Social Media’s Role in the Music Industry

The modern music industry and social media networks have become inseparable in the past year. On top of the advent of digital music, record labels and musicians are continuously adapting to the endless possibilities of the social media world, incorporating its features and new advents as a way to reach out to the scene and expand their fan base. In particular, Facebook has taken a predominant role with many musicians and bands, allowing them to interact directly with their supporters and spread developments about their music, tour schedules, and essentially anything else they wish to throw out there.

Facebook is one of the most popular tools by bands and labels to promote music. Avid Facebook users 'Like' their favorite bands and become connected to the everyday happenings of their world. Sometimes bands will post up interesting reads relevant to their genre of music, while other times a simple shout-out to fans will be enough to stir up the Facebook page. Social media's presence allows musicians to connect to fans and supporters like never before. By advertising upcoming shows, offering promotional discounts, holding raffles for free tickets to a performance, or simply asking 'How are you all today?', these bands have built a genuine bond that powerfully resonates with their followers.

Many artists promote others in addition to themselves, creating tighter bonds within the industry as well. In addition, some musicians even gives their Facebook fans an exclusive look into never-before-seen content. As a result, fans of the band feel 'special', for lack of a better word, and soon the band attracts new people to its fan base. Tens become hundreds; hundreds become thousands; thousands become millions; and the band now is now reaching out to fans worldwide, all because of its continued engaging presence on social media networking sites, like Facebook.

Most other social media sites follow the same methodology as Facebook for building a social media presence. By connecting to fans on a whole new level, the music industry has been revolutionized, for better or for worse.