 You've definitely noticed it. When your favorite group has a song that's clearly a favorite with the fans and then all of a sudden they drop a whole other version of it. Sometimes they'll have Snoop Dogg drop a corny feature on the bridge or maybe a heartfelt song will get strings added to it. The moody ballad may get stripped down to just a piano or a vocal and the banger may get a fresh remix. But why does everyone seem to do this? In this video I'm going to discuss why you may want to do an alternate version of your song and the benefits as well as the pitfalls. Hi, I'm Jesse Cannon, a music marketing nerd who's teaching musicians how to grow their fanbase from zero to ten thousand fans and this is Muse Formation. So I need to start this video with an annoying caveat. It's going to make a whole lot more sense and have way better context if you watch my video on my music release strategy for 2021. So I know I've said this before but I really encourage you to watch that before this one and it's linked now or in the description below. Okay, now that we've done our homework. So what is an alternate version? It can be a remix, adding a featured artist to sing or rap a new part, a different mood for the song like doing a stripped down or maxillized version with a string quartet. It can be doing a whole other approach on the song that inspires a whole new mood. But really there's tons of creativity that can be done with an alternate version that you can base your on your own artistic tastes and whatever other forms the song could take on it in your opinion. But the reason the alternate version is important is it can extend the interest and relationship building with a song that can help grow your audience when people are responding to a song and allow it to live a life past the one the original version can give. Let's first talk about this from purely a marketing perspective before we get into the artistic side of things. If you've watched this channel before, you know that I care more about artistry than I do simple money grabbing marketing ideas. The alternate version allows you to submit your song for playlist consideration a second time if you release it after your original version has been released and you have another chance of it getting on Spotify playlist, which is one of the main reasons I encourage people to do this when a song has gotten a good response. And if your song has been getting a great reaction and doing two to four times better than your other songs, putting out an alternate version a few weeks after the music video can give it extra legs to keep on promoting and have it do you favors in building your fan base. This also signals to your audience that you really find this song to be important. So if some of them haven't given it a try yet and you drop this extra hint, they will often go and listen to the song and finally give it a try. But it also gives a region of a nation and a new way for fans to bond with it that can inspire them to share it with their friends and get you new fans. Right now the radio is flooded with that piano version of tones and eyes dance monkey, which the regular version was the second biggest song of the year. And now this recontextualization has given the song longer legs. And this one shows an added benefit of releasing an alternate version is this alternate version can change the depth of emotion felt around it. Now I know you're wondering what this has to do with you was like no fans, not two billion streams like that song. And yes, that number is real. The alternate version is a way to show depth. And let's remember, you're always trying to tell stories around your music. And if you see yourself as an artist with more depth than just your regular songs, this is the perfect time to show everyone that that's the case. So I know this was tones and eyes breakout hit. It definitely is an exception. But let's remember another way this worked on a smaller scale. The artist Benny saw TikTok welcome their song super lonely into a phenomenon. And the way they played this up was by not only putting a fresh mix on it and it artist Gus Dapperton dropping a feature on it. They did a version that was more chilled out as well. And that has millions of plays to and it extends the life of the song and grew their audience. One of the best stories of the alternate version I can think of is from an audio documentary podcast I made for my series Atlantic Records inside the album. It's from the episode with Matt Maison and his song cringes one of his two biggest hits. But a funny thing happened is at some point, his a and r at neon gold decided to strip it down to the way it was on his demo. And if you look that version is slightly more popular than the original version. But they're about equal. But it gave the song massive legs and submitted Matt as an artist to watch has enjoyed a great career since. But they clearly saw the importance of the alternate version. Since if you look at his new single clues to the genics, it appears as top 10 popular tracks four times as they have a feature with Lana Del Rey and two different remixes. The song is massive. And each version has helped bring him to new audiences and expand his fan base as well as extend the lifespan of the song. Now you may do an acoustic version or one with an orchestra. But what's great with the alternate version is it reminds people to go deeper the song, whether that's the alternate or the original. In fact, some cases both the alternate and the original do very well and they funnel success into one another. The alternate version allows you to tell more stories, demand more attention and get people to think they really need to pay attention to this song since you've devoted so much energy to it. Now this