Category: MarketingCategory: Marketing

The video above was in response to this wonderful quote I found via Substack notes from Elissa Altman:

If you’re not gonna talk publicly about your work, plenty of other folks will. People can’t fall in love with your work if they don’t know about it.

Tell people about your work in only the way that you can, because if an unpaid intern (or an AI prompt) could write your self-promo copy, you’re toast.

🚫 Hey, new song! [LINK]
🚫 I just posted some new art. [LINK]
🚫 New items added to the store. [LINK]
🚫 New interview – we talked about art stuff! [LINK]

Those can work if you’re Radiohead or Beyonce or Rolling Stone or Best Buy.

Which you are not.

Let’s learn from Austin Kleon, who says to learn to steal like an artist (buy that book right now, dammit).

✅ Look at how Jeff Tweedy explains a new solo acoustic track he posted:

“It’s Super Bowl Sunday, that’s what I’m told. I have tallied the results of all your requests, and opted to do an acoustic version of “King of You” from the album Star Wars. Which was an unlikely favorite. Or at least it got two votes. It’s from an album that’s meant to be full of nonsense, because I think nonsense is good for us.”

No way an AI bot or record label intern could write that. And a lot more interesting than “new song, click here.”

✅ If you interviewed someone, get out of the way and put them front and center, the way Sari Botton of Oldster Magazine does here:

In this instance above, Todd Boss is the focus, the center of attention. Get the heck out of the way and let their words champion the piece.

✅ Artist Marie Enger opens her recent newsletter like this:

“Friends, this week? It fucking sucked.

But my buddy Ray Nadine (who you might know from the 2024 GLAAD nominated comic LIGHT CARRIES ON, Raise Hell (with our good friend and yours too, Jordan Alsaqa), and SOMETHING HAS CHANGED) reminded me yesterday as I was spinning out–

The horrors persist, but so do the little treats.

Then they sent me a slurpee.”

✅ Back to Austin Kleon – he promotes a recent newsletter on Substack notes like this:

“I don’t know what it is about my brain, but as long as I can find the right image to put at the top of the newsletter, the rest just flows out. (I started this letter last week but didn’t finish it — remembering Kate’s image helped everything snap into place)”

Not one of these asks for a click, a signup, or a “buy now.”

They all attempt to draw you in with story, delight, oddities, weirdness – you know, art. Magic!

The newsletter or the song is the vehicle, but the creative spirit behind the work must provide the energy to move it forward.

We need to get away from thinking of our offerings as commodities.

We are not promoting just a new song, a new thing to read, or another piece of content.

You’ve already done the hard part; you’re an artist, photographer, teacher, musician – you know how hard it is to play the piano?! IT’S IMPOSSIBLE, I TRIED, OKAY?

But promoting your work? That’s much easier than trying to sight-read sheet music, which is another impossibility – how does anyone do it?!

Let your creative wisdom inform how you talk about and share your work. Literally spend more than 12 seconds on it, instead of banging out “hey click here” and expecting anyone to give a fuck about it.

✅ BONUS: You can also go in the opposite direction.

Think about how you’d start a comedy show. What’s the expectation?

Even if you’re not a comedian, we’re all so familiar with the process that if we had to, we could at least do the introduction part, right?

“Hey everyone, I’m Seth. So great to be here!”

But it takes an artist to spend the first three minutes wrestling with the mic stand, dropping the microphone, and yelling at the production crew to turn the music off.

But note when the music stops, and Tim Heidecker abruptly says, “Thank you, okay, all right.”

That took some work. That was magic.

Those first three minutes are rough. I got a little bit of anxiety from watching it, but it was like a car wreck; I couldn’t look away.

Like – why go through all that?

Because it sets the stage for what’s to come.

Why did I pack up my camera gear and use a wired microphone and go into the woods to make a video about hyping your work?

Because this is my art, my project, my work.

Some people will get that video. Some people will be like, “That guy is weird, and I’m not subscribing.”

Great. This is what I do, this is how I work. thank u, next.

Make people feel something. Stress, tension, release. The hero’s journey.

