231 – How to Get Millions of Streams on Spotify – with Isabella Bedoya of Fame Hackers

Would you like to get your music streamed millions of times on Spotify? What if there was a proven step-by-step process you could follow to achieve that goal? That’s what we’re going to be looking at in this episode of The New Music Industry Podcast. Podcast Highlights: 00:25 – Owner of Fame Hackers Isabella Bedoya 01:34 – Approach to digital marketing and e-commerce 03:06 – Why Spotify? 04:50 – The importance of being fan-centric 08:16 – How do we go about finding our ideal fans? 11:30 – Why is it so important that artists optimize their brand to attract their ideal listeners? 13:50 – Getting the right kind of PR and playlisting 18:16 – Is maximizing your revenue as simple as growing your fan base? 20:35 – Sales funnels for musicians 22:09 – Who not how 24:02 – Can artists get millions of streams? 26:32 – What's the last YouTube video Isabella watched? 27:02 – What's Isabella’s daily routine like? 28:47 – What is the greatest challenge Isabella has overcome? 30:12 – What is the greatest victory Isabella has experienced? 31:00 – Are there any books that helped Isabella on her journey? 32:29 – The Renegade Musician Transcription: David Andrew Wiebe: Today I'm chatting with the founder of Fame Hackers, Isabella Bedoya. How are you today, Isabella? Isabella Bedoya: Hey, David. Thanks for having me here today. David: Yeah, thanks so much for joining me. So today, you run Fame Hackers but when you used to work as an A&R for a label under Sony Music, what led to you doing what you do today and what has your trajectory been like? Isabella: Such a great question. Back in the day when I used to be an A&R, I quickly realized that the very first thing that people are like, or like at least labels are looking for are artists that have a social media following that's real, high quality, authentic, essentially demonstrate that they have a fan base, and that they also can monetize that. Right? So basically, I understood that as long as you have digital marketing and ecommerce principles as part of your music career, then you can make it successfully as an independent artist. So yeah, once I figured that out, then I was like, "Okay, cool. So, if you can just teach an artist how to do this, there wouldn't be so many starving artists in coats, right?" That's how I got to where I am today, just that desire to help. David: That's awesome. And yeah, you're totally spot on. It is so challenging, I think, to convince musicians that they have to learn digital marketing or eCommerce principles. So, I know you have your own approach to that. What is your answer to that? Isabella: I mean, honestly, it is one of the most challenging things to teach artists and musicians because also... And I don't think it's their fault exactly but I also think it's because of the way that society thinks that independent artists are like starving artists and it's a hobby, and it's a pipe dream, you're never going to make it. So immediately, you have these very talented, gifted individuals that are not able to actually live up to their full potential just from the way that they were raised. And it's not even on the parents. It's just society in general. That's how the majority treats musicians. So, when you first get them to actually step out of that and actually realize that they're super valuable, and worthy, and talented, and then you just teach them how to market themselves in a way where you're not also being kind of like slimy and icky because I know that's something that comes up a lot where people don't want to be like sellouts. But yeah, it's just teaching the people the right approach of how to show yourself in a way that is going to be beneficial for everyone. David: Yeah, I like what you said a lot about being valuable and worthy. That's kind of the theme of the eBook I just came out with today - not an April Fool's joke. It's The Renegade Musician and it's at gum.co/RenegadeMusician. I might send you a free copy there Isabella in case you want to check it out but it's definitely about artist empowerment. I feel like it's a timely important message for musicians. Now, I know one of today's theme is going to be Spotify. I've been chomping at the bit to do an episode about this because I know it's been trending for a long time. And it's very much alive and well. I think I really just needed the right guest to talk about it but I'm going to be the devil's advocate right away and say, "Why Spotify? Isn't it's super crowded? Doesn't it pay less than a cent per stream?" Isabella: Absolutely. First of all, David, I would absolutely love a copy of the book. That is so amazing that you wrote that. And, you know, Spotify is one of those things where it's like a really useful tool but it gives you a false hope or a false perception of success. Right? I'm kind of diving a little bit deeper on that. What I mean by false perception of success is so many people place so much importance on getting streams and getting this number of streams up. Although that's a good metric, at the end of the day, those are kind of like your passive listeners, not necessarily your active audience or your active fans. So, a lot of the services out there, they're like super shady playlist stirs or playlist pluggers, or the services that artists are spending their hard-earned money on things that aren't really going to move the needle forward. And a lot of them are fake playlists, which can then harm your whole entire song on Spotify. So, it's just one of those things where you just have to be really, really careful but also understanding, you know, at the end of the day it's the fans that help you make it. David: Yeah. And you mentioned a lot of things there that we're going to dive deeper into, including the bit about passive and active listeners. I think I found that compelling, and it's a really important thing to dive into. I think, first, you're a big advocate of building that strong fan base. You talk about the importance of being fan centric as an artist. I definitely agree but why is that so significant? Isabella: Well, that's a great question because especially in today's world, where everybody is an influencer, everybody's a founder, everybody's a podcaster, right, everybody has merch, we're at war for attention. It's very simple. We're at war for attention. And then the people that are successful, gaining over the attention, those are the people that are actually being successful and making a living off of it, whether they're influencers or brands, or whatever it is. So, when you become fan centric, you're literally placing your fan as your number one consumer. That's the most important part of your movement. They're going to support you. They're going to love you. But in return, you have to show that same level of respect for them. So, if you really think about it, it's kind of like having stellar customer service for the fans. And when you can become that person, right, where you can actually make the fan the centre of your universe, you always make them happy, you provide for them, they're going to do that plus more tenfold. So that's one of the reasons why I think independent artists should start being more fan centric. David: From your perspective, is that different from the traditional model somehow, where artist getting away with not interacting with their fans? Or are we just in an age now where we have to be even more diligent about engaging our fans? Isabella: I think it's, of course, on a case-by-case basis, but there's a lot of... in terms of people that aren't really being engaged with their fans. I think now more than ever, we're in the age of accessibility. So, we have to be accessible. And there's a lot of artists out there that they've read blogs or books or whatever, they just have this idea or notion that just because they're artists, that they have to have a barrier between them and their fans, or that they're, you know, a little bit more of a higher pedestal maybe because they get a little bit more clout and exposure. But at the end of the day, if you really want to be successful, and we see the big artists do it, right, like Taylor Swift has a whole department dedicated for her fans because she gets it. So, I think if you really like... and this is what we're saying too. If you really want to be successful with your music on social media and have that digital presence, you have to place your fans first and open up the level of accessibility with them. David: Right. So, you could have a mysterious personality. You probably just couldn't be like Prince and be a recluse in practice all the time and get away with it. Isabella: I mean, even then, right? You can still be super mysterious but just saying hello, or commenting back, or DMing them, just engaging with them in your own mysterious ways too, right, if that's your brand you're going for. But it's just that level of interaction that it's really interesting because it's on a psychological level. If you get a notification on your phone from Instagram, it releases dopamine, right? So, it makes you feel good. So, if you're getting that dopamine, and then it just happened to be by one of your favorite artists or like someone that you're going to like, that's going to increase that level of loyalty. Like, "Oh my gosh, I feel so special." Such and such just like my comment. David: That's a big thing that I was learning from my coach recently. He has a course called Conversational Conversions. People can find it if they want for just $9 over at SuperfastResults.com. It's ridiculous. The number one thing that I learned was, anytime anyone follows you, just say hi and thank the person for following them. If you want to go a step further, you could send them a video too thanking them. That can be unscalable but at least initially that can create a stronger engagement. Isabella: Absolutely.