that they'll want to stream and even buy. Are you old enough to remember when people bought music? Yes, they do! The sales pitch, however, is harder now.

These are the steps you can take to make your album seem more interesting and enticing to listeners:

It is recommended that you record more songs than you need: Spotify and Apple Music have similar definitions of what constitutes an album: to be regarded as an album, you must either have seven or more tracks, or be over 30 minutes long. Set your goal to 12 tracks instead, instead of just missing that seven-track threshold to qualify. You can fill any extra slots using all your ideas. To save only the best songs for your album, you should always have more songs than you need, so you can be ruthless and cut the ones that do not meet the standards you set for your album.
It is still important to design attractive cover art even in the age of streaming; especially in the age of streaming. Listeners have more choices than ever, and your album needs to stand out among fans' feeds among thousands of choices. Fortunately, today you can DIY a professional-looking cover with very little graphic design experience and for very little money.
Photograph yourself as an artist: Just like cover art, photographs serve as a visual representation of who you are and what kind of music you make. Consider hiring a professional photographer to document your work. Have a sense of what these photos need to convey before the shoot so that you can convey it to the photographer. These photos are useful for all kinds of uses, such as album art, liner notes, artist websites, social profiles, etc. Your music will have a face when you upload a great image wherever you can post it.
Get to know yourself: What makes you stand out among the thousands of other artists who release music? How does your new album fit into the story of your music? How is it different from your previous releases? Your band is your most aggressive release yet, so are you a bunch of rebels? What type of work do you do on your own? Make sure your website, social media profiles, and other web presences emphasize that. On that note...
Your new artist photos make an outstanding addition to your website. Use these to dress it up and update it for the new album. The release of a new album represents a new phase in the life of an artist. Your bio should be updated with information about your new album along with your new photos. Your story should provide context to this new music, and you should create an enticing call to action (CTA) to encourage people to check out your work. Your banners and social media posts should be updated frequently so people can see your new albums. If your band is rebellious, try writing "Hear the album that almost got us kicked out of the studio." Or, if you're an indie musician, consider saying "My new album almost made my producer cry on the first tune." Also, don't forget to update your social media profiles. Make a short announcement on the new artwork such as, “All-new album coming soon!”.”
Create an awesome physical product: As we mentioned above, the death of the CD is greatly exaggerated, and vinyl is still super popular, especially this year. The tactile nature of vinyl and CD gives fans a closer connection to the music and the artist who created it, so print some physical media. Your album's tactile experience can be heightened with things like detailed liner notes, exclusive artwork on CD or vinyl (gatefold LPs have tons of room for the artist photos you took!) and limited-edition colors.
Deals are great for your fans: Don't be afraid to offer a discount on your CD and vinyl pressings. You should run a limited-time sale for your fans once you've added your new album to your website store. We suggest you do this within a certain amount of time after the release date. Using retargeting ads, you can entice someone to purchase your music CD who added it to their shopping cart but did not check out.
Create a web store: Shopify allows you to integrate your store with Facebook and Instagram to sell your merch directly. By integrating Bandzoogle's artist website platform with a commission-free web store, you can easily sell your artwork online.
Your impending album release can be built up in anticipation with singles: You can release a series of singles prior to your album release to create a buzz. During the months leading up to an album release, some artists follow the "waterfall strategy," releasing one single each month until the CD arrives. You don't need to release your entire album at once if you've already finished your next album's songs. Promote each release on social media to build anticipation for the final full album by releasing one song each month for three to five months.
Create a promotion strategy: Make sure you take the time to promote your album before and after its release. Show.co enables indie bands on smaller budgets to create effective promotion campaigns on social media platforms, like Facebook and Instagram, as well as major websites. The platform is a useful element of your marketing arsenal.
Making video content is still important in the age of streaming, even though music videos may have been dominant in previous years. Considering YouTube, TikTok, Instagram, and other social video platforms with billions of users, it might even matter more. All these platforms and formats offer a variety of options to promote yourself and your artistry, and it is a versatile tool at your disposal for fan engagement, spreading your art and increasing your fan base. Making a great video need not cost a fortune, unlike the golden age of MTV and VH1. Your mobile device allows you to create exciting album launch videos, lyric videos and ads for posting on Stories, Shorts and TikTok right from your device.
Use a content calendar to manage your strategy: Departments that produce content should keep all that organized with a content calendar, so they know who is responsible for what by what date. Your own content calendar is a great place to start seeing everything you're planning to do. The chaos that comes with releasing an album can be mitigated by planning out when you will post videos, new singles, social media posts, or advertisements.
Timelines for album releases should be planned similar to your promo schedule and associated content preparation. You will also need to plan out all the necessary information that you need for the actual release.
It has taken a lot of time, effort, and money to write, record, and prepare your album for release. Plan an album release party! Once all that's done, organize an event to celebrate releasing your creation into the world! Considering we are living in a pandemic age, we are very likely to see this in a virtual setting like a livestream. No matter what, give yourself about three months of cushion time between when you receive your CDs/vinyls back from the manufacturer and when you host your release party. There is therefore ample space to send out your complete album and press release to influential people like bloggers, radio program directors, podcasters, journalists and others. Additionally, this allows you some wiggle room in case your press fails to work properly. In order to ensure maximum attendance, promote your livestream on your website and all your social media channels.
A PR campaign can boost your promotional campaign: Looking for an extra boost? Your public relations professional should pitch your album, videos, releases, live shows, and just you or your band to bloggers and music websites. As part of their services, they'll create an electronic press kit (EPK) with all this information collected, so everything's in one centralized location for those you are pitching to for coverage. Whether you hire a publicist or create your own music video, PR professionals can make a world of difference in the long run if it results in more people attending your release event or getting excited about your album. Your album will be more popular if it has all that hype behind it, which means more people will buy it. We are here for this very reason!