These are all things you can learn and study and steal ideas from (and a much better use of your time, instead of spending 2+ hours a day scrolling social media).

Time for another walk in the woods.

Craig Lewis of Running Tales left a comment recently, and I wanted to answer it for everybody so we all benefit (though I did post a note about it here):

How do you practically make that move to talking to those closer to you/simply putting out quality content if no-one is seeing/interacting with it?

If you never post on socials etc, no-one ever sees what you do. If you have an audience already, it’s cool to get stuff out to them and they will hopefully do you a good turn and shout about it for you.

But if you’re still building an audience… back to shouting into the void?

Imagine you play the game, and you get 100 new followers on whatever social media platform. Big win!

But the next time you post something, only 10-20% will see it (probably).

That’s 10-20 people – out of that 100!

This is why getting “just” 10 new email subscribers is worth celebrating – because you can actually reach them!

So, where do you find those ten people?

• They’re in your DMs, or Discords, Messages – send them a link to one of your latest posts in a cool and chill way
• If you sell something online, you have email addresses! Send them a link to subscribe (DON’T just add them to your list, let them opt-in)
• There are people you talk to every day who have no idea you even have a newsletter (I’ve been doing this one for 2.5 years and some friends still have no idea)
• You can collaborate with someone and make something together, expanding your work to a new audience.
• Ask to be a guest on a podcast (via Astrid Bracke)
• Take online courses relevant to your field and expand your network of cool people
• Start your own online video chats (like Raz from Running Sucks), or Discord hang outs, or streams based on things adjacent to what you do and build a community (musicians do this a lot with video game streams)

These ideas require some thought to get your point across in a way that feels good.

It’s hard work.

But it ain’t “make video content that you hate doing four times a week” hard.

That said, it’d be way easier to forget all this Social Media Escape Club nonsense and upload a new piece of content to social media and get that dopamine rush when it gets four likes in the next 10 minutes.

This is how social media rots our brains.

They’ve convinced us that the only way to market our work is by using their platforms, every one of them optimized to get you to spend more time using their products.

Do you have time for more unpaid work?

Are posts not doing well? Try a carousel (which is more images you have to make).

Are carousels not working? Try making short-form videos!

No, thanks.

The power lies in our networks, our communities, our scenes – things that social media has done its best to rattle apart, but they still exist.

“Are we so powerless to change the current situation that we sit back and hope somebody else fixes everything?

And then what? That person will sell the company to a Nabisco+Tide hedge fund subsidiary, and we’ll be back where we started.

Maybe centralized kingdoms of power and influence aren’t the answer.”

Here’s an example: every week, a friend of mine emails creative people he sees making things he enjoys.

He’ll cold email the person who did lighting on a music video he saw on YouTube, or the person who edited a great essay.

No agenda, no pitch, just an appreciative note to say good job, keep it up.

Does it lead to work? Sometimes, but most often it doesn’t.

Did I mention this friend has a Grammy and an Emmy award?

And he’s not on social media anymore, either.

Don’t just follow other cool artists; BECOME FRIENDS. Creative partners. Support one another. There is strength in our collective magic.

Make cool stuff, and show it to your friends in casual ways without social media.

Get to work.

Tara McMullin wrote a great piece about self-promotion, which you should read.

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I posted something on Substack Notes about the subject, and since it resonated so well, I figured I’d share it again:

Years ago, “self-promotion” meant posting something on a social platform, and most of your followers saw it.

It was great when it worked!

Then came algorithms, and now self-promotion feels like a constant battle.

It’s not you, it’s the system.

You can’t post just once, because 90% of your audience won’t even see it. This is why I’d always tell people, “Promote your new song a few times a week, at different times of day!”

But then having to post, plan, and schedule starts to feel like screaming into the void.

Oh, and then Instagram says it wants videos. Twitter removes links. Facebook and LinkedIn limit your reach when you include a link. Also, don’t say “link in bio!”

It’s not even self-promotion at this point – it’s tap dancing, juggling, or card tricks in the middle of Times Square, along with 900 million other creative people doing the same.

