6 Ways To Increase Your Facebook Fan Engagement

Carl Jacobson, Nimbit's Vice President of Marketing, recently posted some great advice about how to increase your Facebook fan engagement. Nimbit's new MyStore for Facebook lets you capture the fan's information, reward them, and makes it easy to sell them music, merch, and tickets, but you still have to have a strategy to go with any tool that you use.

"IDEA 1 - Be Ready to Sell Today!

• When is the best time to make a sale? When a fan is excited.
• When is a fan excited? When they discover your music.
• Where's the best place to make a sale? Exactly where your fan is when they are excited.

That means you've got to be ready NOW to make a sale from your Facebook page. You can't rely on fans going somewhere else to find your music, and the last thing you want to do is ask them to go somewhere else.

IDEA 2 - Engage...Don't Advertise

When you see updates like the following on Facebook, you tune out…right? Your fans will too.

"BUY MY NEW ALBUM!"

Try asking questions instead:

"Hey everyone, we just put up our new album. We're trying to decide on the next single. Please a listen and leave a comment about your favorite tracks. [link to your album on your store]"

The key to success with your fans on Facebook is all about engagement. And asking questions, or asking for their support is one of the best ways to do that.
The example above is a soft sell, and has additional promotional benefits:

• You're inviting people to share their opinions
• You're asking them to try before they buy
• They'll see they can purchase the album or other items in your store
• When they leave a comment/review, it will appear on their friends' newsfeeds making more people aware of your music.
• Earlier this year, Forbes reported that people were much more likely to buy after online recommendations from friends.

IDEA 3 - The Virtual High-Five
Any time a fan leaves a comment like this, or any comment for that matter, it's important to be responsive. At the very least "Like" their comment. If it's warranted, make sure you respond. And lastly, if it's particularly great, share their comment with a thank you / shout out on your wall. This is the online equivalent of a high-five from the stage. A like, response, thank you, or shout out is a subtle way to reward your fans. When they see a status update from you, they'll be thrilled, they may even share it again.

IDEA 4 - Reward Fans Then Ask Them to Reward Their Friends
Free tracks are a great way to reward your fans, and they aren't really "free" when you capture the fan's information, or get them to Share it with their friends, which increases your reach by hitting all of their friends Facebook Tickers.

Once you capture the fan's info, you can then build the relationship. Many times, they'll later reciprocate with a purchase or by attending a live show. In a recent Nimbit promotion, Suzanne Vega teased her fans with a free download, and later found that 61% who later made a purchase also received that free download.

Don't you love turning a friend onto a really amazing artist or song? Your fans do too. So when you give that free track away, always ask your fans to share it with their friends. You can either set the song's price to Free or use a promo code that people will need to redeem.
Here's how to get started:

1. Start by sharing a song from your store. It's as easy as clicking the share button next to a track in your Nimbit store.
2. When you send it, include a personal message like this:
   
   Hey everyone, I'm pretty excited about this new track, and I'd like you to check it out. Take a listen. If you like it, get it for free by clicking the link. If you really like it, click Share to also send it to your friends.

We've seen a few artists using this approach and when they have an established and active fanbase, it spreads like wildfire.

IDEA 5 - Advertise Yourself to Fans of Similar Artists
Once you have your Musician/Band page set up, Facebook makes it incredibly easy and affordable to create an ad that's perfectly targeted to your demographic. I know, you're a songwriter, not an advertising agent, but this is a lot easier than you think.

The steps are fairly straightforward, but here are some key tips for you to consider.

1. To reach the right people, type in names of similar artists in the "Precise Interests" field. That will target your ad to people who entered that artist as music they listen to. Completely original? Then enter your influences.
2. Pick a geographic region that makes sense. If you're a touring musician, only select the areas you play or want to play.
3. Start Small - Set your daily budget low, Select Pay for Clicks (not impressions), and set your Bid way below what they select. If you set a low bid, you'll pick up ads on off hours, or when other campaigns end.
4. Fine Tune your ad as you go along. Set it up, check back to see how it's doing, then change your settings to see if you can increase your reach

IDEA 6 - Get Creative
These are just a few ideas of how you can engage your fans and increase your sales and promotion on Facebook. There are as many ways to succeed with your fans on Facebook as there are songwriters signed to ASCAP (maybe more). So find your voice, and try things out. The nice thing about the Facebook, is if you try one promotion, and it doesn't work you can quickly switch to another."

These are great ideas, and something that you should consider, since Facebook is one of the most powerful social media tools at your disposal.

