HELLO, I'M SETH WERKHEISER

Daily Loop #53

It’s Monday. This week freshen up your social media bios. Make sure your links are pointing to good things. Consider setting up a Lnk.bio or Link Tree (I made a list of links here via my WordPress set up) for your Twitter and / or Instagram. Link to stuff that matters, and ask people to click.

Link your shit. Put the link to your thing (your shop, your course, your album) in the first Tweet.

Fuck hashtags. I want to read your words, your thoughts, your ideas. Inspire me, radicalize me, sell me, push me. Hashtags take up space and their only purpose to attract “more,” when in fact there are people in front of you who already signed up.

You got them – now what?

LIKES

“Never feel bad for not being “productive” when you read about 500,000 people dying. Soul anguish is what happens when grieving rituals are replaced by normalcy rituals. Don’t “power through” the heart of your humanity,” @FaithfullyBP

“It seems obvious, but the solution for a family suffering poverty is to get them money. Not a tax credit, not a program, not something they need to qualify for or jump through hoops to access, just give them money,” Steve Albini

Daily Loop #52

I was awakened at 4:30am to the sound of my cat terrorizing a mouse (the cat won), and the morning followed suit. Worked most of the morning hours, though made my coffee extra strong, which was a treat. Played around with new tools for my day job (Close Mondays), then got busy making this loop.

This loop is not as fully fleshed out as I’d like, but it’s something. You’ll notice (maybe) that there’s actually bass on this one, as I got inspired by by the recent “Precious Metals’: Starring Les Claypool & Robert Trujillo” video that was uploaded a few days ago. Weird being a bass player since 1991 and hardly ever playing it with any of these.

LIKES

“Breaking NBC: The U.S. death toll from the coronavirus has topped 500,000,” @kylegriffin1

“People want to work with individuals whom they enjoy and can see themselves working with. Skill can be built, but personalities stick,” @jelfish67

“Why do bands say that they have a rhythm guitar and lead guitar? Just say one only knows power chords and the other is a narcissist. It’s fine,” @Amygdalatx

“why are we not all obsessed with Bandcamp?” @helloitsaudrey

Daily Loop #51

On the weekends I avoid making social media assets for these videos. One, because I need the break, but two, hey, if you’re a fan; visit my site.

That’s the thing with “managing your own site.” Why would people visit it?

You see what some sites do to get eyeballs; top 10 ways to monetize your site, the best dresses at the recent awards show, 13 songs from the 80s that we love. Those get written because they work.

That’s now saying you have to make the same thing, but try to copy the spirit. People that like what you do – what else do they like? What else do you like?! Write about that. Or make videos about that. Or make a podcast about that. It’s hard for your main thing to be the draw unless you’ve already created the big thing and get traffic and eyeballs and fans from that.

LIKES

“it’s weird how it’s assumed that everyone wants to start a business,” @mama_emeritus

Video by Ricardo Esquivel from Pexels

Daily Loop #50

Welcome to 50, huh? That’s fifty mornings since January 1st, 2021 that I’ve been posting something like this here on this site. We’re 50 days into 2021. Wild.

Music loop just came about from layering some ideas on top of other ideas. Didn’t spend much time on drums or any lead part. I think this loop could really use some vocals, but that’s for another day.

Video-wise, yeah. That came together at the last minute, with sort of “why not” attitude. Now I feel like I need to incorporate video loops along with this whole thing. Again, why not?

LIKES

“I love to be at the grocery store with a dude behind me at the checkout who is very proudly not wearing a mask and say “why are you trying to kill us” over and over until he’s literally backed up 12 feet from my cart and won’t make eye contact with me anymore it’s very chill,” @CosmicChambo

“me, looking up from my screen after 11.5 months straight: why do my eyes hurt,” @mollyshirreen

Daily Loop #49

Mornings are for coffee, staring out the window, and understanding that this music doesn’t need to go viral in a Tic Tok video. The internet isn’t just for fully finished, agency-approved deliverables. The internet doesn’t have to be completely filled with polished, HD videos and studio produced hits.

There was still room for small bands to sell CDs in music stores back in the day, alongside the big hits and holiday albums.

LIKES

“I’m tired of badly edited images of black and brown people. Poorly exposed frames with recycled presets slapped on has got to stop. It doesn’t help tell the stories of black and brown folks,” @aundrelarrow

“I would not recommend friends work at Mailchimp, especially women,” @justkelly_ok

“My line is “a single newsletter email sign-up is worth 10 Instagram followers,” @Katieiscrafty

Video by Zuzanna Musial from Pexels

What’s Your Social Media Exit Plan?

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

Daily Loop #48

It’s okay for things to feel heavy, and miserable. We suffering a collective loss, a mass grieving. Being creative requires energy, going for a run requires energy, doing the things you love require energy, and these days a lot of energy is spent on the sole task of surviving. Getting through the day.

Today’s loop is just that. No fancy arrangement. No vocal parts. It gets by on the loop, even if it’s simple in measure, much like all of us these days. Just surviving.

LIKES

“every day i wake up and see emails. why,” @bijanstephen

From @lzbth on Instagram (via Norah Lorway)

Video by Kelly Lacy from Pexels

Make Mistakes When No One is Looking

This was a great talk with singer-songwriter Luke Sital-Singh. I love the point that Cath of Direct Input makes (among several points, really), of how there’s “not just one route through the music industry.”

She talks about bands getting signed from blog posts back in the day – oh, the glorious music blog days!

There was a time when bands got signed off the buzz created from a few bits of coverage on a few websites. Hell, there was a time when Pitchfork review helped you sell thousands of albums in a week.

So bands would get signed, and they wouldn’t have played more than a handful of shows. Or toured!

Meanwhile, bands that band played hundreds of shows a year, toured thousands of miles, all around the world – those were the acts without the buzz, but they were putting in the work regardless.

All that said – don’t be so in a rush to get noticed that you forget to handle the basics.

Know how to play to an empty room. Know how to mess up the release of an EP. Book time at a studio and have a miserable experience. Spell things wrong on your new merch line.

Make all the mistakes now, when no one is looking.

‘Outlier’ by Sectioned Turning Eight Years Old

Somehow that droning, menacing intro popped into my head. I was listening to something else, actually, but this particular intro came to the forefront. The bass tone, the looping noise, then the drums and vocals come in… gee, why would something so dark and terrifying come to mind during these unprecedented times?

This album came out February 28, 2013, and it feels like a a lifetime ago.

Daily Loop #47

Lovedrug’s ‘Down Towards the Healing’ came on tonight, at just the right time. That slow, quiet build-up at the 3:00 mark came on and crushed me. The perfect storm, the stress, the anxiety, the doubt, the chaos, the fear – it all came out. This 17 year old song opened me up.

Seeing more and more how this nearly year-long isolation is hitting me, and those around me. People I talk with, work with, keep in touch with via email and DMs.

Hang on, friends.

LIKES

“Web 4.0 will be everyone discovering that actually Web 1.0 was amazing and bringing the bulk of it back. Less surveillance, less centralization, less complexity,” @dhh

https://twitter.com/boop/status/1331408547180146689

Video by Mike from Pexels