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There were many great comments:

• “It’s not self-promotion. It’s called persuasive technology and it’s used to increase user engagement. We are social media puppets, working for free to increase stakeholder share value.”
• “Honestly, it has just become shouting into the void for me now.”
• “It’s a game of ever changing rules, that’s for sure.”
• “It’s clear that if you’re (on social media), you’ve gotta play the game. It’s kinda no different to the office politics I endure on a daily (workday) basis in this way.”

I was asked a few times what the solution is, and my belief is this:

WE ARE THE SOLUTION.

Do cool things with your friends and put it on the internet. That’s it.

Make interesting things, tell your interesting friends about those things.

Here’s how I grew my newsletter…

One, Ryan J. Downey recommended me to his subscribers of Stream N’ Destroy. I’ve known Ryan for well over a decade, and we know (and work with) many of the same people.

I didn’t ask Ryan for the recommendation, but he did it, and I owe him a dinner, that’s for sure.

I couldn’t make that happen. I would never ask. But hey – make cool things and sometimes people will share the cool things you make with people they know.

Second, Laura Kidd and I had a chat about email marketing on her YouTube channel, which led some of her fans to check out what I’m doing. We were just two cool people talking about a super nerdy thing (email newsletters), but it resonated with some people, and that’s what matters.

Third, I trusted my gut (because I have a cool gut, just like you!) and changed the name (and direction) of this newsletter. What started out as Heavy Metal Email became Social Media Escape Club in October 2023.

I leaned more into what makes my blood boil (social media) and found even more of an audience for what I write about.

Do cool things, and cool people might find them interesting and tell their cool friends about them, too.

You can wait for Spotify rates to increase, or a new benevolent social media platform to debut, or you can realize you’ve already got a great “social network” of people and fans and friends around you.

Focus on the people who are right in front of you. Delight them, focus on them, and self-promotion will be a breeze.

I had a wonderful chat with Raziq Rauf and friends last week (Raz writes Running Sucks, and it’s great), and got to continue screaming this message from the rooftops:

Don’t ask social media followers to subscribe to your newsletter; tell them what they’re getting.

And don’t just say “an interview” or “new music,” sell it!

“Make it easy for your fans to say “yes, I want that.”

Do you want free donuts? Yes.

Do you want more of my art? Yes.

Do you want more photos of my travels? Yes.

Do you want more music? Yes.”

Get fans to your site (or newsletter).

If they subscribe, great.

If they don’t, they don’t.

Sure, with a zillion followers, you can ask for the subscribe and see some success, but explaining what fans will be getting is a lot more fun.

Many of us in the creative world have a choice in how we tell people about our work.

It’s not just picking which platform to use but also how much time we devote to each. Do we make videos? Static images? Long captions or short?

And now, after years (for some of us a decade or more), we’re faced with the unique challenges of using (or even supporting) the platforms that are deemed so vital to our success.

This is why I changed the name of this newsletter to Social Media Escape Club – because people are being more intentional about how they use these platforms. Some people even consider not using them (gasp), like Robyn Hepburn Illustration said in our recent Zoom Club Meeting:

We’re not crazy for thinking there has to be a better way.

As I wrote last week, Bryan runs the As The Story Grows podcast with zero social media presence.

Softer Sounds podcast studio isn’t on social media.

I say all this as we’re barreling into the holiday season, where we’ll be drowning in marketing messages, commercials, and various media blasting in our faces.

The name of the game is interrupting everyone all the time, grabbing any bit of attention with ten thousand other bright lights and flashing messages.

BUT… in the middle of all that, it’s nice to get a call from an old friend, right?

A DM from someone you love hearing from—an email from someone you always have time for.

As artists, photographers, musicians, DJs, writers – that can be us, you know that, right?

Now, if you only show up every time you have something to sell, that’s not as endearing.

It’s hard to fall in love with mail-order catalogs.

It is far easier to have a pleasant exchange with the jovial mail-person who shows up daily with a smile and a bit of small talk.

Social media is about interruption, noise, and reaching only a fraction of your followers.

But with an easy pace of telling stories, showing up regularly, and earning the trust of your fans, you win the social media game of attention roulette by not playing.