Hi folks, I just wanted to talk about something that I've been seeing for quite some time now, especially in this day and age of digital marketing/consumption. It's something that I've been also working on myself because, let's face it, you can't fight the trends.
This, my friends, is your social image. Posting, being present, being online, responding, basically what we call a "social presence".
And what does this mean exactly? What do we do? Can we beat this thing? What happened to the "grass roots" way of doing things?
Well let's try to answer some of these questions here. I, myself, am by no means an expert in social media. I have definitely grown up through dial up internet, Myspace, early Facebook, Youtube, Instagram, and now TikTok, Clapper, Pintrest, Twitter... it never seems to end and it can certainly be overwhelming.
I've had a lot of friends and business acquaintances over the years try and fight this machine. "I'm not gonna give in to Spotify" "Spotify pays artists like shit" "I prefer to sell CD's". Okay, okay, great. While some of these things may be certainly valid and true, those of us who have little power to make real change are only hurting ourselves by not having a presence on these platforms. We won't get into digital streaming payouts, that's a whole other can of worms, but what we can get into is what it means and how important it is to be present on social media.
I don't think for a second that grass roots promotion is dead, but I do think it has taken a back seat to social media/digital marketing. I've been experimenting a lot and trying amp up my own social image, not to be an internet "personality" but simply to have more of a presence online.
You ever notice that the posts your friends interact with or the ones that you interact with the most will start showing up in your feed more and more? Your friends that you rarely interact with or that hardly post on Facebook seem to get pushed to the bottom of the newspile. It's the algorithm man, the ALGORITHM!
I'm not an SEO expert or anything but I can't help but notice that these social media algorithms are pushing content to us based on our interactions, our interests, what our friends interests are, what we stop on... hell, even sometimes what we google.
The fact of the matter is, if you want to reach anyone these days you need to get on "the socials". And this doesn't mean just making a profile and popping in once in awhile, liking a few pictures... it means posting meaningful content, commenting on other peoples posts... and I mean meaningful comments that engage the poster or their other followers. You need to try and stay on the front page at all times. And it can be exhausting.
A recent acquaintance of mine, Matt from HeyTony, has been sharing very useful content about SEO optimization for websites and social media, and about the importance of what you post and how often you're posting. I've been trying these things myself so I'll definitely be reporting back on my findings, but no one can argue that it's a requirement in todays entertainment industry.
It breaks my heart to see talented artists work so hard (and spend a lot of money) producing a record, shooting and editing music videos... and then completely fall on their face when it comes to their social media game. I'm not gonna say the music shouldn't speak for itself... because it should... but these days you need to be really pumping it out. You ought to be proud of what you've put your heart and soul into and tell everyone about it every day.... but in an engaging way. Hell, I want to hear from you. I want to know what you're doing. I know it's hard to think up content every day but just watch your favourite artists and see what they're posting about. Most of the media we ingest is rather inane day to day stuff anyways, so tell us what you had for breakfast for all I care, just stay relevant in my newsfeed. And this doesn't mean just Facebook, it means Instagram, YouTube, Pinterest, Twitter, Clapper and whatever the next new thing. Repost everything on every platform because one fan that's on one, isn't on the other and you need to drive these people to you. Think about it, this is all FREE advertising. Back in the day you would need a label to reach this many people. Not to mention most of these platforms include insights and statistics based on your reach and demographic. And did I mention that it's all FREE???
Now don't get overwhelmed here, Matt showed me a program called Repurpose.io. I'm not affiliated with them or Matt, I'm just trying to share what I've learned. I've yet to delve into this myself but basically what it allows you to do is automate your content to be shared among your different social platforms. So if you're getting overwhelmed from posting on IG and then Facebook and then Twitter and etc etc... you just post on one of them and Repurpose will repost it for you on the other platforms. Check it out and let me know if it works for you.
And just to loop back around to streaming... stop trying to win the streaming war. Leave that to Neil Young. YOU need to be on Spotify and Tidal and Apple. Sure, print some CD's and vinyls but don't try and tell me you'd make more money if people still bought CDs. They don't. And they don't want to. They want to look you up and find you and listen to you at the click of a button. You need to be available, easy to find and easy to share. Worldwide. You would never sell CD's to the same people you reach on social media. Your music is not your sole income, it's a vehicle to your other consumables, to your gigs, to your next opportunity. If people like you enough, they'll buy your merch or come to a show. Don't worry about that $0.000067 that you're making. Consider that a bonus for reaching people you would have otherwise never reached in an analog age. Embrace the present. Things are changing so fast for everyone, we're all still figuring this out. Trends change like seasons. You need to be on the cusp of new technologies or you'll be left behind.
