Category: Social MediaCategory: Social Media

Instead of being lonely content machines, we can do cool stuff with good people to help build a vibrant community of people around whatever we’re doing.

In a recent Social Media Escape Club hangout, 

Beth Spencer discussed her method of collaborating with artists.

Beth’ Introvert Drawing Club welcomes a guest co-host, the community grows, and everyone has fun – it’s perfect!

This isn’t a “growth hack” or shortcut, though – this is work.

It’s getting away from the “follow me” game, and getting into the “let’s do cool stuff together” mindset.

Because cool people doing cool stuff together can lead to fun things.

For example, I met Laura Kidd earlier this year on Twitter. We connected over our shared appreciation of email lists and a disdain for social media (ironic, I know).

Laura suggested we do a video interview, so we set up our cameras and microphones and made it happen.

Laura shared what she’s learned as an independent artist and emphasized the significance of maintaining an email list. I talked about my experiences with newsletters and online music marketing.

This one interview led to my largest bump in subscribers in the two-year history of this newsletter (thank you, Laura).

Again, bring good people together, make fun stuff, and watch what happens.

Marisa Dabice of Mannequin Pussy talks with Karly Hartzman of Wednesday on the Talkhouse Podcast.

In this chat, these two friends talk about touring, and specifically about how unusual it can feel to perform—and how that can lead to actual tears on stage, not the most fun experience. They chat about the difference between Mannequin Pussy and Wednesday fans, and about the pressure to enjoy your success while it’s happening.

Fans of Mannequin Pussy are going to read that and find out all about Wednesday, and vice versa. See how that works?

Kathryn Calder (of The New Pornographers) talks about making music with Mark Andrew Hamilton (of Woodpigeon) as Frontperson:

What I love about writing together with Mark, is that he always has really interesting ideas, I really trust his taste, and he comes up with ideas I wouldn’t think of. I used to be a little bit more strict about what I wanted things to sound like, and Mark loves keeping the character of sounds, and something I’ve learned to embrace more from working with him is just because something isn’t exactly perfect, that doesn’t mean it needs to be redone. Sometimes the small imperfections are part of what makes something really special.

Dancer and musician Mikayla Geier dropped a short film to accompany her latest single.

She had help making this film from a director/cinematographer, someone scored it, someone else did the animation, and she had help writing it.

And while I don’t think anyone reading has aspirations of being the next Mr. Beast, I think it’s interesting to hear how obsessed he was about figuring out YouTube with a few like-minded people.

I’m not saying you need to Skype your pals from 7am to 10pm everyday, but a 30 minute Zoom call with a few people to “figure things out” couldn’t hurt (see below).

Bring good people together, make fun stuff, and let’s see what happens.

Flip social media from “come hang” to “you missed out”

The creative community is a wonderful thing, which is why I’ve been hosting mid-week 30-minute Zoom calls with subscribers.

Click play below and hear how a bit of conversation and creative energy led to a fun realization for DJ Shotski, and how to promote her passion for polka in a way that feels sustainable and pure.

Yeah, I think what I’m getting from this conversation is an answer to a question that I’ve been chewing on for a couple of days. Seth, thank you so much.

My mission is to try to get to find people who like this (polka) like I do, but also to inspire younger people, and more people to like this music, that’s so much a part of the history and culture of our state. Right?

So I have the benefit of having this weekly radio program, that now is about to have a ton of potential reach all over the State. Very exciting.

Like, what if, instead of saying, “Here’s an album of the week, like, here’s a spotlight. Look at this cool record. It’s this physical artifact. It’s neat. It’s got a cool picture. It’s got something interesting on the back about the artist. The song is really cool. I want you to tune in, social media people. I want you to tune into my radio show and then maybe sign up for my emails.”

Like, what if I flipped it? What if it was my website, or my email subscriber, saying, “You get to see on Thursday what the highlight album of the week is.
So when you tune in on Sunday, you get to hear the record that I’m talking about.”

Right! Give your most exciting content to the people who’ve already bought in FIRST. They signed up, raised their hand, and said I WANT YOU – so give it to them!

And then social media post is the same content, it’s just a post to say, “Hey, look at this thing that I did last week. My subscribers already heard about this, that’s why they tuned into the radio show. You shouldn’t miss out. You should subscribe because this community that I’m building are people who get this, who love this music, who are inspired by this, and who love the same things that I do right.”

So instead of social media being the thing to try to trickle people in, like – flip it.

Social media is the last thing you share about something that already happened. Don’t miss out. 

I’ve been saying this for a while, “don’t leave your magic at the food court.”

