It’s official, Apple Music has finally added the ability to follow artists on its platform.
They’re calling it “Favorites”, but, despite the slightly altered naming convention, this new rollout is very much in the same vein as Spotify’s long-existing “Follow” button.
So let’s examine the specifics of Apple’s newest addition and understand why it matters.
Introducing “Favorites”
Apple Music has added the ability to follow artists with the little “Favorites” star on the bottom right of the artist’s profile page:
When a listener adds an artist to their “Favorites” list in Apple Music, Apple states that “they can find your content faster and stay in-the-know about your latest releases.”
Apple even goes so far as to say that they will “receive notifications when you release new music.”
Sound familiar?
It should.
This is exactly how Spotify’s artist profiles already operate.
Not to mention accounts on every other social platform in the world.
Spotify figured out a long time ago that music is a social affair, and the more invested an artist’s fans can become, the more they’ll use the platform.
Most other music platforms have followed suit: both Amazon Music and Deezer have the ability to “favorite” or “follow” artists, for example.
Apple Music, true to their form of taking their time to add new features, is simply the latest to recognize that the ability to follow increases engagement and, therefore, their bottom line.
What this means for us
Getting listeners, fans, and customers to follow on any given platform is a cornerstone of building a successful artist brand in the digital age.
Followers on Spotify, TikTok, Instagram, YouTube, or anywhere else, are the definitive metric to pursue.
The ability to serve up new content to our fans is what allows our businesses to scale.
If we had to start from square one with every single release, it would be next to impossible to build any long-term equity with our customer base as a business.
The more streaming platforms recognize their need to operate as social platforms in this regard, the better life becomes for all of us.
Unfortunately, in the case of Apple’s new “Favorites” feature, there doesn’t seem to be much indication that we can actually track our follower count at this point.
Hopefully, though, they’ll add some new data points inside Apple Music for Artists in the near future.
The effects on music marketing
The most exciting part about this, for me, is the ability to now pursue the exact same end goal across streaming platforms inside our growth campaigns.
We’ve been able to build in followers on Spotify for a long time, but if we’ve expanded out to include multiple DSPs inside the same campaign, we’ve had to optimize for multiple objectives.
Followers on Spotify, streams on Apple Music, favorites on Deezer, etc.
Now we can send listeners to our artist profile on every platform with the objective of getting them to follow.
This is huge.
And while we still don’t have the rich data feed from Apple that we currently have from Spotify, my guess is they’ll continue to roll out more and more information for us to use to optimize our growth.
And that, to me, is exciting stuff.
It’s official, Apple Music has finally added the ability to follow artists on its platform.
They’re calling it “Favorites”, but, despite the slightly altered naming convention, this new rollout is very much in the same vein as Spotify’s long-existing “Follow” button.
So let’s examine the specifics of Apple’s newest addition and understand why it matters.
Introducing “Favorites”
Apple Music has added the ability to follow artists with the little “Favorites” star on the bottom right of the artist’s profile page:
When a listener adds an artist to their “Favorites” list in Apple Music, Apple states that “they can find your content faster and stay in-the-know about your latest releases.”
Apple even goes so far as to say that they will “receive notifications when you release new music.”
Sound familiar?
It should.
This is exactly how Spotify’s artist profiles already operate.
Not to mention accounts on every other social platform in the world.
Spotify figured out a long time ago that music is a social affair, and the more invested an artist’s fans can become, the more they’ll use the platform.
Most other music platforms have followed suit: both Amazon Music and Deezer have the ability to “favorite” or “follow” artists, for example.
Apple Music, true to their form of taking their time to add new features, is simply the latest to recognize that the ability to follow increases engagement and, therefore, their bottom line.
What this means for us
Getting listeners, fans, and customers to follow on any given platform is a cornerstone of building a successful artist brand in the digital age.
Followers on Spotify, TikTok, Instagram, YouTube, or anywhere else, are the definitive metric to pursue.
The ability to serve up new content to our fans is what allows our businesses to scale.
If we had to start from square one with every single release, it would be next to impossible to build any long-term equity with our customer base as a business.
The more streaming platforms recognize their need to operate as social platforms in this regard, the better life becomes for all of us.
Unfortunately, in the case of Apple’s new “Favorites” feature, there doesn’t seem to be much indication that we can actually track our follower count at this point.
Hopefully, though, they’ll add some new data points inside Apple Music for Artists in the near future.
The effects on music marketing
The most exciting part about this, for me, is the ability to now pursue the exact same end goal across streaming platforms inside our growth campaigns.
We’ve been able to build in followers on Spotify for a long time, but if we’ve expanded out to include multiple DSPs inside the same campaign, we’ve had to optimize for multiple objectives.
