Marketing Your Music This Halloween: 5 Tips

Halloween is just around the corner, bringing with it a whole host of opportunities for artists looking to give their music a spooky marketing boost.

Guest post by James Shotwell of Haulix

The spookiest time of year is here, and the opportunities to boost your career with timely marketing efforts are endless.

Halloween and music go together like flesh and bone. Both bring people together, and both have the potential to make everyday people feel special, even if only for a moment. So, why doesn’t the music industry capitalize on the spooky season with timely music marketing? Your guess is as good as ours.

Aside from a select few groups who are synonymous with Halloween (Ice Nine Kills, Rob Zombie, Motionless In White, etc.), the vast majority of artists only mention Halloween when it’s time to share their costume. That effort always creates engagement with fans, but it leaves a lot of potentially incredible community-building opportunities unexplored.

Don’t follow the pack. This Halloween, we want you to make every effort possible to engage your audience, build your community, and raise awareness for the excellent music you work hard to promote, all while having fun. We’ve got five tips to get you started, and we’ll tell you about them all in the latest Music Biz 101. Check it out:

For those without the time or ability to watch our finely crafted video, here are a few quick tips to get you started:

• Brand Refresh. Go through your online presence and find simple ways to leverage Halloween aesthetics to temporary update your presence. Some easy examples include changing your profile picture, changing the theme of your Twitter page, and change your social handles to include ‘spooky’ content such as skulls or pumpkins.
  
• Exclusive merch. Fans love feeling like they are part of something special. Create limited edition merch that is only available until Halloween utilizing seasonal trends. Fans most likely won’t receive the items in time for Halloween this year, but they will be ready for 2021 and beyond.
  
• New music. Every listener wants something new. Artists trying to deliver something special could choose to record a Halloween-themed original or cover a holiday classic. The Nightmare Before Christmas has many songs to choose from, but the “Monster Mash” never goes out of style.
  
• Livestream Event. COVID-19 will (hopefully) prevent any mass gatherings this October, so give your fans something to do with a special one-night-only online event. You don’t have to perform, per se, but do make yourself available. Fans will appreciate having a place to go to be around people with similar interests (which, in this case, means your music).
  
• Costume Contest. You can add this idea to your livestream event or leave it as a standalone competition. Challenge your fans to make costumes inspired by your music. Share their creativity online to engage the community further and give a prize (or multiple prizes) to the ones who blow you away.

We’ve added an extra suggestion to the video, but you’ll haver to watch it for the reveal. Good luck!