EDUARDO CASTILLO

Many brands speak about community-building when they’re actually talking about building consumer relationships. Turning fan bases into communities takes time, effort—and a lot of love. XP Music Futures brought together journalists, musicians, and entrepreneurs, representing scenes from Miami to Morocco and Dubai to South Korea, to discuss how they evolve their audiences into genuine communities.

Natasha Stambuli is the award-winning General Manager of BoomPlay Tanzania and a new Grammys Recording Academy member. She observes in the XP Day Program panel discussion, Building an Audience Vs Building a Community, “It’s very easy now to build an audience on social media. But what does it mean? Are these viewers loyal enough to be a community? The people who are actually streaming day in and day out, the loyal people saying ‘this is our person’—that’s your community.”

Fellow panelist Eduardo Castillo, musician, and HABITAS co-founder, concurs: “People will identify if they have a sense of belonging.” He noted that in creating spaces for community, powerful emotional experiences far outweigh specific amenities: “When thinking about audience vs. community—it was focused on how people felt.”

Stambuli pointed out that a solid understanding of the industry is needed to underpin meaningful, lasting success. “The digital space itself is quite new in Africa. We are in a time of digitalization, and not everybody is privileged to be in that space yet.” As a result, she sees a need for greater education about everything that can come with artists’ online success, from preventing piracy to understanding legal frameworks, royalties, and monetization.

As music scenes across the Middle East and Africa rapidly grow, Stambuli stressed the importance of relationship-building and reciprocity. “When it comes to relationships in the industry, it’s a ripple effect. We are no longer in a small village or a closed space. We need to open doors a lot more, and opening doors means being in a position to be authentically yourself, and reaching out to people graciously, so you can all achieve what you need to achieve.” For her, XP Music Futures is a perfect starting point: “With the rich and dynamic sounds, knowledge, and culture coming together, I can only hope each and every one of us pays it forward. It is only the beginning of many more!”