Marketing 101
YES… you do need to help with the marketing of your music. You are self-publishing after all. That being said, we are a team and we’ll be doing this together!
CONTEXT
Marketing is “the action… of promoting… products” (Google definitions). SLM is a digital platform that acts as a distribution hub for composers to publish and disseminate their liturgical compositions. The idea is that individually, our presence in this market is very small making it very difficult to promote our own product. Together, our presence has become bigger and very much known. This collective effort has given us the ability to promote our products well.
But here’s the kicker – SL cannot promote every individual work. Nor can we publicize every individual composer. Instead, we’ve learned that it is our job to promote the company itself and to explain this unique platform we’ve created. Your job, then, is to let everyone know that your product can be found on SLM.
So…
- SLM’s job is to make SLM known to the world.
- Your job is to make it known that your music can be found on SLM.
You might be saying, but my “presence” is still small. How should I make it known that my music is on SLM? Why would that make a difference? Think of this as a snowball effect. Simply Liturgical is advertising our SLM platform on social media and working with NPM, ONELICENSE, the USCCB, individual diocesan offices, and other entities around the US and beyond to make it known that our hub exists. While we do this, the dozens of composers that we work with all are reaching out to their circles of influence (friends, family, social media, parishes, diocese) inviting them to look at their own music on the SLM platform. Together, we are creating an ever-growing marketing net that will simply compound as the company grows. But you can see that without the help of composers self-promoting, the net doesn’t reach nearly as far.
How to promote your music?
Here are our tips for effectively promoting your music once it’s available on the SLM site:
- Make announcements on all your own social media platforms (& all applicable groups within those platforms).
- Spread the word to all those in your own liturgical circles – local parishes, friends from NPM, etc.
- If applicable, make announcements on your own website(s).
- Keep doing it over and over!!
- Promoting your music when it comes out is extremely important, but it is equally important to continue promoting in the months and years after.
- Suggested times to continue promoting:
- In the weeks leading up to a feast/Sunday/celebration it would work well for: “‘x’ has a perfect tie-in to the Gospel…”
- On the anniversary of its initial release date: “I can’t believe it’s been 3 years since…”
- Just for fun on a random day: “I was thinking about when I wrote ‘x’ today…”
- HAVE FUN!! There is a great joy that comes with this ministry and it is often poured out through our composing, so have fun sharing that joy with others!