A couple of years ago, I opened a small marketing agency called The Tune Farm. We help independent artists and labels — and part of the job is helping those artists understand the industry a little bit better. Along the way, a few common themes keep coming up. This is one of them.
Sooner or later, nearly every independent artist I work with asks the same question: “How do I get more streams?” It’s a fair question. Streams are visible, countable and easy to compare. But I’ve started answering with a different question: “How do I get more fans?” They sound like the same thing. They’re not. And the strategies that answer each one can send an artist in very different directions.
A stream is a play. That’s it. It tells you a song was heard — or at least started. A fan is something else entirely. A fan is a person who connects with the artist and wants to hear more. Streams can absolutely help with discovery. A playlist add or an algorithmic boost can put a song in front of thousands of new ears. But a big stream count doesn’t prove a lasting audience is forming. Ten thousand plays from ten thousand passersby isn’t the same as a thousand people who’ll show up for whatever comes next.
From Impressions to Fans
When I started my agency, I was selling impressions. Reach, frequency, ears — the language I’d spoken for years in radio and media. It took me a while to admit what was staring me in the face. Impressions are exposure. They aren’t fans. Someone who sees your ad or hears your song in the background hasn’t made a decision about you yet.
That realization reshaped the work we do at The Tune Farm. Today, our boutique label services are built around one goal: turning attention into an audience that sticks around.
Credit where it’s due — Seth Resler and his Community Marketing Revolution were influential in helping me develop this thinking. Community gets at something marketers often miss. Content gets consumed. Community gets returned to. The relationships that matter are the ones that bring people back. Not because an algorithm served them something, but because they feel connected to the artist on the other end.
The P1 Lesson Radio Already Taught Us
Radio people already understand this. Every station has the casual listener — the person who punches you up on the drive to work because you’re the third preset. And every station has the P1. That’s the superfan who lives on your frequency, knows the jocks by name and defends the station at the backyard barbecue.
Programmers used to hope that P1 would end up with a diary or a meter. If your most loyal listener happened to get measured, your numbers could look great — and you could look like a genius. The data could reflect loyalty. But it also depended on who got measured.
Artists face a version of that same truth. A stream count tells you about plays. It doesn’t tell you who’s actually in your corner.
The Playlist Trap
Here’s the mistake I see most often with smaller artists. They pour their energy — and often their money — into playlist placement and stream curation instead of building a fan base. I understand the appeal. Playlists can generate plays, and plays feel like progress.
But if the goal is to develop a single, and ultimately a career, that focus can be a misstep. A playlist listener may hear your song sandwiched between two others and never think about you again. The play counts. The connection doesn’t happen.
So ask better questions. Are listeners coming back? Are they following you? And are they exploring other songs in your catalog? Will they buy a ticket when you play their town? Will they be there to support the next release?
Those behaviors point toward a relationship. And relationships are what lead to a more sustainable path to monetization. A career built on fans doesn’t reset to zero every time a new single drops.
The data is starting to back this up. A recent Luminate case study, commissioned by Meta, looked at artists using Instagram to connect with fans. Artists whose streaming growth tracked closely with their Instagram engagement saw median streams climb 23% year over year — compared with 3% for artists overall. And when artists posted original Reels through Instagram’s Artist Activations program, backed by Meta’s ad support, off-platform streaming rose about 10% over the following five weeks.
Build the connection, and the streams tend to follow.
A Better Measure of Progress
Streams matter. I’m not telling anyone to ignore them. They’re a signal, and discovery has to start somewhere. But they’re not the whole goal.
The artists who last are the ones who stop asking, “How many people played the song?” and start asking, “How many people might come back for the next one?” That’s the number worth building.
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