Followers on Spotify, streams on Apple Music, favorites on Deezer, etc.
Now we can send listeners to our artist profile on every platform with the objective of getting them to follow.
This is huge.
And while we still don’t have the rich data feed from Apple that we currently have from Spotify, my guess is they’ll continue to roll out more and more information for us to use to optimize our growth.
And that, to me, is exciting stuff.
It’s official, Apple Music has finally added the ability to follow artists on its platform.
They’re calling it “Favorites”, but, despite the slightly altered naming convention, this new rollout is very much in the same vein as Spotify’s long-existing “Follow” button.
So let’s examine the specifics of Apple’s newest addition and understand why it matters.
Introducing “Favorites”
Apple Music has added the ability to follow artists with the little “Favorites” star on the bottom right of the artist’s profile page:
When a listener adds an artist to their “Favorites” list in Apple Music, Apple states that “they can find your content faster and stay in-the-know about your latest releases.”
Apple even goes so far as to say that they will “receive notifications when you release new music.”
Sound familiar?
It should.
This is exactly how Spotify’s artist profiles already operate.
Not to mention accounts on every other social platform in the world.
Spotify figured out a long time ago that music is a social affair, and the more invested an artist’s fans can become, the more they’ll use the platform.
Most other music platforms have followed suit: both Amazon Music and Deezer have the ability to “favorite” or “follow” artists, for example.
Apple Music, true to their form of taking their time to add new features, is simply the latest to recognize that the ability to follow increases engagement and, therefore, their bottom line.
What this means for us
Getting listeners, fans, and customers to follow on any given platform is a cornerstone of building a successful artist brand in the digital age.
Followers on Spotify, TikTok, Instagram, YouTube, or anywhere else, are the definitive metric to pursue.
The ability to serve up new content to our fans is what allows our businesses to scale.
If we had to start from square one with every single release, it would be next to impossible to build any long-term equity with our customer base as a business.
The more streaming platforms recognize their need to operate as social platforms in this regard, the better life becomes for all of us.
Unfortunately, in the case of Apple’s new “Favorites” feature, there doesn’t seem to be much indication that we can actually track our follower count at this point.
Hopefully, though, they’ll add some new data points inside Apple Music for Artists in the near future.
The effects on music marketing
The most exciting part about this, for me, is the ability to now pursue the exact same end goal across streaming platforms inside our growth campaigns.
We’ve been able to build in followers on Spotify for a long time, but if we’ve expanded out to include multiple DSPs inside the same campaign, we’ve had to optimize for multiple objectives.
Followers on Spotify, streams on Apple Music, favorites on Deezer, etc.
Now we can send listeners to our artist profile on every platform with the objective of getting them to follow.
This is huge.
And while we still don’t have the rich data feed from Apple that we currently have from Spotify, my guess is they’ll continue to roll out more and more information for us to use to optimize our growth.
And that, to me, is exciting stuff.
Whenever you're ready, there are four ways I can help you:
Subscribe to the Newsletter: Join our growing network of artists, creators, and entrepreneurs by receiving The One Thing directly to your inbox every week.
Book a Consultation: Schedule a one-on-one call with me to improve your marketing across paid advertising, social media, and more.
The Spotify Traffic Accelerator: Join the hundreds of artists who have successfully learned to automate their growth on Spotify using paid ads on Instagram.
Become a DuPree X Artist: Hire our team to manage your marketing across streaming platforms and social media so you can focus on what matters most—making music.
Whenever you're ready, there are four ways I can help you:
Subscribe to the Newsletter: Join our growing network of artists, creators, and entrepreneurs by receiving The One Thing directly to your inbox every week.
Book a Consultation: Schedule a one-on-one call with me to improve your marketing across paid advertising, social media, and more.
The Spotify Traffic Accelerator: Join the hundreds of artists who have successfully learned to automate their growth on Spotify using paid ads on Instagram.
Become a DuPree X Artist: Hire our team to manage your marketing across streaming platforms and social media so you can focus on what matters most—making music.
Whenever you're ready, there are four ways I can help you:
Subscribe to the Newsletter: Join our growing network of artists, creators, and entrepreneurs by receiving The One Thing directly to your inbox every week.
Book a Consultation: Schedule a one-on-one call with me to improve your marketing across paid advertising, social media, and more.
The Spotify Traffic Accelerator: Join the hundreds of artists who have successfully learned to automate their growth on Spotify using paid ads on Instagram.
Become a DuPree X Artist: Hire our team to manage your marketing across streaming platforms and social media so you can focus on what matters most—making music.