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Turning Radio Airplay Into Sales

Any artist or band that has gotten radio airplay knows that it doesn't necessarily translate into sales. Once upon a time before Music 3.0 maybe more so, but certainly not today. The biggest problem in the past was having the product available in the local stores to coincide with airplay, but that's not necessary or even possible today when most music is purchased online.

That being said, getting people to pull the trigger to purchase isn't easy. Here's a video from Nimbit's co-founder Phil Antoniades that outlines a way of using station ID's and promo codes to help turn airplay into sales.

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Help support this blog. Any purchases made through our Amazon links help support this website with no cost to you.

You should follow me on Twitter for daily news and updates on production and the music business.

Check out my Big Picture blog for discussion on common music, engineering and production tips and tricks.

Direct To Fan Platform Overview

Oniracom (who's vice-president and creative lead Jacob Tell was recently featured in my Music 3.0 Internet Music Guidebook) recently posted a great overview of three of the most high profile direct-to-fan platforms (D2F for short).

D2F marketing is what every artist and band should be doing, but it takes a lot of time and a good bit of expertise. As a result, a number of companies have developed services that enable you to do D2F quicker and easier than you could do yourself. Let's take a look at an excerpt from their post. You can go directly to Oniracom's site for the full overview and their conclusion of who does the best job.


BANDBOX
Bandbox is a widget that you embed on your blog, website, and/or social profile that enables fans to directly purchase digital downloads, order full CD’s, and other merch bundles without having to navigate them away from your website or social profile.

Why it’s cool
It’s free and it’s right there! The fan doesn’t have to go looking for your songs on an online store or separate download application. Which is why Bandbox is great for independent and up-and-coming artists. This platform also enables you to set your own price for songs and physical products, which means each artist controls their own store.

In addition, Bandbox also gives you access to consumer data (e-mail and shipping address) to see who is buying your songs. This information is great for geo-targeting fans later on down the line.

TOPSPIN
The Topspin D2F platform consists of three components; a retail channel on social sites, blogs and websites, promotional widgets that drive and track traffic, and campaign management through integrated Google Analytics E-commerce reporting.

The embedded shopping cart enables you to sell customized merchandise and product bundles, where you are able to set your own prices and promotional agendas. Topspin is one of the few platforms that advocates a fan/customer support system.

Why it’s cool
Topspin is the only site that accepts international currencies and allows you to fulfill physical product shipments from any warehouse in the world. Topspin provides detailed information about each fan, which allows you to track specific fan behavior profiles.

The Topspin Knowledgebase is a great way to learn the basics of direct-to-fan marketing and how using their product can benefit both you and your audience. They did an excellent job at providing a user-friendly resource to go to with any questions or concerns, check it out here.

NIMBIT
The Nimbit D2F platform is comprised of three parts, Marketing, Direct Sales, and Business Management. Managed all from one Nimbit dashboard. Nimbit does not choose to utilize a marketing widget like the other two platforms, instead they capture fans through e-mail lists and sign-ups, in a customized store front that matches the skinning on your site or social profile.

Every time someone downloads a free track or purchases anything from your site, they automatically get added to your e-mail list. Which allows the artist to see what each fan is purchasing, where they are purchasing from and gives you a means to contact them, in order to sustain that reciprocal relationship between artist and fan.

Nimbit also utilizes very detailed analytics, click thoughts and geo-targeting features, that enable you to easily segment and customize your marketing campaign. Features include a fan list manager, content manager, campaign manager, message editor and custom search windows.

On the storefront, every Nimbit account includes digital and physical fulfillment, which means you don’t have to worry about shipping anything out to anyone, anywhere. Other features include nimbitskin, (allows for the customization of the retail store), Mystore and nimbitOMT (a channel to embed across your social profits).

Why it’s cool
It’s totally easy and user-friendly. Catalog and content management allows you to submit content once into the Nimbit dashboard and you can instantly add it across all of your social networks, blog, calendar and website, (I’m still uncertain about how this works for tour dates). But, it does provide the fans the opportunity to instantly buy tickets from you website or social profile.

People who don’t know how to write professional messages to send out in an e-blast can choose from a template and fill in the blank with a promo code to get free tracks. It tracks each fan’s activity for you, which allows you to foster a better relationship with the “super fans.”

Nimbit provides a means to capture fans as soon as they purchase a digital download or any other product from your customized storefront. This site also integrates text messaging into their marketing campaigns more so then any other site, which is definitely the next step in social media.

For the complete article and their opinion of who does the best job, go this page on the Oniracom's site.

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Follow me on Twitter for daily news and updates on production and the music business.

Check out my Big Picture blog for discussion on common music, engineering and production tips and tricks.