Category: Social Media

We Love Anniversaries

So you didn’t release a seminal record 20 years ago like Converge did with ‘Jane Doe,’ huh?

Notice all the articles written about that? All the buzzzzz from people chiming in on social media, expressing how time flies, and all that?

People love anniversaries. People remember bad anniversaries (deaths, divorce, etc). For whatever reasons our brains are wired to appreciate them a bit more, which is why they do so well on social media.

“Hey! This album turned 10 years old today!”
“Today is when we started our first European tour!”
“Our drummer has a birthday today!”

It’s free and easy, and it doesn’t feel like click bait because it’s just 100% true. Putting out an album five years ago, or releasing a video during a pandemic – that’s hard.

https://allfather1.bandcamp.com/album/century-sessions-vol-1

So document all your big moments – those first out of state shows, the first demo, the first print review, your singers birthday, the first guitar you bought (or the most recent one). I mean, be cool about it – don’t go overboard, but you can use this to mix things up a bit.

Bonus idea: write a post about the notable anniversary on your site. Write a paragraph about that first album, that first show, whatever. And of course, be sure to include photos, video, and a bit of text. Get everyone from the band to write a little bit. Hell, do a Zoom call or a podcast, and put that in there.

Then, when you post the anniversary to social media, include a link back to this new post!

Magazines and websites write big posts like this because they work. I mean, it helps if you’re Converge or Slipknot, sure. But start where you are – neither of those bands became who they are overnight. They did it one fan at a time, and that’s exactly what this helps with.

Quick Ain’t Always The Answer

We all have the ability to post something on social media, and every post has the ability to change your life.

You can literally write something whimsical and get 100K likes.
Your text can be on TV a few hours later.
A screen shot of your words could be on the late night shows.

It’s alluring. It pulls us in. Even a reply to someone else’s post can make you famous.

Or you can sit down and write. Maybe it’s a 500 word blog post. An essay. A book.

You can write a song. And then another.

Paint a picture. Take a photograph. Or a dozen.

It’s easier to post on Instagram, with a giant 300 word caption with no line breaks.

It’s a bit harder to pull back. It’s a challenge to just use one photo, and write “if you want to know more about how I did this / made this / wrote this, head to my website.”

Yeah. Algorithims sucks. I get it.

But you’re training people to remember that domain name. Start doing that today!

Maybe you notice that artist isn’t posting so much on Instagram anymore, so you check out their site, and see they’ve been posting something everyday for the last two months.

That’s not quick. That’s a grind.

There’s no LIKES on my site. No “shares.” No immediate feedback.

That’s okay. How much is a like worth, anyways? They’re on your site. That’s gold.

Slow down. Build up your site. Pretend it’s a monthly magazine, and you’ve got the cover story, week after week. Write your story, tell your story, share your story, bring others along for the ride.

You Don’t Need Millions

There’s already enough loud mouth podcaster and personalities. We need more people who are their authentic selves.

There’s plenty of room for quiet. Shy. Reserved. Goofy.

Will it attract millions of fans this week? Maybe not. But you don’t need millions.

Via @BigSto

But don’t think you’re going to get 2,000 fans until you get 200, or until you get 20.

Learn how to reach and be real with 10 people, 20 people.

You don’t have to be a mega star to DM a fan and send them free stickers. Or leave them tickets to your next show.

Do that shit now.

Do the shit that doesn’t scale. Do the shit that the big artists can’t. Connect and build your audience. Fuck “recommended if you like…” stickers and curated playlists.

Find you 10, your 20, and build from there.

Produce on Socials, Archive and Elaborate on Your Site

“Nobody uses websites anymore,” says everybody who reads news, interviews, and reviews on websites. And buy tickets on websites. Watch videos on websites. Buy albums on websites.

Give people a reason to go to your website.

No one goes to your site?

Probably because there’s nothing on it but music player embeds and old tour dates. Thrilling stuff!

As a photographer, artist, musician, producer – you could be filling your site with thoughts, ideas, behind the scenes, stories (you have so many stories).

Tease all this on socials, then include a link to read the full thing (just like every media outlet does).

Here I wrote about the band that changed my life. I could have just wrote a quick tweet about that, or an IG story… then it’d be gone in 12 seconds. But it’s on my site, waiting to be read. Like a book to be checked out at the library.

No, it’s not going to get 10,000 views. But maybe someone who shares the same story will email me about it. That’d be cool.

I’ve gone back through some of my “twitter rants” and turned them into blog posts. Like this one: Most People Haven’t Heard Your Album. I even took some time and made a video to go with it. And elaborated on some of the things I Tweeted.

We’ve all got YEARS of things we said that could easily be turned into blog posts.

Top albums. Fave shows. Funny stories. Wild adventures.

Stop giving all of that to social media, and building value for mega corps. Put it on your own site and link to it, over and over.

Use social media as the billboard, and get people to your site.

Use the Press You Get

Via @BigSto

This over and over again, “use the Press you ARE getting.”

Don’t just say you got a review somewhere – use the words that the outlet used to describe your music.

If a major media outlet said your album was an album of the year contender, say that. Scream that, post it, screen shot it, put it in your bio.

Teens With Ring Lights

Since I saw this Tweet below I seriously went to sleep and woke up thinking about the phrase “while teens with ring lights are signed for millions.”

Via @DonnaMissal on Twitter

I want to believe, “hey, those people with the ring lights will fade just as quick as they showed up. They’re here one minute, gone the next!”

