Exploring YouTube's Role in Discovering Independent Artists

YouTube is an online video streaming platform that was founded in 2005 by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim. Now the platform is considered one of the most influential social media platforms with over 2 billion monthly active users. The video streaming platform also has a whopping 30 million users active daily. These remarkable statistics regarding its users make it the world's second-biggest search engine and the second-most visited site, right after Google. With 2.5 billion active monthly users, the site is also the second biggest social media platform, coming very close to Facebook in terms of popularity. 

Such big statistics surely made the platform influential and its availability at the fingertips of the artists, both immensely successful and emerging, has become a meaningful way of sharing new music with audiences. With its availability and user count, another thing that helped the platform grow is the impact of video. According to various research, humans get more attentive to videos than they pay attention to texts so launching music videos has helped artists to get in more listeners and popularity in the industry. This means reaching more audiences has now become easier for artists. However, it is more than just playing music on the application, having a channel there allows the musicians to make money as well. So let's get into how the platform impacts musicians, especially in discovering aspiring artists. 

YouTube makes discovering talents easy 

YouTube has significantly made it easier for talent scouts such as managers and agents to discover talent on the internet. Any and every important artist now has an account on YouTube which lets them independently release music and tap into a wide pool of audiences. With this, scouts can have thousands of budding musicians at their fingertips rather than finding real talent, out in the world. With so many successful examples in the past, this makes sense why this method has now become common. For scouts, this is a better, easier, faster, and cheaper way to discover aspiring talents. In addition to that, the artists who begin their careers on YouTube or with the help of it receive a wider and bigger initial audience. This does not happen if they were discovered from local live performances to whom they were limited. When it comes to YouTube, musicians have 2 billion monthly users on the platform, all of them would be their potential listeners. So they have a bigger opportunity online and put the artists on a beneficial platform as they now get access to a bigger music market. This also makes them more likely to get discovered by scouts and have a higher probability of being signed. This discovery and signing becomes even faster if the artist already has an established audience, especially an international audience base. 

Continuous development of aspiring talents 

YouTube is a powerful social media platform that makes discovering artists and musicians from across the world easy. However, that is not the platform's only use as it can very well be used as a key tool in the continued development of musicians. Although this applies to successful artists out there as well, it becomes more important to aspiring musicians. Even though music videos may seem irrelevant in today's world due to the decreasing popularity of music channels like MTV, they still play a key role in an artist's development, especially in their popularity. Music videos are a great way in terms of sharing and viewing music and the best platform to do so is YouTube. 

These days, when an overload of music is being poured on streaming services, videos play a major role in getting recognition. Previously it was the artwork of the track that made listeners engaged in the music, especially when it comes to recognizing the music which is a role currently played by music videos. Additionally, artists now have an opportunity to share their creativity through these music videos that become a talking point on social media, increasing fan engagement. Aspiring artists are now taking this opportunity and express their creativity, talent, and overall ideas to become a hot topic on social media. 

Interviews on YouTube 

Another way that YouTube increases online engagement for up-and-coming artists is through giving access to their interviews to fans. Listeners with the help of the platform have the opportunity to access a mass of videos of their favorite budding artists. This offers valuable insights into their artistic career, as well as their personal lives, helping the artists create a special bond between them and their fans. Not only an insight into their personal lives but habits and personalities that impact this relationship hugely. This deeper connection between aspiring talents and their fans proves to be crucial in the long run as there are no successful artists without a fan army campaigning behind them.

YouTube’s initiative

YouTube as a video streaming platform itself has made huge efforts to support the development of artists and give them proper exposure. The platform has different segments such as the Artist Spotlight Stories series and the Artist on The Rise program where they help budding artists get more recognition and views. In 2016 the second-biggest social media platform launched its international artist development program Foundry which focuses on producing innovative content along with music videos that get paired with the artist's musical release. The aim behind this initiative is to encourage extensive audience connection along with promoting good practice as a musician. One big example of this is of Rosalía who is a Spanish artist, being really underrated and rather up-and-coming at that time, undertook Foundry in 2018. During her work with the Foundry, the artist's subscriber count grew by over 7000%. In an interview with YouTube later, the artist said, "YouTube has been a key piece in making my music global. With YouTube, my music can be seen while heard, which is fundamental for me because it allows my radical musical bets to be more accessible. It's a blessing for an artist when the world can access your music — whoever you are, wherever you are, whenever you want."

YouTube provides a big opportunity for artists who are new to the industry or trying to get more recognition as a way to get the word out there. There are several video promotion agencies available in the market that can help these new talents keep the spotlight on them and make it easier to get discovered by music lovers and scouts.