Live Stream 102: Scheduling and Promoting Your Live Stream Show
Now that you have the tech side sorted we’re going to walk you through getting ready to run a professional quality show from home starting with marketing and promotion. If you haven’t got the tech side all set up check out Live Stream 101.
Scheduling in Facebook
Simply click Go Live. If it jumps into a tour of the updated publishing tool, go through that to use the new publisher.
Your initial set up will all be in the left side panel.
Then, switch from Go Live Now to Schedule A Live Video.
Choose the Date and Time of Live Video.
Choose Share to A Page You Manage. Select your music business page.
Put in a Live Video Title and Description.
Optionally, Crosspost to More Pages (i.e. a venue you’ve partnered with, your management company or an affiliated act/brand. Note you will need to be an administrator on these additional pages in order to crosspost.)
You can also change the Audience Settings to make age and/or geography restrictions. For example if you are performing explicit songs you may opt to do an 18+ show. Or if you are partnered with a brewery they may request you do a 21+ show.
Then you can Select an Image to be part of the announcement post. If you don’t this will default to your cover photo.
On the main portion of the page, we’ll take care of tech settings.
Next you’ll want to double check that all your technical settings are saved from your Test Streams. You want to be using a Stream Key. We recommend unchecking End Live Video if Stream Stops. In case your internet cuts out briefly, you don’t want to start an entirely new stream.
Lastly, double check that your Announcement Post Preview looks good! Check your time, photo, and spelling for any issues.
Then to finish up, click Schedule Live Video.
Don’t worry. If you’ve made a mistake or want to adjust anything you can edit the settings leading up to the live stream.
Setting up your Facebook Event and Inviting your fans, friends, & family
Scheduling a Go Live lets your Facebook fans click “get reminder” when they see you’re planning to go live. However, we also recommend creating a Facebook event. This lets you invite friends and fans to tune in and use a part of Facebook that folks are more familiar with. You’ll want to be sure to paste in your Live Tab URL in the description so people can easily find the live stream at the scheduled time.
A really fun part of live streams is that fans from all over the world can tune in. It’s not like having a show in Houston where you may only invite fans in a certain radius. Your fans from Texas, California, and Australia can all tune in together! (Although timing that is convenient for the US is less likely to be convenient in Australia...but you get the idea…)
Add Your Streaming Event to Bandsintown (and Your Website)
Your Bandsintown page and the shows section have likely been looking pretty lackluster recently. Thankfully, Bandsintown reacted swiftly to COVID-19 by implementing the option to post your Live Stream Shows on your profile.
If your website isn’t integrated with Bandwintown you will need to add the show however you do that normally. If you are interested in a modern, easy-to-use website that integrates with tools like Bandsintown, check out Crescendo’s Website Services.
Promote on Social Media
Last, but not least, it is imperative that you get the word out through your social media channels. Create a simple show poster and post to your Instagram account, Facebook page, and stories a few times leading up to your event. You should also share the Facebook event in the days leading up to your live stream.
Here is a free template to make a show poster.
It is also a good idea to post in the Facebook event leading up to the show. For example, the day before you can post a “looking forward to seeing you tomorrow” type post. And 10-15 minutes before the event post a photo of getting set up. Fans love a behind-the-scenes angle and Facebook will send them a notification that there is a post in an event they RSVPed to.
Another great way to engage fans leading up to the event is asking people to make requests ahead of time. This not only builds hype, but also lets you integrate them into your set list and brush up on those songs. You can ask for requests as post comments or use the Instagram Stories question feature to field requests (or both!).
That’s all for this post! Our next post will cover running your show. Be sure to sign up for our email newsletter and follow us on social media to get updates.
Doing a live stream using tips you learned from Crescendo? Tag us and use #crescendocrew for a chance to be featured on our social media channels!