Inside the Business of Sam Feldt and The Next Steps of Fangage: Exclusive Interview

You’d have to live under a rock not to know Sam Feldt’s name. From collaborations with Demi Lovato to tours around the world, to tracks with tens of millions of streams attached to him, he’s found his sound a long time ago and developed it in all the right ways to become a star. Some of his most popular tracks include the single “Post Malone” and “Way Back Home,” which have become cultural staples in the new era of digital music the world has entered.

Always ambitious to take projects to the next level, Sam Feldt teamed up with successful businessman Nick Velten to rebuild a fan-driven platform for artists called Fangage. The app and dashboard make it easy to build healthy and meaningful relationships between artist and fans, with features like mass email, data collection, and tracking content to unlock. One-stop shopping is something Sam Feldt supports with all his weight, which says a lot about the growth and direction of the app.

For those readers who do not know, what is Fangage and what does it aim for?

Fangage provides creators and brands with their own dedicated fan engagement and monetization platform entirely dedicated to their brand. This way, they can free themselves and their fans from the social media platforms and algorithms they are stuck in.

How did the idea of ​​continuing Fangage between you and Nick Velten come about?

In 2016, I founded Fangage out of personal frustration when I found out I had over a million subscribers, but only reached 2% of them when I posted something. If I wanted to reach all of my own fans, I had to pay hundreds of dollars on Facebook and Instagram in ads and to post boosts – ridiculous! With Fangage, creators and brands can take back control of their fans and easily monetize their followers.

What is an average day like for you between Heartfeldt, Fangage and Sam Feldt? How do you manage your time and what will you do when the tours resume?

To be honest, it all comes down to working with great people you can trust and count on. Which gives me the freedom to focus on the big picture and the creative things. For Heartfeldt and Sam Feldt my main tasks are making music, doing A&R for the label and doing concerts. The rest is handled perfectly by the management, which gives me a lot of freedom and focus. At Fangage, I work mainly as Chief Creative Officer, and operations are managed by the team. Coming up with great ideas to improve the platform and provide valuable input from a creator’s perspective is where I add the most value. When the tours resume, I will probably do fewer concerts. I plan to spend the weekdays between Heartfeldt and Fangage and play shows on the weekends.

What makes Fangage different from a platform like ToneDen.io, Feature.FM and other marketing dashboards aimed at the “EDM” market?

While other platforms provide tools that allow artists to develop their profile, Fangage offers an all-in-one solution for fan engagement and monetization. We provide artists with their own website with built-in growth, marketing and monetization tools. In addition, the platform and its data belong to the artist and not to Fangage. In this way, we allow artists to break free from the social networks they are stuck on and build truly independent careers.

Which features, in particular, do you think would appeal the most to fans of electronic music?

For upcoming artists, our track to unlock feature is great to help grow their Spotify or social media profiles. Plus, they love that they get a fantastic website right away for a fraction of the cost. By watching our most established acts, they get more direct access to their Superfans, for example, to sell more tickets to live events. They also make great use of our monetization features which allow them to sell content and subscriptions directly to fans.

How will Fangage’s partnership with SoundCloud be of benefit to electronic artists looking for a competitive advantage?

We anticipate that integration with SoundCloud will make it easier for Fangage artists to share private audio downloads with fans. In the future, they will be able to easily link their two accounts and have direct access to their (private) song library from their Fangage dashboard. That way, they can sell early access to the songs or force fans to follow them to listen to them. At the same time, they collect data about fans, which they could easily use to promote new music, content or events in the future.

Have you given any thought to integrating cryptocurrency / NFT into Fangage in the future?

Certainly, we are currently in talks with Rally.io to integrate their services into Fangage. It’s on the roadmap for the end of the year. I am a strong believer in crypto and NFTs and also made my first drop some time ago. Tying Fangage to a decentralized ecosystem will give artists even more freedom, which is very much in line with our vision.

Now back to Sam Feldt! It looks like your Heartfeldt label is doing well. How did it go to be behind the scenes of a label?

I love it. I’ve always enjoyed exploring SoundCloud and Spotify to find new and exciting artists. Now I finally have a home for them. With over 50 releases on the label to date, we’ve established a great family of Heartfeldt artists, and every song we release is bigger than the last. We also recently launched Heartfeldt Publishing in collaboration with CTM to provide upcoming artists with a home for their music and composition.

Was there any contact with the Post Malone team after the release of your hit “Post Malone”?

Still not a word. I sincerely hope he enjoys the track!

You’ve been releasing blow after blow for the past two years. What can we expect from Sam Feldt’s music in the second half of 2021?

I’m working on over 20 songs right now, so you can expect a few singles to come out the rest of the year. I’m also slowly building towards an album, such exciting times to come!

Don’t forget to visit Fangage and explore all that it entails, or even register as an artist!