Undoubtedly, no person is eminently qualified to speak on the cost of breaking an artist in Nigeria than Mavin Records boss, Don Jazzy, who has powered musicians to stardom across three different eras.
Speaking in an interview on The Echo Podcast, the label owner said that it costs approximately $ 150,000 to $ 300,000 to service a new artist from the point of their debut single to the release of their first project.
Don Jazzy said that up to ₦500 million can be spent on taking an artist from relative obscurity to the point of releasing their debut project. His remarks draw attention to the high cost of music marketing in Nigeria.
The growth of Nigerian music, thanks to the advent of social media and streaming platforms, has created a rewarding yet competitive market where artists have to outspend each other in a bid to attract consumer attention.
Unlike in the past, where there was no social media an artists primarily marketed themselves through radio, TV, and street activations, today, social media has changed the marketing model.
The rise of social media and its pivotal role in marketing music means that labels and artists now have to expend resources in servicing Instagram, TikTok, X (formerly Twitter), and Snapchat, both through targeted ads and influencer marketing. This is not cheap.
Music and Marketing Executive Honour Aghedo, while speaking on a Facts Only special episode, said that the cost of social media marketing is now eating deeply into the marketing budget of labels and artists who have no choice but to play the games of numbers..
“Even Influencers now want to be paid ‘Afrobeats To The World’ because there’s more money in the ecosystem,” Marketing Executive David Adeyemi pointed out while appearing on Pulse Facts Only episode on The State of Music Marketing in Nigeria.
As marketing is one that generally favours the bigger mainstream artists with the deep pockets to service all platforms at scale.
