Category: NewslettersCategory: Newsletters

Approach your social media and email newsletters like a DJ.

A DJ doesn’t open the set with self-promotion; they give the audience a carefully chosen playlist of music, drawing from various sources, sounds, and eras.

Similarly, you can blend your influences and experiences into a cohesive online presence for your audience.

Plan ahead and schedule social media posts on specific days. Set a rhythm for your posts, and tastefully repeat announcing your new songs, tour dates, and upcoming events.

We do this because, “if your social media posts are seen by less than 3% of your followers, that means over 97% of your fans didn’t see it.”

Now, when a DJ is sourcing music for a mix, they draw from their own collection, along with new material. Random discoveries from other mixes.

In a way you’re probably already doing this.

You’re sending new music to your friends, and going to shows.
Dropping links to music videos in the group chat.
Talking about upcoming shows in Discord, on social media, in person.

You’re more of a DJ then you realize.

Your “online presence” is your existence in the digital space, so keep it authentic.

Use your good taste and share that with your audience. Tell them the new album you discovered, the old album that moves you to tears, a book that inspired your creative journey.

This makes “marketing ” feel less gross because you’re just being yourself, reshaping the conversation into whatever online container you happen to inhabit.

Social media can be a full-time job – if you let it become a full-time job.

Let me explain Parkinson’s law; “work expands to fill the time allotted to it.”

So if your online marketing plan is just, “ehh, whenever I get to it,” great – you’re now a full time social media person.

After all, you’ve set no boundaries or limits. You get to always think about social media, and fret about if you’re doing enough, and if you should post something.

“Oh man, I haven’t posted on Facebook is weeks!”

Instead of that amateur-hour nonsense, set up a plan that fits your life, since you probably have better things to think about than social media.

Open up Google Calendar, we’re going to create an “editorial calendar.”

If you’ve got a new song coming out, put that in there.

Now, plan a social media post two weeks before that date.

Then seven days. Then three.

Oh, the new song is out! That’s another post.

Now, plan a post for three days after it comes out.

And seven days.

And 14 days.

Your numbers may vary, but you get the point.

Go into Twitter, write out your posts, include an image, and schedule them.

Use Facebook’s Business Manger thing and do the same to schedule posts on Facebook and Instagram.

Congrats! That’s the bare fucking minimum to have a seemingly active social media presence, and 95% of bands in your scene can’t be bothered, so you’re a star.

But what about when you don’t have a new song coming out, or a new tour?

Figure out what major holidays are coming up, then plan a post around something that matches the vibe and feel of your creative endeavor.

57 days til Halloween! Spooky things! Horror movies!
79 days til Black Friday! Special deals!
112 days til Christmas!

You get the idea.

Or search “[genre] albums released in 2013” and find albums that are 10 years old (or 15, or 25).

Write about your favorite albums on your website, link to it from you social media platforms, and in your newsletter.

For example, ‘Surgical Steel’ from Carcass came out September 13, 2013.

Instead of just writing your homage to this epic album on Instagram, put it on your website instead.

Then, on September 13th, tell your followers on socials to read you post on your website (that’s what Loudwire will be doing).

Send the link to your email list, too.

You can do that with movies, books, shows you went to, albums you’ve released, and all sorts of various other milestones you’ve had in your career.

Now, when you sit down and write out these ideas, it makes your “content creation” a lot easier, and the job takes less time.

You’re not just throwing shit at the wall and hoping something sticks. Instead, you’re being deliberate.

You can take an hour a week, write some stuff, schedule it, and be done. DONE.

Then, since you’re putting out solid stuff, it just makes it easier for your audience to click, comment, react, and subscribe.

And it’s also how you keep from making social media your full time job.

Here’s the slowest, least-scalable way to grow your email list – “just ask, man.”

Want to reach a new audience that could help grow your fanbase?

Ask to be on a podcast.

Offer to write a cool feature for someone’s site that you like.

Did you make friends on a Discord? Don’t be a jerk, but maybe ask for someone to check out your newsletter on occasion.

Meet someone in real life and hit it off by talking about your art, your business, your offering? “Hey, I write about this stuff all the time, here’s the link to sign up for my newsletter.”

Have a cool back-and-forth on social media in the comments. DM them and ask them to subscribe.

Have a QR code on your merch table – people who sign up for your email list get 10% of their purchase, or a free sticker.

Neil Mason (LinkedIn) spent $3,000 on a photo booth to set up at shows. It runs on an iPad and captures people’s email addresses:

Since purchasing the photo booth, we’ve averaged 80 emails captured per show.

