Welcome [back] to another week of your weekly dose 🎶

Every Tuesday, I’ll be sharing tips, updates, and must-know music marketing insights to help you get your music heard!

By Finch Bergling

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This week's newsletter is sponsored by... me 😀

I would like to introduce you to "More Than Streams 🧩" - the weekly music marketing podcast that will teach you how to get, you guessed it, more than streams.

Listen to the most relevant music marketing tips, case studies, interviews, and everything you need to grow your music career.

Today's episode - "Inside My $4,000/month Playlist Business"

LISTEN TO MORE THAN STREAMS 🧩

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Your Weekly Tip

When should you promote your song - before or after release? And what does it have to do with Charlie Puth?

My friend asked me an important question yesterday that I think you're wondering about too:

If you have a finished song and you believe in its potential, does it matter if you promote it before it's out, or work hard on promotion post-release?

Here's exactly what I think - and the answer depends on your situation.
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If you don't have time to plan and create content:

Simple problem, simple solution.

Post 2-3 times pre-release, then post as much as you can post-release.

Focus on playlist and ad promotion after the song is out, and use social media to get your current audience excited about your new song.

A successful release campaign sometimes takes 10+ pieces of quality content, or 50+ pieces of lower-effort ones.

If you can't reach that level, post-release is your strategy.
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If you can plan and execute a proper content strategy:

A good pre-release strategy can be very impactful for a few reasons:

1. You can show Spotify's editors that your song has potential, which will make them more likely to add your song to their editorial playlists. A good song isn't enough - sometimes they want to see that people already like the song, and you can prove that by showing your promotion results when you pitch to them.
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2. Pre-saves can help on release day - with a pre-release campaign you can start collecting pre-saves, which will make you release your music with less stress. Knowing that you have 1,000 saves on release day will remove the panic and give a good signal to the Spotify algorithm to push your song to more people.
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3. People like to feel exclusive - people like to say "I knew this artist/song before it was famous." You can give listeners a chance to be an exclusive supporter, which you can't do when the song is already out there.
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4. Building anticipation makes someone appreciate the song even more. After waiting a few weeks for the release, once it's out there, the listener might stream the song 10 times a day.

Overall, a good pre-release campaign can give the song a massive boost that it can't normally get post-release.

So, bottom line - if you're considering putting all the effort post-release or pre-release, do it pre-release, and if you can, start even 6 months before releasing the song.

Once the song is out there, don't take your foot off the gas - now post more and remind everyone the song is out.
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Practically, what kind of strategy should you use for a pre-release campaign?
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Option 1 - Involve the audience in the creation of the song

The first example I want to give is Charlie Puth's song "Light Switch."

Charlie teased the song months before he released it and made it look like he created it from scratch with the audience.

It started with the first idea, "what if there was a song that started off like..." and then some mouth noises.

Over time, he created more videos showing how he was building the song, while asking his followers what they thought and if they had suggestions.
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Charlie already had a huge audience when he started teasing the song, which is why I like my second example even better: Sadie Jean.

Sadie had 0 fans when she started sharing her song "wyd now" months before she released it.

And it all started when she did an open verse challenge - she sang the first part of the song, then asked her followers to sing the second part.

Thousands of people on TikTok created their own version of the song, which made it blow up.

Sadie kept doing this kind of challenge until her release day, where she got 1M streams in a very short time.

Conclusion: Engagement from your audience helps push your content further, and making the audience part of the song makes them more invested and likely to care about it.
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Option 2 - Get it stuck in their head

If your song has a catchy part - sing it over and over again.

Once someone engages with your video once, they will start seeing your other videos, and if you keep playing or singing that catchy part of the song, it will get stuck in their head so much that they will beg you to release the song.

Imagine you started teasing the song for 90 days and you post 90 pieces of content. That's 90 times someone might hear one part of the song.

You can't do this post-release because you can't build anticipation, and after a few weeks, the release momentum is already lost.

An example of this is the band Father of Peace (which I also mentioned last week).

They played a very catchy part of their song over and over again, and it got stuck in my head, which is why I had to pre-save the song and stream it on release day.
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And now...

Those 2 pre-release methods only work with a good song, quality content, and consistency.

If you're lacking one of them, that's why you don't see results.

Don't give up too soon. And if you don't have time to promote your music properly, don't wonder why it doesn't reach people.

My advice is - Pick one approach based on your available time and energy, then commit to it fully. Half-hearted promotion in either direction won't get you the results you want.

Let me know if you have any questions about this strategy by replying to this email!

Finch

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Your Weekly Reel Idea

Since I already mentioned Sadie Jean and the impact of her open verse challenge, here's your own version to try.

Create an open verse challenge with your upcoming song - sing the last line of your chorus, then let the instrumental verse play while asking your audience to duet the video and add their own verse.

📝 Want to watch this full content idea + hundreds more? Find this and hundreds of other proven content ideas inside my 'Content Vault'. Click here to unlock lifetime access to the full collection - never run out of content ideas again!

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Let's work together

• ​Submit your music to my Spotify Playlists.
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• Get my new $1 training - "Turning Playlists Into Fans."
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• Learn step-by-step promotion strategies with Your First Hit Song 2026.
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• ​Book a 1-1 consultation.
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• ​Build a playlist and grow your streams, email list and fanbase.

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That’s it for this week! Hope today’s email gave you something useful to work with.

Until next week, Finch 🎶

P.S. Newsletters aren’t social media - I can’t see what you’re enjoying unless you tell me. Hit reply and let me know what you liked (or didn’t) - I’d love to hear from you! 😊

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