#323: Talkin' TikTok Trends - How to Use Them for Your Music Promo

12/23/22 • 100 min

TikTok is a powerful platform for music discovery; your songs and videos can reach the right new fans because of TikTok's algorithm. But did you know it's also one of the best places to find inspiration and showcase your quirkiness.

TikTok travels at the speed of memes, and that means there's a constant churn of humor, skits, trending audio, fun filters, and more. Conversations to join. Creative collaborations. Things to imitate or spin your own unique way. More than other entertainment or social apps for artists, TikTok frees you of always needing to be the prime instigator and driver of every piece of content.

In this episode we talk with multi-instrumentalist, TikTok connoisseur, and CD Baby's social media expert Rachel Bearinger — all about the culture of TikTok, how to source inspo, stay organized on the app, and keep up with the pace of a platform that thrives on memetic energy.

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BONUS EPISODE: Viral Success for Niche Music - How TikTok Worked for Windborne

How does niche music reach millions on TikTok? In this discussion from 2022's DIY Musician Conference, CD Baby's Chris Robley spoke with Jeremy Carter-Gordon of the vocal group Windborne.

Not only have Windborne's videos gone massively viral, but the group grew their TikTok audience while staying true to how they want to perform and represent their music.

In other words: Windborne didn't work for TikTok. TikTok worked for them. And in this session, we break down the story, the strategy, and their editing and caption tricks. We also analyze fun example videos along the way!

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#324: Music Predictions for 2023

n some ways, 2022 felt like another year on pause. In other ways, the past 12 months passed in the blink of an eye. How did music trends (and the music industry) change this year? And what are our biggest predictions for music marketing, music creation, and music consumption in 2023?