This could be on your shop window or merch table. A simple way for people to scan a code, enter their info, and be added to your email list (good to have a backup pen and paper list, too).

Is it FOMO (fear of missing out) when you’re not seeing 90% of the posts you signed up to see?

Is FOMO a thing when your fans don’t see 90% of what you post?

Missing out? We’re missing nearly everything – even when we spend multiple hours a day on these social media platforms.

How many more reels are we going to make?

How many announcements are we going to make to crickets?

Where is going through the motions getting us?

It’s time to build stronger connections without relying on social media, and here are a few ways you can do that:

• Get your friends’ phone numbers and emails and message them directly. Call your friends. Send them a video message. Remember, we’re not really built to follow the lives of 3242 people every moment of every day.
• Get your fans onto an email list, and occasionally send them a good newsletter.
• Set up a website and keep it current so friends (or potential clients) can look you up and see what you’re doing.
• Send out postcards (Miranda Lambert sent out postcards this summer).
• Got SMS data? Get good on that channel because most folks are bad at it!
• Get in front of people, IRL. Become unforgettable with your work, play your music on the street, show up in wild places!
• Make flyers for your next event and hand them to people. Include other people’s events, too. Become a trusted source of information for your community. Do this for mutual aid, short stories, or album pull lists.
• Email people you’ve worked with in the past to catch up.

These ideas require more effort than simply “posting,” but it won’t get any easier to reach your fans on social media in 2025, so what are ya gonna do?

Mark Zuckerberg is the second richest person in the world and doesn’t give a fuck about your pre-order or community event.

(Thanks Kyle Raymond Fitzpatrick for that link).

If you’re not working on untangling from social media, you’re putting your career into the hands of platform owners who only seek profit for themselves at your expense.

I recently did an email marketing “tune-up” for a record label and got this email soon after:

If you run a small business and want to make a few more bucks every month, you should schedule a time with me to discuss working together.

DON’T LINK TO SOCIAL MEDIA PLATFORMS

I will die on this hill – kill all links to places like Spotify and Instagram and Facebook and Twitter – platforms where you can’t reliably reach your own audience.

A higher percentage of your fans will open and read your emails, so link to your website (with Bandcamp or Spotify or YouTube embeds).

START USING SEGMENTS

You can build granular segments with Klaviyo and Flodesk and Mailchimp (like sending to people in a particular zip code or region), but Substack is pretty limited.

Personally, I’d say focus on two segments here – free and paid.

I’m not saying paywall everything, but you can post things on Substack (or your website), and then send an email to just your paid subscribers as a way of making it exclusive. Or maybe it’s an early pre-order link, or to RSVP for an upcoming Zoom call.

From Substack: How do I send an email to one or a select group of subscribers on Substack?

MIND YOUR DESIGN AND LAYOUT

I don’t want to get too deep with this – to each their own, but I feel every email campaign should have your most compelling image at the top. It’s how newspapers, website articles, blog posts, and Instagram work, so it can work for your newsletter.

And please, use your own photos. Stock photos are great for content farms and SEO clickbait articles, but if you’re reading this you’re a smart and creative individual with a phone filled with 100 photos you took last week. Use one of those.

STOP SENDING TRAFFIC TO YOUTUBE

I will die on this hill.

If you’re emailing your fans to let them know about your new video, embed it on your own site and link to it there.

Embed it on the product page of the thing you’re selling.

Embed it on the sign-up page for the course you’re booking.

Embed it on the page of tour dates where people can buy tickets.

When you send people to YouTube, you’re dropping them off in the middle of the busy food court at the mall, and expecting them to not get distracted by all the recommended videos and assorted noise of the YouTube platform.

▪️ Google blows. Give Fastmail a try (affiliate link)

I got a few questions from CansaFis Foote via Substack Notes, and figured I’d share my answers with everyone. Enjoy.

Q. What made you choose this platform above all others?

Honestly, I started all of this using Circle, under the name HEAVY METAL EMAIL.

I wanted an online space for musicians to come together and talk about reaching their fans with an old-fashioned email newsletter. This was back in mid-2021 or so. I Tweeted about this little project and got about 19 people to click and sign up.

But things felt off.

I wasn’t using a newsletter to talk about newsletters, so I started looking for at Ghost, Beehiv, and of course Substack.

I picked Substack because I didn’t want to mess with designs and themes and settings, I just wanted to import my subscriber list of 19 people and send them an email.

Oh, and it was free.

With any new platform, the “Is this tool for me?” phase can get cloudy with just a 30-day trial to determine whether it’s a proper fit.

But then Substack rolled out Recommendations, which led to 2,000 new subscribers (remember, I started with 19).

Substack rolled out Notes, which feels like the early Twitter days. That’s led to making friends, paid clients, and plenty of fun interactions. It feels like I’m not just shoveling my “content” into a social media platform and hoping for a click.