But that still does nothing to help the artist pay a director, or hell, pay the rent. A few more thousand Spotify streams aren’t going to help, either.

SIGH.

I just want artists to make money so we can all keep doing this.




Use Words as Weapons

When you get press, it can be tempting to post, “hey, go check out this piece of press!”

Really? That’s as exciting as cardboard.

If it’s an interview, use a pull quote. Use the words you spoke which translate your beauty and magic.

  • “Hey, go read my interview over at MEDIA OUTLET. LINK.”
    Bland, boring, literally every other artist is begging for the same thing.
  • “When I got back from a 10 hour hike in the desert, where I hallucinated and spoke with a space ghost, that’s where the album title came from. LINK”
    No one else gets to post that. Your story is fucking unique, take advantage of that.

The same goes for reviews.

  • “Hey, MEDIA OUTLET reviewed our new album. LINK.”
    Again, every other band, artist, writer, etc. wrote the same thing a dozen times in the past four minutes.
  • “An absolute banger album, and contender for album of the year honors already,” says MEDIA OUTLET. LINK.
    Again, no one else gets to say that about their album except YOU.

Big movies trailers use pull quotes, so should you.

Hell, if an outlet crowned your release as album of the year, you’re not really going to post, “Hey, MEDIA OUTLET said nice things about our album.”

Hell, no.

You say, “MEDIA OUTLET said OUR ALBUM is ALBUM OF THE YEAR.”

Social media is a lot like running away from a bear. You don’t have to out run the bear, you just have to out run your friends.

Every day there are a thousand artists posting bad copy on socials, so use a media outlets words as a weapon to cut through crap.

Always Credit People

This is a great bit of advice from artist and illustrator Caroline Harrison:

People putting out music: please remember to credit the album artist on your Bandcamp page! I spent a while down a rabbit hole the other day trying to find an album artist for something that just came out and had to scroll through a bunch of Facebook posts.

Via Twitter

Credit the album artist, the designer, the photographer, the engineers, the producers – all of ’em! Not only is it just nice and proper, but it also helps with organic search!

Don’t make your fans or curious parties dig through months worth of social media posts to discover who made your album art – put that information right where you release your music!

“This has the added benefit of making your bandcamp page more likely to come up if someone googles the artist, so it’s really a no-brainer for musicians to do this,” Jock Sportello via Twitter.

People search band names and album titles and song titles – and all sorts of goodies come up! The same happens when you search for artist names, photographer names, guitar player names, producer names, and everyone else. This isn’t just some “growth hack” to get more eyeballs, it’s just the proper thing to do.

Credit everyone involved, the people who made a vital contribution to the work you’re putting out there into the world. The deserve it.

Plug and Replug

Announce your thing, and keep announcing it.

I always appreciate when people plug and replug their work on Twitter. Never feel bad about it. There’s always some article/book/video/ that pops up in my timeline and I think, “I need to check that out … but later.” Later comes and I can lose track. Your replugging reminds me.

@mattthomas on Twitter

Let’s say you finally get to announce that pre-orders are now open for your new EP. You post it on a Tuesday at 10am. And then…

People who happen to be on Twitter (or whatever other social media network you announce the news on) on Tuesday, around 10am… well… that’s the afternoon for folks in Europe. And just 7am for people on the West coast – sort of early.

So make sure you post about your link a few more times in the coming weeks. Yes, multiple times. For the very reasons listed above.

People might see your link when they’re sitting down to a new episode of something on Netflix. They might be in line at the bank, or waiting for a Zoom meeting to start.

Schedule out a dozen Tweets.
You can do the same on Facebook.
And even Instagram (using Buffer).

Schedule them out, even at weird hours. TV commercials get shown over and over again. You see the same banner ads. The same pre-roll ads on YouTube.

There’s no shame in talking up your thing multiple times on social media.

What’s Your Social Media Exit Plan?

From 2014: here

Someday you’re going to log into Facebook for the last time.

Same with Twitter.

Someday you’ll uninstall Instagram.

And so will your fans.

What’s your social media exit plan?

People don’t dump their email. And email will outlast whatever zany social media platform comes along in the next four minutes.

Look, you’re a songwriter, not a social media manager.
You’re a photographer, not a marketing guru.
You’re an artist, not a content creator.

You should be spending your time working on your magic, not increasing shareholder value for mega-corps. Every time you post on social media, you build value for that company. That’s why writers get paid to write for website – their articles and interviews get posted, which brings people to the website.

Hey! You should be getting paid!

So slow down on posting everything to social media, and save it for your email list.

Start an account with Mailchimp, Substack, or MailerLite.

The magic is this: send out an email, and it goes to all your fans. All of them. You can’t do that with social media unless you pay money.

Then, every two weeks or so, send out an email to your fans. Yes, you’ll have enough material to send every two weeks.

Include some of the photos you posted to socials (chances are 80% of your followers didn’t see ’em), write a few words about them. Talk about your new work, your new project. The things you’re passionate about.

Tell people you’ll be sharing your recording process. Your behind the scenes work. Your unpublished work. Lyric ideas. Maybe share some tips on how you create some of your magic.

“I want to share my magic with you; sign up here.”

“I’ll teach you something that I learned the hard way in each email.”

“I love horror movies, and each week I break down my three favorite scenes from the best (worst) horror flicks.”

It’s time to think about social media exit plan.

One on one coaching / teaching about email marketing / social media / website / strategy for creative types who don’t want to think all the time about all this stuff. One hour session, $100. Shoot me an email and let’s get started: hi@sethw.xyz