You make all those cool videos and assets for social media, but your website hasn’t been updated in months and doesn’t reflect one bit of the show you’re putting on for platforms that don’t even let you reach your entire audience.

Flip the script – treat social media like a billboard (h/t

Dino Corvino), and drive people to your online space, where you control your messaging, branding, and vibes.

Don’t seat your guests at your restaurant, then explain that the specials are at your other location across town.

EDIT: this post sort of led to this interview with Audience Republic!

So stop telling fans to follow you on platforms that are built to limit your ability to reach them

I know it’s easy to post to socials during your big event, but remember; you’re lucky if you reach 10% of your followers.

Instead, go grab a slice of pizza afterwards. Go dancing. Get home super late, and collapse on your bed fully clothed and exhausted.

The next day, after some coffee and a shower, put together an email newsletter with a handful of the photos and stories from the night before.

Because, come on… when you “take a minute” to post to social media at the event, you’re going to end up checking your email and DMs, open IG, process your notifications – stop it!

Get back to the show, hang out with your collaborators, go make some new friends.

And stop posting your most exciting photos and stories to the places where your fans are least likely to see them

You can put photos in a newsletter.

You can upload audio right to your Substack.

You can upload a video clip right to Substack.

You can write big captions.

When you send it with Substack, it’s also on the web, so new fans can find it from Google.

When you send it with Substack, you can link to it from your social media (good luck with that, but still).

You can link to your upcoming tour dates, pre-orders, or anything you want unlike Instagram (which doesn’t allow links)

You can link to anything and your fans will still see, unlike on social media which throttles your reach when you do that.

It won’t get any easier to reach your fans on social media in 2024

That’s why you should start an email list today, and get subscribers by sending great newsletters.

Stories work, friends.

Feeling stuck on what to send to your fans this week? Here’s three things your fans might appreciate in the coming days:

🌮 Oct 4: National Taco Day

Don’t just say, “hey, happy National Taco Day,” tell your story about how you kinda met Jack Dorsey of Square. Okay, I didn’t really meet him, as I was busy stuffing tacos and making coffee, but he stopped by our little shop and hooked us up with shiny new Square equipment. Seemed like a nice guy.

💔 Oct 5: Mike Alexander of Evile passed away in 2009

Just 32 years old, gone far too soon. I got to meet Mike when I was running Noisecreep, when we had Evile in for an interview, and he was a sweet, kind dude.

💿 Oct 7: Candiria’s While They Were Sleeping came out in 2016

This banger turns seven years old this year.

Maybe you’ve got an epic story about getting tacos after a show. Or you have a killer salsa recipe.

Maybe you played a show with Evile, or you met Mike years ago, or just love their latest album. Share something genuine, and the spirit of Mike Alexander lives on, 14 years later.

Maybe you haven’t listened to Candiria in awhile, and this brings up good memories.

All of these are just ideas to show that you’re not just a band with an album to sell, an artist with a new print, or a photographer for hire – they show you’re a real person, with unique experiences and stories to tell.

And people buy from people that vibe with. Just saying.

NOTE: Please double check all these dates. I’m a one dude operation here, so mistakes happen, and yes, I’m gonna miss a bunch of stuff. Use this as a guide!

ANTI-SOCIAL

A vulgar display of social media hostility

“But now, the couple said, the change to Instagram’s algorithm has resulted in some (of Idea’s) Instagram Stories reaching barely 1 percent of their audience,” from ‘Instagram’s Favorite Bookseller Is Ready to Go Offline.’

“Instagram changed the hashtag system,” says Craig Gleason, “you can no longer see ALL the posts connected to a hashtag, only the ones they decide are “TOP” posts.” Not great!

“To be an artist, a writer, an herbalist, a creative and thoughtful person – we are risking so much at the hands of the apps that keep us sucked in,” says Cody Cook-Parrott Grace in ‘I quit Instagram.’

“My beef is more with Facebook and Meta than with the hackers,” says co-artistic director of Punkt Festival Erik Honoré in ‘The anatomy of a Facebook account heist.’

“You don’t need to reach a million people all the time. You don’t need to reach a thousand people all the time… one person can do it.”

This video centers on a simple but easily forgotten idea: impact doesn’t come from scale first—it comes from attention landing in the right place.

After talking with a longtime musician who quietly kept sending extreme metal records to college radio, the result surprised him. Once a station latched on, everything changed: “now instead of playing to old dudes with their arms crossed we’re playing to young kids who are going crazy.”

The lesson is this: “just because a thousand people didn’t see your thing, maybe one person that someday can do something with that is the person that you need to constantly be putting that in front of.”

You won’t always know who they are, but that’s why you keep going.