Substack has let you upload video for the last few years, embed audio, and set up paid subscriptions, all for just a 10% cut.

For me, Substack is the place to be right now, and it’s built around the concept of having an email list. Call it social media if you want, but my email list will serve me for the next several years, even if this place goes out of business.

Q. Are there any other web spaces you recommend for creators?

This question always leads me to its deeper meaning, which sounds something like, “Where are some good places I can set up where MORE PEOPLE can see my stuff?”

Being “a regular” at 10 different coffee shops in town takes a lot of time and energy, so I’m always wary of going on that journey.

I recommend focusing on one or two places at most, intentionally driving the interest and clicks back to a place (Substack or your website) where people who want to become bigger fans of your work can subscribe to an email list.

When you spend all your time on social media platforms, you’re building an audience you can’t reach.

The long game is building an email list to reach people who want to hear from you.

Q. Would you recommend Substack over a personal webpage or is this better?

Substack is a platform like any other, and it can disappear tomorrow (that’s a reminder to export your email list).

Right now (9/24/2024), I recommend setting up Substack to give people an easy way to subscribe to your email list and to read your work online.

That said, I will always recommend you set up a website/blog to have a running archive of your work, a space on the internet that is wholly yours, where you control the branding, the vibes, the images, the typeface – everything.

I have a blog I’ve been updating since 2018 (sethw.xyz), and I’ve been adding and archiving my work from all over the internet, which dates back to 2004.

Austin is also on Tumblr, too (thanks Sarah Shotts for the heads up). I haven’t seen a post that links back to his work, but as you can see, right below his name, he links back to his site with three links, and his Substack.

Final thoughts:

Don’t leave your fans and readers to bounce around between different platforms like a pinball machine.

Have a website, provide a way for people to sign up for a newsletter, and then send them a damn good newsletter on occasion, telling them about the cool things you’re doing.

Then we get back to work.

I found out my dad died on July 30th, 2024.

We don’t know the exact time he passed, but he died alone in a trailer park in Florida. We didn’t have much of a relationship in the last seven or so years of his life for reasons I won’t go into, but I want to share a bit about his music.

My dad was an absolute music theory genius. He spoke in keys and modes and time signatures. He could play multiple instruments, listen to a song once, and play it for you backward and forward.

When I was a kid, he played in a country rock band called The Buckaroos, playing at ski resorts on the weekends and clubs during the week. He made good money playing guitar in the eighties.

Live music started to fade in our area, so he started teaching music out of his house. One of his students was a fiddle player who moved to Nashville and toured with a notable country artist or two.

In his later years, he’d seek out bass players and drummers, always looking to form a jazz trio. He had some luck getting gigs back in PA and later in Florida.

But when these groups fell apart, so did he.

He would still play at home, with his little Polytone amp that he bought in the 80s, playing his be-bop jazz and whatever else came out from his decades of experience.

While loading up our rental car with some of his belongings to take home, a neighbor named Otto pulled up, rolled down his window, and asked, “do you a photo of Ronnie I could have?”

My sister found a photo during the two days we cleaned out his trailer. It was newer, a shot in a grassy backyard, wearing his fancy shoes and his beret.

He loved that fucking beret.

“We would sit outside and listen to your dad play,” said Otto.

I handed him the photo that my sister found.

He didn’t say a word, but his eyes welled up.

“I’m glad you got to hear him play,” I said, and Otto drove away.

Dad’s idea of “success” was having a group so he could get booked at local venues. Without that, life seemed not… worth living.

And yet, his neighbors loved hearing the music he played.

It’s a lie that you’re not a real musician if you’re not booked at an actual venue.

The lie is real artists are in galleries, their names are on marquees, they have engineers setting up expensive mics in a studio in the hills.

The biggest lie is we have to make our entire living on the sale of our art, or else we’re just no-talent wannabes.

So many artists fall for this, feeling like 100 views isn’t enough, and they stop because “no one cares.”

I wake up thinking about the artists, poets, writers, and musicians we’ve lost because they couldn’t keep up with the “hitting it big” rat race of social media.

Somehow, 10,000 views aren’t enough because you really need 100,000. Having 12 people at a show on a Tuesday night is a waste of time. No one buys your art because you’re not making enough Reels.

It’s lies, it’s all bullshit.

Otto probably has that photo of my dad on his refrigerator or next to his record player.

The world doesn’t need another hot-take reaction to Spotify rates, or Instagram impressions – it needs you to release a three song demo you recorded you in your bedroom. Self-publish that piece of fiction.

Like the wise Cassidy Frost says:

“Go play a roller rink. Create your own festival. Tastemakers can’t take away your power if you’re creating a sick world around your music that other people want to be a part of. You have the tools. You don’t need the tastemakers.”

Someone needs your podcast episode about Edward Bouchet.

Someone in a small town would love to read your essay about landlocked countries.

