Amazon Music 'For Artists' - Under The Hood
Before 2020 took a turn for the worst with the COVID-19 pandemic, Amazon Music released their newest ‘For Artists’ feature which may have been overlooked. Here is everything you need to know about it.
The mobile app, available in both ios and Android, has some similar features as Spotify and Apple music’s “For Artists” app. This includes real time streaming and fan analytics. Artists can view where fans, and super fans, are based on location and also have the ability to keep track of what playlists or stations are featuring their songs.
One feature not offered on other platforms is the ability to see how songs are trending via Alexa on Amazon music. The app displays an artist’s total number of voice requests and well as the different ways people request the songs, such as by song, album, artist, or lyrics. Checking the ‘Daily Voice Index’ provides insights as to how an artist is performing (with Alexa Searches) vs other musicians in similar sized audiences. It uses a sliding scale that moves from Cool to Warm to Hot to Fire. Alexa gives fans the ability to use voice commands in various ways such as setting alarms to certain songs and asking to be notified upon new releases from favorite artists. Amazon Music’s director said that “Alexa play..” is the 2nd most popular command used. This data will give artists more details to focus on their marketing strategy. The app refreshes with current analytics every few hours to provide the most up to date stats.
Lyrics on Amazon Music makes it easy for listeners to follow along with the song since the song lyrics are displayed line-by-line while your music plays. Fans can jump to any part of the song by just tapping on a lyric. Amazon Music licenses lyrics from both LyricFind and MusixMatch to provide this experience. The lyric data is also tied to the voice platform so fans using Alexa can search for you song by lyrics by simply asking “play the song that goes..”
Another key feature and one of my favorites for artists is the ability to use amazon to sell merchandise to your fans. Fans that follow you will be able to see all your offered merchandise for purchase directly on the app. As an artist you have few options as to selling. If you already have premade merchandise you can either opt to ship to your fans directly or ship it to an amazon fulfillment center where they will ship all orders once purchased. Artists can also choose to upload their own designs and Amazon will take care of printing and shipping on a per order basis.
As far as streaming services go, Spotify recently earned the #1 spot with the most listeners surpassing Pandora. Amazon music has a smaller listener base but showed promising growth in 2019 with 38.7 million listeners, up 27% from 2018.
It is important for artists to be active on as many platforms as possible. Each fan is different and will use different methods for listening to their favorite songs. As with Spotify, Artists can ask their fans to ‘follow’ their artist page on Amazon Music for the latest updates on releases.