The prevailing music industry knowledge of the last 5 years is that social media is critical to building a career. But results from a recent MIDiA study may challenge the notion that social media virality builds music fandom.
The study from MIDiA research is dubbed "All Eyes, No Ears: Why Virality Is Not Building Fandom." And because the music industry in particular has spent so much energy investing in social media as the cornerstone of artist discovery and growth, it's sure to raise a few eyebrows.
Why The Music Industry Needs Social Media Virality To Drive Fandom
Why is it so critical for social media to be a viable driver of music consumption? In part because it's such an affordable means of promotion. In the past, global promotion of music required things like radio tours, press junkets, music videos, opening touring slots, and more.
In their heyday, labels could afford to pump millions of dollars into ten artists with the hope that one or two of them would break — because they would pay for it all and then some. But now, sustainable music careers are all about operating lean and finding the right niche.
Now, so much of that has been replaced by trying to get viral social media posts with a song in them.
"The theory is simple: virality leads to streams, streams lead to fandom, and fandom leads to long-term, sustainable artist careers," the study's authors say. "With fandom pivotal for sustainable growth, the music industry does not simply want this vision to work – it needs it to. However, cracks are showing in social’s social contract."
And that presents a big problem.
Social media has, in many ways, changed how critical elements of the music industry work, including artist development and A&R (the process of finding, recruiting, and nurturing music talent). A lot of labels decided they would just let social media platforms "do it for them." Even if they invested tens of thousands of dollars on influencer campaigns, these costs were a fraction of what they would previously spend to market an artist.
An artist would go viral on a platform like TikTok, labels would jockey to sign that artist (often to a one-song deal), and then reap the financial benefits of that deal. Meanwhile, the artist may or may not actually get the development and resources they need to turn a viral hit into a sustainable career.
Within a matter of a year or so, the music industry embraced the idea that artist discovery and promotion should be the cheapest and easiest part of the process — one that an artist should be able to do themselves, in many cases, via social media. It is a complete 180º from decades past.
But if social media virality isn't actually driving more streams and building more fans anymore, well, then the industry has a major problem.
Key Takeaways From The Study
The study involved about 10,000 consumers across different platforms. The primary focus for social platforms was YouTube, Instagram, and TikTok. The study found that:
- YouTube is the largest source for music discovery, with 52 percent of respondents saying they discover music on the platform. Seven different sources had at least 10 percent of respondents saying they discover music through that source. The order from greatest to least, according to the study, is YouTube, streaming platforms, TikTok, other social media, radio, sync (in TV and film), and word of mouth.
- 87 percent of respondents say they hear music on social media, but 58 percent of them say they heard it somewhere else first.
- Almost half of users did not stream music after hearing it on social media in the prior month.
- There is a growing age gap in music discovery. Today's people aged 16 to 24 are less likely to discover a new artist they love in the last year versus people aged 25 to 34. This may represent the first time that a younger demographic isn't associated with new music discovery more than their older peers.
- TikTok is the platform least likely to convert listeners to fans, with only 26 percent of TikTok users saying they listen to more of an artist's music, compared to 45 percent from the other platforms.
There are plenty of other interesting tidbits as well, but the cause for concern stems from a handful of these findings.
First, the fact that people aged 16 to 24 are not discovering new music as much as their older peers. That combined with the fact that nearly half of respondents did not seek tout new music after discovering it and only one third of respondents became fans of an artist suggests social media is far from the fan-maker the industry believes it to be.
Algorithms, Follows, And The Myth Of Social Media Virality
The study also found that the more reliant users are on social media algorithms (like the "For You" page), the less likely they are to discover music. They are also less likely to go out and search for it on their platforms, meaning the industry is betting on algorithmic pushes to reach new fans, but those fans are in fact less likely to stream music (and those algorithmic pushes are less likely to contain music).
Similarly, the study found that when a user discovers an artist on TikTok, they are more likely to follow that artist (35 percent) than they are to go listen to that artist's music (23 percent). "When TikTok users discover artists, they are more interested in following their content than in listening to their music on streaming platforms," the study's authors say. "TikTok is driving more TikTok consumption rather than streaming consumption."
Perhaps even more disheartening: close the 75 percent of the users who follow an artist on TikTok do not choose to go discover that artist's music. In fact, the platforms are working harder to keep users on them instead of driving users away to streaming. This means, according to the study, that "social is both a consumption end-point and a context-less place of discovery."
Basically, that means that when an artist goes viral, they are more likely to gain followers, who are more likely to stay on the platform and not listen to their music.
So Is Social Media Pointless, Then?
While social media is still a driver of fandom, there are clear cracks in the funnel. Does this mean that using social media to build your fandom is pointless, then?
Definitely not. But it does mean that we're probably seeing more of a balancing out of priorities.
Particularly for artists with smaller followings, there is more to gain from consistently posting on social media and growing your following. After all, even if there is less of an effect on music consumption than we thought — there definitely still is some. Virality may not lead to a sustainable career, but it's definitely a piece of the puzzle. Even if you don't go viral with your music, the more you post, the more chances you have to make fans — even if it's at a declining rate.
For many, this juice is definitely still worth the squeeze. But it's not the only fruit you should be paying attention to, either. Many artists have focused almost solely on social media (often because they were told that's all that matters). So they may put a ton of effort and time into curating their content, but they haven't put much thought into the other elements that were traditionally important to building a sustainable career in music.
Curating a strong social media presence should probably only be 15 to 20 percent of your focus as an artist. You should also be thinking about creating better opportunities to engage and monetize your fans, whether it's in fan clubs and livestreams or live performances or long-form content. (It's never too late to start a YouTube channel!). Of course, songwriting, rehearsing, and recording should be the plurality of your focus.
Independent artists can make these tweaks themselves and hopefully adapt. Artists who are pretty much told constantly by their label to "post more" may have a harder time navigating the realities of dwindling returns on social media investment.
But if the industry doesn't realize they may have put too many eggs into the TikTok basket now, they'll be in for a rude awakening as social media continues to drop in terms of places to build legitimate, sustainable fans.