6 ways soca artistes can earn money digitally

It’s Carnival season again and there has never been a better time to become an artiste in the world of soca music!

When we look at the search data for soca music, it is being searched from by countries all over the world like the Philippines, Uruguay, Slovenia, Austria, Uganda, Nicaragua and so much more.

As soca music continues to penetrate parts of the world like never before, now is a great time for artistes to start thinking about how can they earn money digitally beyond just the norm of performances.

These are ways that can complement your revenue streams as an artiste and allow you to earn money from supporters, regardless of where they are in the world. As the music continues to grow, you are going to want to have these things in place to capitalise.

Here are six ways an artiste can earn money digitally:

1. Live studio sessions

2. Crowdfunding

3. Website and You Tube monetisation

4. Merch

5. Podcasts or vlogs

6. NFTs

Live studio session: One of the things I would love to see more artistes do is give us the journey through the process. Fans would love to see the insides of a studio session or maybe you working on the lyrics to a song. You can have paid stream showcasing sessions and your fans would love to support, you if it meant getting exclusive access.

Crowdfunding: There are several ways for you to monetise your audience. One way that’s gained popularity over the years that we don’t see in the soca community is using crowdfunding platforms like Patreon, Hy.Page, Tribe, Podia, Memberful, Liberapay, Buy me a Coffee and Ko-Fi. There are many more but the goal is to give your audience options to support you by subscribing to a monthly fee to gain access to exclusive content and other perks.

Website and You Tube monetisation: To this day, most artistes still don’t have their websites or understand how they can help to grow their brands, all the while generating an income for them. They can set up Google Ad Sense for ads to run on the website and the more traffic that comes, Google cuts a monthly cheque or they could sell ad space themselves on the site. We also need to see more artistes starting their own YouTube channels, creating content on their channels and earning money through You Tube. If you are still posting
all of your content on social media, you need to start thinking about how you can add You Tube to the access and start generating income from the platform.

Merch: This one is self-explanatory but still not one we see artistes taking advantage of. Check out platforms like Printful and Teespring that allow you to create a wide assortment of merch for your brand and they handle the payments and fulfilment of the orders to your global audience. The only thing you need to do is design your merch and promote it, these services will handle everything else and send the money to your PayPal account.

Podcasts or vlogs: This is another thing you can create that will give your audience a new light to see you outside of just the music. Create a podcast or vlog about topics you care about and you can monetise through advertising, and sponsorships, the podcast platforms house monetisation programmes and also drive traffic to your merch or affiliate programs.

NFTs: Connect with an NFT expert and start learning what types of digital assets you can create and turn into NFTs. NFTs will become big for artiste since they empower social commerce. Your fans can now purchase exclusives, and resell them for a profit, whilst you will continue earning money off of every sale of the NFTs due to how the technology works. Now is the best time to learn all you can about NFTs and your music.

Start thinking about how your brand can create multiple streams of income besides the gigs you get booked for. Remember, you won’t be able to physically be at every single party or event in the world but your fans will still want to support and consume your art. Start adding various digital ways to earn money, so that you can expand your brand's earning potential and satisfy your fans in all parts of the world.

Keron Rose is a digital strategist who works with Caribbean businesses. Learn more at KeronRose.com or check out the Digipreneur FM podcast on Apple Podcast/Spotify/Google Podcast.