Ep. 164: Music marketing is always changing - and yet the fundamentals stay the same. So what's going to change in 2025 – and how can you change your strategy to make sure you keep cutting through? Liam James Ward is CEO/co-founder of social/digital music marketing agency Something Something, and he joins Music Ally's Joe Sparrow to look ahead.

And it's not just a bunch of hand-waving predictions – Liam digs into shifts he sees coming around some fundamental concepts:

• What does and doesn't work today and how to think about marketing ROI
• How the "vibe marketing" we saw in 2024 was perhaps an attempt to get feeling and curatorship back to the core of the fan experience
• How truly-useful online fan communities are actually about medium-term nurturing instead of trying to leap all the way down the funnel from virality to superfandom
• How niche tastemakers are back and more powerful than before (and why you should partner with them)
• How fans are seeking the feeling of being genuinely connected to friends and fellow fans on social media
• ... and there's a lot more in this Music Ally Focus episode, made in collaboration with Something Something

Liam also talks about the tech and platforms he sees increasing – and decreasing – in influence, and the kind of "big artist" strategies that anyone, regardless of size or fanbase, can use.

Something Something: somethingsomething.social

Guns N' Roses – Appetite For Destruction: youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_n13hmdsIozcCRyaY4cRDuuviphpfbzPrw&si=rbiGgZpb71x-8Rcs

Music Ally Co-Labs: musically.com/music-ally-co-labs

Ep. 162: It's always a Very Special Episode when Music Ally's Head of Insight, Stuart Dredge, joins the Focus podcast, and lo, Stu chats to Joe Sparrow in depth about AI (of course!), music fintech, music ecotech, music healthcare tech and more!

This episode is part of Music Ally's annual music-tech Insight Report, available to Music Ally subscribers.

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