Category: Social MediaCategory: Social Media

“Legacy blue checks will be removed soon,” tweeted Mr. Musk, “those are the ones that are truly corrupt.”

My friends, here’s a short list of the most notable names in metal with the “corrupt” legacy blue checks on Twitter:

Metallica, Iron Maiden, Slipknot, Testament, Black Sabbath, Metal Blade Records, Nuclear Blast Records, Metal Hammer, Exodus, Napalm Death, Behemoth, Cradle of Filth, Suffocation, Municipal Waste, Loudwire, Lamb Of God, Arch Enemy, Hatebreed, Earache Records, Revocation, Kreator, Ozzy Osbourne, Megadeth (and Dave Mustaine), Guns N’ Roses, Mötley Crüe, Korn

So you’re telling me all these bands will start paying Twitter $8-11/mo for the joy of reaching 10% of their followers?

Ooooh, this is gonna get interesting!

Below I’m blasting SOCIAL MEDIA, not Fear Factory!

I could do this sort of surface-level reporting for almost every metal band out there, since social media is horrible for all of us, across the board.

That said, posting a notable anniversary on social media is fantastic way to drive engagement! Great idea!

Right?

Yikes.

Here’s the surface level breakdown:

• 780,300 total followers (Twitter + Facebook + Instagram)
• 45,600 views (across all three platforms)

That means 6% of their total social media audience saw these posts.

Which means 94% of their audience on social media had no idea about the 13th birthday of ‘Mechanize.’

That means 734,700 followers probably didn’t stream the album on a DSP, or watch this video on YouTube:

Again, not pointing fingers at Fear Factory – this is across the board, friends. We’re all in this same boat, and it’s filled with holes.

So start thinking about your Social Media Escape Plan, as it won’t get any easier (or cheaper) to reach your fans this year on any of the social media platforms.

Saw a Twitter prompt today asking about an album that changed my life, but rather than just reply there for 5% of my followers to see, I figured I’d repurpose that “content” and use it to illustrate a two points.

In my first band back in 1991, guitarist Tim Day gave me a dubbed copy of ‘Sailing the Seas of Cheese’ from Primus. As a bass player he figured I’d enjoy it, and wow, Les Claypool opened up a whole new world for this naive, young Seth, as a bass player, and as a person.

Years of playing and I somehow settled on this “one man oddity” known as Seth W. for a bit. I opened for metal bands, got hardcore kids singing along with goofy songs, and met a lot of amazing people that I’m still friends with (and work with) today.

What’s ANY of this got to do with Social Media Escape Club?!

1. Expand on your social media posts. Put your witty comments and interactions into newsletters and on websites, where they’ll last longer than a few hours.
2. Try new things. Starting a newsletter in 2023 might sound weird, but so does pouring hours per day into social media platforms that only let you reach 5% of your fans.

Sure, you can say, “but no one visits our website.”

Well, your website is a static page with a Bandsintown feed, a band photo that’s three years old, and still has links to MySpace.

Gee, I wonder why no one visits your website?

Start copying and pasting all that content you’re shoveling onto those VC-backed, corporate funded websites that don’t give a shit about your art, and build something of your own that will outlive ‘em all.

Step right up, friends, and pivot to YouTube Shorts!

From Feb. 1, YouTube is introducing a revenue scheme to its Shorts format, meaning eligible creators earn a 45% share of the revenue from the ads viewed around their Shorts videos, while YouTube retains the remaining 55%.

(Sure, YouTube isn’t really “social media,” except that it’s media, and everyone talks about it, so it’s pretty social)

Soon after this announcement, Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai said “YouTube Shorts has surpassed 50 billion daily views, up from 30 billion a year ago.”

YouTube says “qualifying channels can get between $100–$10,000 each month,” and note that, “Shorts views exclusively receive ad revenue sharing from the Shorts Feed, which is separate from long-form video monetization on the Watch Page.”

If you’re ready to compete with kids with 4K cameras, and way more time on their hands than you, check out YouTube’s ‘Create YouTube Shorts,’ and ‘YouTube Shorts monetization policies.’

ANTISOCIAL

➡️ “A House Republican on Thursday is introducing a bill to ban kids and teens under 16 from using social media,” reports the Washington Post, just as the Surgeon General says that 13 is too early to join social media. Oh, and a bill just passed the House in Utah requiring parental consent for minors on social media.

➡️ Elon said “Twitter will share ad revenue with creators for ads that appear in their reply threads,” but “To be eligible, the account must be a subscriber to Twitter Blue Verified.” Pay to play! Oh, and he wants to charge businesses $1,000 a month to keep their check marks.

YOUR SOCIAL MEDIA ESCAPE PLAN

If the work we’re putting in a social media platform isn’t really working, then why keep doing it?

Think about reducing your time spent on social media without completely eliminating it.

Are all those hours staring at our phones worth it for the 14 “likes,” the 3.2% impressions, the 12 clicks?

Imagine if we took one day worth of social media scrolling (like 2+ hours), and instead spent that time on something else?

1. Learning how to edit videos (I recommend ScreenFlow on the Mac)
2. Writing new music (or finishing a year-old song)
3. Setting up a collaboration
4. Building a website (or buying a domain name)
5. Seeing how to build community via Discord, Substack, or Reddit

Don’t burn your social media platforms to the ground, but we can reclaim hours we’re investing in them to learn skills and strategies that will provide a bigger return down the road.

Use the emails you get from other industries as inspiration for your own newsletters.

For example, I got this email from Venmo recently:

The main point of the email was the video, but the links wasn’t to the video on YouTube – it was on the Venmo site.

You already know where I’m going with this.

When you drive someone to YOUR site, you control the branding, the vibe, the links, the experience.

When you drive someone to YouTube, your video is now competing with content that is algorithmically alluring to your fan! Oh no!

Your site can be set up to feature your upcoming tour dates, new products in your store, a pre-order package, or an email sign up link – all things that are buried under the “SHOW MORE” link in the YouTube description area.

Look, you command a room, and you command your narrative online.

So lead your fans.

Lead them to your website. Show them your newsletter.

Not all your fans hang out at the food court at the mall anymore, subsisting on a diet of pizza, smoothies, and chicken nugget outrage.

Social media is the food court at the mall, where your posts appear next to sports news and racist tirades, and the landlord keeps raising the rent.

It’s time to leave the food court at the mall.

Stop building your entire existence on rented property, and set up your own website + newsletter.

WEEKEND TASKS

Here’s four things you can do before Monday:

1. When’s the last time you cleaned your LINK IN BIO links?
2. Buy a domain name from Hover (that’s a referral link) and think about setting up (or updating) your website.
3. Make your own “pick one” images (like this one), and put it on your website. Have your band mates chime in and make it a whole feature – hey, it’s what all the music sites do, and people click on ‘em! Get ‘em clicking to your site instead and sell some albums.

4. Double check and make sure you set up 2FA for Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube, and just about every other service that is critical to your operation.