Category: WritingCategory: Writing

Had a fun Social Media Escape Club Zoom hang this week (become a trial member and come to the next one).

This week I got us started riffing from Seth Godin’s recent quote, “Your (current) customers need to bring you your (new) customers.”

Through our 30 minute conversation we got on the subject of hyping new projects, and asking our fans to click to check it out, or subscribe. You know how it goes.

And well, sometimes the “check out my new thing” don’t resonate with our fans, as Robin Yang talks about here:

“Seth and I were in a LinkedIn class,” says Robin. “It’s about providing value, right? People aren’t going to do the thing that you want them to do unless they understand what they get out of it, right?

And so if it’s like, “oh, I have a new Substack over here.” But it’s like, why does that matter to me?

And some people have enough of a fan base that inevitably some people will follow them. Like, I’ve always loved whatever Seth’s doing, I’ll follow him till the end of… which like, I think we all will have those “true fans.”

But maybe the majority of your audience is like, well, “yeah, he’s like a good guy, I really value the content that he delivers in his new newsletter here. Why would I… what is he doing with his new social network?” Right? Like, why would I follow him on TikTok? (laughter ensues)”

This is why if you need to have a plan if you’re looking to get away from social media.

Telling your social media followers to sign up for your newsletter won’t get you far.

Sure, like Robin said above, some of your true fans may subscribe, but you’ve got fans at so many levels.

Remember to ask yourself, “what’s in it for them?”

Put yourself in their shoes,

Say, “follow our adventures as we leave for tour in a month. Sign up so you don’t miss a single photo of our adventures. Sign up so you, you don’t miss out on all our crazy tour stories.”

There’s a reason media outlets ask, “got any crazy tour stories?”

It’s because stories sell. Stories are what make movies!

Tell stories, not updates.

If you get engagement from a certain type of photo you post on social media, tell your followers they can get more by visiting your website, and subscribing to your newsletter.

If you get great feedback from your Twitter rants, consider putting more of them into your newsletter. Ask people to subscribe so they don’t miss any.

Maybe you stream tutorials online for everyone for free. That’s awesome, but remember, you’re making money for Zuck and Musk with each on of those! Ask your fans to subscribe to your email newsletter, and then link folks to your own video stream that corporate dorks don’t get to monetize it.

If you’re an artist that’s still trying to grow a following, you can’t just imitate what the big guns are doing and expect the same results.

A band like Beartooth can do this because they’ve been around for over 10 years, sell out venues in Australia on co-headline tours, and probably have 25,000 people on their email list (probably more).

Another approach is what Teenage Wrist did with their recent newsletter, writing 300 words before even getting to their upcoming tour dates (which are all linked, btw).

“i’m coming at you from the floor of soda bar in san diego, waiting patiently for my generic charger to bring my phone back to full juice.  spiritual cramp is sound checking, and boy do those guys have some shit to say that i can relate to.  deeply poetic verses like, “wake up in the morning and i think i’m gonna die”, “i’m sick of looking at my phone” and “i wanna smash my phone”.  seriously… i’ve spent countless hours over the past four weeks in the back of the van opening and closing my instagram account, refreshing my email, waiting for the fleeting dopamine hit.  it has officially stopped coming.  i need to find a new vein.  i wanna smash my phone.”

You share feelings and emotions and stories through your art, so try doing the same thing when you send an email to your fans.

Neil Mason talks about this in his Artist Development Newsletter:

“Be the artist continually creating a great escape, and you’ll be the artist that people turn to whenever they need one.

And we all need one.

The trick here is to connect the narrative from your music to your social media, your concerts, your merchandise, and on and on.

The best escape artists meet their audience in their emotions by showing they have been there too and they understand.

Then, take your audience on a journey to escape their troubles, and as a by-product, you will escape yours by creating the audience you once wished you had and making the money you once wished you made.

Don’t compete on the final product – a zillion songs are uploaded to Spotify every day, and trying to set yourself apart from that noise is tough.

Like, look at what I do; there are 1,000 other people writing about email marketing for bands and artists on the internet.

But I’m also trying to help you get away from social media, while most of those marketing professionals are telling you how to optimize your TikTok account.

That’s not me, and that’s hopefully why you’re reading this.

You’re watching this video on the new Social Media Escape Club.

A minute ago we were HEAVY METAL EMAIL, but now it’s Social Media Escape Club.

I thought long and hard about that, and I realized no one cares. I could name this thing Zip Zorp and you’re gonna either read it or you’re not gonna read it.

No one’s thinking about this stuff as much as I am.

So – welcome to the Social Media Escape Club. Make yourself at home.

(more…)

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.