We’ve played 63 shows in 2023, with 62 to go.

80 x 63 = 5040 emails

I know not everyone reading this is in a band, or if you are, maybe you’re not interested in setting up a freaking PHOTOBOOTH, BUT… take these ideas and run with them.

Do interesting things, meet interesting people, and, on occasion ask them to check out your stuff.

Sharing this post from TOKiMONSTA to demonstrate how hard it is for everyone, even a Grammy nominated artist with 178,000 Instagram followers, and 1.3 million monthly listens on Spotify.

But hey, Jeffrey Wisenbaugh (Director of Social & Content at Meta) tells Link in Bio about some new things coming to Threads!

“I think I’m most excited about an improved search experience, the web version, and multiple account login—will make managing brand pages and your own personal account so much easier.” 

Who else is excited about an improved search experience?!
Are you excited about “the web version” yet?! WOO!

Most artists would be excited about reaching their fans who clicked follow, but you gotta pay money for that (and even then, there’s no guarantee they’ll see it).

SO WHAT DO WE DO?

What do folks without Grammy nominations, press coverage, label support, and a management team do?

Are we really going to stick it out on Instagram and Threads and “X” and whatever else, working our asses off to get a million followers just so we can reach 10% of them if we’re lucky?

You’re closer to 10,000 people on an email list than you are to a million on a social platform (probably).

And if you got “just” 10,000 email subscribers and a 40% open rate you’re cooking with an email a week.

Now, that doesn’t just mean some vinyl mock ups and video stills linking to YouTube.

That’s the sort of stuff you can outsource to Fiverr.

Like my pal Laura says in her latest video, she doesn’t need to be the one stuffing mail orders.

Her magic comes from writing catchy songs and making great videos – the sort of thing you can’t outsource.

Tegan and Sara have been writing multiple newsletters every week since January, 2022.

Nina Nastasia wrote about the one year anniversary of her album ‘Riderless Horse,’ complete with photos of the recording process with Steve Albini (disclaimer; she’s a client, but she wrote all that).

PUT DOWN THE PHONE

If you wanna do the bare minimum with a newsletter, don’t expect great open rates, or people rushing to subscribe.

Instead, set aside one hour from the multiple hours you spend on social media each week and write a great newsletter.

Include some photos. Maybe a video.

Oh, you know – like all the stuff you shovel onto social media that most of your fans never see!

And all those cool interview features you see in magazines and music sites (maybe stuff that other artists are doing, but you’re not at that level yet), DO THEM YOURSELF.

Make you own photo session.

Hell, work with a photographer friend. COLLABORATE.

List your 10 favorite horror videos, favorite 80s action movies, the album that got you to start playing music, the mentor that got you making art… should I keep going?

I can do this all day.

Because dammit, if you got that sort of press on a site or an alt-weekly you’d share it with your fans, right?

YOU’RE MORE INTERESTING THAN THIS NEWSLETTER

I mean, straight up; I write a newsletter about MAKING NEWSLETTERS and got about 25 new subscribers in the last month.

This is the nerdiest shit and I’m nearing 600 subscribers.

You probably make art, run a shop, write music, interview bands, photograph live shows, teach amazing courses – you know how much more interesting that is than writing about newsletters?!?

BUT, if you just make your newsletter about 10% discounts and BUY NOW buttons and NEW SONG in bold with a link, well, then yes, my shit is cooler.

But you can tell stories! You should share photos! Talk about the things you like!

Or… just sit around and hope that social media platforms are gonna change.

That ain’t gonna happen.

We’re all a million times cooler than these social media nerds.

Make cool stuff, and share it with your friends on your website and newsletter (where they’ll see it).

Yep, things look slightly different here at Heavy Metal Email.

I discovered an account that started in 2019 was using the same “iOS email app with 666” design for their logo, so I switched things up.

Aside from the batch of stickers I made with that old design, it’s not a great loss. I doubt any of you reading this right now will un-subscribe, and six minutes after reading this you will have forgotten all about it.

It’s okay to scrap old things and start fresh.

That’s why you should start your email list today.

Pick a service like Button Down or Substack or Beehiiv and just start.

Like I wrote in “GET BETTER AT REACHING YOUR FANS,”

If you start with Mailchimp, you can send five emails and decide you hate it and use something else.

Just export your subscribers and leave.

I did this recently with a client.

We sent two email campaigns and jumped to Substack.

We are at week 33 of 2023. Do not wait until the new year to “maybe figure out that email thing.”

It will only get harder to reach your fans on social media in the coming weeks and months – it’s time to figure out your Social Media Escape Plan, friends. Let’s go.