doesn't work if you cry wolf and do this all the time or if the song doesn't bang it's gonna fall flat and people won't pay attention. But if you come through with something that's great and eventful it will be what gets people telling their friends about you and spreading your music. But it doesn't even have to be the song. Sometimes you can have an alternate version of your video. The group Water Parks put out their most recent single Low Key as Hell and then made a pop up video version of it which gives their fans a new version to experience and share it extend the life of a breakout song for the group. I also sometimes like to use this as a wild card since consistent sustained promotion is so important and occasionally you're running behind on your next single or the video is late. Dropping an alternate version can turn what's about to be an oil spill of a tragedy into a Molotov cocktail you can use to reignite your promotions. But let's talk about the main marketing benefit of them is adding features or remixes can now bring you to another artist's audience which really helps for marketing. Putting featured artists and remixes out allows your name to be seen by a whole other artist's audience. It gets you on their Spotify pages and your name in front of tons of other new eyes. If you haven't watched my video on marketing features it will be linked at the end of this video since seriously I think it's one of my best videos and if you're going to be doing features or remixes or collaborating with other artists you really need to watch this video. I know some of you don't see yourself as a remix type artist but let me also remind you of something I think people forget. While no one thinks of Adele as an EDM artist what many people forget is that she was coming up on her label XL which is mostly electronic artists. They circulated her acapellas to DJs and was played at every club constantly as she was getting more popular and it was familiarizing people with her songs so when they heard the real versions they were more susceptible to them and they seemed more familiar after hearing them out at the club night after night. Long before Goatier was just someone we used to know he was also on every dance floor I walked to on for years because getting their name established the public was primed for his breakout hit with all the remixes he used the vocalist on and the same went for tons of other breakout stars whose vocal stems I'd hear long before they were famous. Can't you just picture my nerdy marketing self getting wild on the dance floor? I'm sure we will work some of that cringe at the channel once we're allowed to dance together again. Now I know some of you are thinking this just doesn't seem right for you and honestly that's fine but I do think there's an interesting thing I talk about often which is if you've ever watched the Rolling Stones movie sympathy for the devil and trust me this is about the only time I'm ever gonna recommend that you watch something this old since I'm a modern type of guy who has real allergic reaction to anything old but I digress. In this movie you watch how many ways the Stones try performing the iconic song of the same name as the film. Now if you've ever heard that song you know it's quite a mood and a particular mood but when you hear all the ways they flip it it really shows you the possibilities for the moods the songs lyrics invoke. I think many musicians are often very close-minded to how their songs could sound until they try drastically different approaches to them as an experiment and it all of a sudden changes their songwriting for the better as they see how to emotionally iterate their songs in a new way that allows them to reach their full creative potential. So I challenge you to write your songs other ways and if dance remixes and acoustic versions make you cringe maybe your own group doing a different version of the song from a different perspective may be it. One of my favorite videos I've made is on musical fan fiction which is linked now are in the description and it talks about how many groups imagine a song the way one of their favorite artists would do it and see if it brings them new ideas. Anyway but since I have no agenda but to give you good advice it's time to get real about these alternate versions. So many people put so little effort into these alternate versions and it can really bring down the emotion of the song. I actually think they can ruin all those song for listeners when a future that isn't emotional is just added just to get the famous person who's doing the feature on the track and the artists sense of release it even though they know the feature sucks. I really implore you that if you have good momentum going on your music to be careful of the features you do and not to put out absolutely cringe remixes that are a total embarrassment because while I feel that everyone should be able to experiment and play around with their own songs putting out something you know is trash is just not going to do you good. The fact is the features need to not just be judged by how many monthly listeners someone has and how it's going to bring you into their audience but instead of it is actually working as a song since it will do you no good if no one likes the emotion of the feature or the remix or whatever you put out. Well I think I've gone on about this long enough but I'd love to hear in the comments if there's any way to use the alternate version I haven't mentioned it and if you think of one leave it for me below in those comments and if you enjoyed this video please like and subscribe and check out some of the playlists on the screen now on how to promote your music on Spotify or how to go from zero to ten thousand fans thanks for watching