Release your Album

You have finally finished all your preparations and now are ready to release your album! Your album will need to be distributed to all digital platforms through a distributor. AudioWundr is the perfect solution for that.

DISTRIBUTE YOUR MUSIC

What you Should do Before your Album is Released

While preparing an album for release, these steps will help you to give it the best chance of success. Also ensure that you complete some general housekeeping and paperwork after submitting your music in order to protect your work and get paid for every stream, sale, and use you get once they start rolling in.

You should follow the following steps when submitting an album:

Ensure that your Copyright is Protected

The term copyright refers to a person or group's ownership of a piece of intellectual property.

Songwriters and/or publishers own the composition rights (PA copyright) - such music and lyrics
A sound recording (SR copyright) is a specific recorded version of that music or text owned by the artist or label

The rights to your songs are yours if you wrote, recorded, and produced them yourself! Split sheets are useful for keeping track of your ownership rights when you have written or recorded with others.

If you’ve figured all that out, then you should register your copyrights for compositions and sound recordings with the United States Recording Industry Association (RIAA). It's not necessary to do this before you release your album, but it would be a good idea to do it soon rather than later so you're protected.

Manage your Publishing Account

Performing rights organizations (PROs) and mechanical agencies are the next step in protecting your copyright. Royalties from publishing rights organizations go towards protecting your composition's copyright. You are paid what you are owed when they use your composition anywhere they are used.

You could belong to all those organizations and register your songs, but that would probably take a lot of time. Several organizations do not let you because of publishing restrictions and language barriers.

SoundExchange Registration

When we're talking about collecting royalties, register your album's songs with SoundExchange so that you can collect the royalties. Record companies like Pandora and satellite radios pay royalties to this organization. It's not the songwriters or publishers but the labels and artists who receive this revenue since it's for the sound recording and not the composition.

You can't do this through AudioWundr. Create an account with SoundExchange and register all of your songs if you do not already have one. You may not be aware that your music is getting satellite airplay even if it isn't on Pandora (yet!).

Make Money from your Songs

Making money from my songs is monetizing my music, right?” you might ask. In a sense, it is, but not entirely.

The term 'music monetization' refers to the attempt to generate revenue through new, non-traditional means, such as through social media and video.

These platforms could be used to earn revenue whenever your music is played:

YouTube
Facebook
Instagram
TikTok/Resso

It is possible to monetize your music on all of those platforms via AudioWundr, as is the case with everything else on this list. We will send your songs to those platforms once you opt in for monetization when you submit your album. You get some revenue for those uses, and AudioWundr collects revenue as well!

Selling Merch

There's nothing like new merch to celebrate a new album! Put the title on a hat or a shirt and you've got an album cover. When merchandise is associated with a specific album, it appears to be limited and special. There's no comparison to a generic band shirt with your name on it. Because albums don't come out very often, people want to collect them.

If you've made your own merchandise, you can sell it at these places:

A virtual merch table called Merchbar is offered by Spotify as part of its merch integration. Merchbar allows you to list your merch directly on your Spotify profile after you sign up and verify your Spotify artist profile.
Having an artist website is important if you do not have one already. Your official artist website is a critical element in your marketing efforts, even in the age of social media. Bandzoogle or Squarespace makes it easy to build an attractive, intuitive website. In addition to allowing you to keep in touch with your fans and promote your music, a website can also help you sell merchandise since you keep the majority of the proceeds (or all if you choose to use Squarespace or Bandzoogle's Store Feature).
Our previous mention of Shopify mentioned Facebook and Instagram, but we'll mention them again. Your merch can be sold through their storefront on social media easily.
On stage: They're returning! Artists are gradually playing shows again. Virtual merch tables have been discussed extensively, but what about analog ones? Artists sell merchandise directly to fans through a well-stocked merch table at a show. How cool is that? Everything you make goes right to you. Aside from the smiles of happy customers whenever you sell your items.

Physical Distribution

The merch platforms we listed in the previous section allow you to sell your physical media directly to fans. It's all very well to have merch promotions, but you can take things a step further with Free Plus Shipping and Handling (F+S&H) deals.

You can offer a F+S&H deal to customers by offering them a copy of your new CD if they pay for shipping and handling. You achieve a promotion strategy that ensures your CD reaches your fans' hands and fosters a relationship with them. In addition to the deal, you may offer a subscription to your mailing list so you can increase marketing opportunities.

Album releases play an important role in an artist's career. It takes a lot of planning and a lot more effort to release an album than it does when it's a single.

Mitchell Prahl