Underground music was once the province of indie artists struggling to be heard. In these digital times, all music is underground. With some help from a rarely sought audience, even the most obscure artists can taste stardom.

• How much spam do you read? How about e-mail you asked to receive? Both educators and event specialists have recognized the positive correlation between registration and action. Similarly, by investing time and effort to download music, an underground audience commits to distribute.
• Although these consumers do not participate in the sales process, they are motivated by the effects of sharing and trading and thus have formed expansive social networks. These networks allow them to distribute product to hundreds of thousands of people worldwide with little effort.
• Most importantly, the underground audience is comprised of people who, all motivations considered, are driven to talk about their inventory to more people just like them. This audience spreads word and increases awareness faster than any street team and can indirectly generate revenue for artists.

While embracing music pirates as anything other than bootleggers with zero respect for intellectual property rights is taboo, underground audiences are undoubtedly untapped as high-performance marketing channels.