You need to go to that open mic night and sing that song the universe dropped in your lap three months ago because someone in the crowd really needs to hear it.

Like Amy Stewart wrote, you need to “Be the Artist-in-Residence of Your World.”

Don’t wait for external validation from someone who just needs to fill up a Tuesday night, or fill a slot in their editorial calendar.

Don’t wait, don’t wait, don’t you dare wait to release your magic into the world because time spent waiting adds ups, and the regret compounds, and most of your belongings will end up in a dumpster a week after you die anyways.

In last week’s Escape Pod (my group Zoom calls with subscribers), we told stories about our experiences with social media, culminating with one person asking a direct “yeah, but as a musician how do I exist without playing the Spotify game or being on Instagram?”

We all went around and chimed in, but sadly, we didn’t get them booked at Madison Square Garden by the end of the call.

On Friday, Cassidy Frost’s Weekly Live Q+A Sessions had much of the same vibes – we’re all trying to figure things out, bouncing ideas around and chiming in with suggestions, ideas, and concepts.

No one won a Grammy that day, but we all gained a bit from the collective energy and ideas in that group Zoom call.

Figuring out how to lessen our dependency on social media is a journey, there is no map, and it’s best to travel with others.

The people who run social media platforms would hope we isolate and try to figure this out on our own, which is why we need each other more than ever.

• We need groups of writers for every fathomable sub-genre. Silent co-working style, or groups to talk about self-publishing, or pitching outlets.
• I bet you could start a songwriting group. Bring un-finished songs to the group, and everyone shares their work at the end of the call.
• Photography groups, where people could get together and edit photos together, or go through a photobook together, or talk about styles and gear or anything else.

Fire up your favorite video chat service and get back to being people, making connections, and building each other up. Do this in person if you can.

Because I don’t think competing with the daily publishing schedules of the more prominent media outlets is our game. Instead of churning out daily “content,” what if we slowed down and hung out with the core people who appreciate the art we’re trying to make?

Is it scalable? Heck no.

But is spending 12 hours this week posting to Instagram and trying to lure people to sign up for our newsletter the best use of our time?

How many subscribers is enough? How many fans is enough? Do we ever find contentment? Is our thirst ever quenched?

Today Substack rolled out Substack Originals to go along with their new media tab in the app, and I got this question from Johnathan Dodson, which I answer above.

I think two things are true here:

1. Video and audio can be a great way to deepen your connection with your audience (heck, it’s what I’m doing right now).
2. You should do it only if you want to do it.

I reference Beth Spencer and the amazing work she does with her drawing sessions on Zoom, but she also makes videos for some of her posts, too.

A video like that brings you just a little bit closer to Beth. If you’re a fan, well, you’re probably a little bit more of a fan after watching that clip, you know?

At the same time, if the thought of talking on camera makes you sick to your stomach, then yeah, it’s probably a good idea to skip making videos. Or find a way to make videos in your own style, like Marcus does with his Probably Riding channel on Youtube.

I love how Marcus shares his love of riding bikes without ever doing the whole “talking into a camera” thing.

Photographer Noah Kalina walks around the woods and answers questions from his audience.

You can even just record small audio clips and upload those right to your posts, and those are wonderful, too! You don’t even need to make a full podcast – single blips of audio are still wonderful!

I don’t think you’ll get left behind by Substack if you don’t start making videos. Just focus on the subscribers you have in front of you today. Those are the people you need to build with, before you ever need to hope to get “promoted” by some official Substack channel.

When do we stop doing things we hate for people who don’t care and start doing things we love for people who already love what we do?

• “God, I hate posting on social media.”
• ”Making content for social media is so draining.”
• ”All the time I spend on social media promoting my work feels like such waste of time.”

We have people right in front of us – digitally, and in real life. Imagine if we spent our time and energy on them, instead of spinning our wheels on social media trying to impress everyone and no one?

Like Molly Ella says in ‘The hard truths of content creation” (emphasis mine):

“The community that I have grown online are the reason that I continue to do what I do. Their thoughtful messages and comments can lift me even on a bad day. I recognise the names that come back again and again and I’m so grateful for them.

I intend to continue to prioritise nurturing these existing relationships as opposed to solely focusing on attracting new people.”

Growing relationships isn’t just about subscribers or “fans,” either. It’s about the entire community that exists in the little world around us.

In the music world, this could include producers, label owners, painters who make album art, effects pedal makers, and/or the local record shop owner.

So instead of posting for “everyone” and hoping to get discovered, we build a foundation of great people in our orbit with intention. That community is how we’re going to untangle ourselves from the social media / creator economy shit show.

As Metalabel wrote, “The creative status quo has made us lonely content machines” (read the whole thing from their New Creative Era booklet).

Our individual Social Media Escape Plan gains momentum in backyards, and on Zoom calls with other creative spirits, without algorithims.

Let’s go.