"Social Media presence is a must for any artist willing to properly promote themselves." In the years after we started our own project, I've always believed in these words and the importance of social media. After all, one can create the best possible artistry they're capable of, and still, no one will even find out it exists because it has zero visibility. So, we join socials full of hope and will to share our creations, and different situations start being part of our daily lives, often trapping us in the negative, never-ending circles of fakeness, trapping ourselves and our own art behind golden walls in between stress, depression, and the illusion of popularity. In this first blog post for Pop Art Ave, I want to talk about the main mistake I see everyone do on social media.
THE ULTIMATE GOAL
Before starting the talk about the negative loops and the mistakes, I believe it's important for all artists to stop for a second and re-align with the goals we have for the usage of social media.
So why are you on social media?
If you do not have a goal, then you're 100% not going to get a good result.
Are you there to find other artists that might be of inspiration to you? To find fans for your own artwork? To support a movement? To earn money? To make friends? Depending on the goal you have for your socials, the entire way you should look at socials should change.
For this article, I will assume that the ultimate goal for an artist is to "find new fans for their music," as everyone usually wants.
THE GOLDEN RULE OF SOCIAL MEDIA
Engagement is everything.
Strangely said, seeing how "follower count" is the wet dream of so many people.
In fact, the number of followers is so important to many that at least 90% of the "strategies" I see used are nothing but attempts to scam others into leaving a follow.
But why is engagement so important? The way many social media works is very similar to this: every time you post something on social media, that something is shown to a small percentage of your followers. The social media algorithm then analyzes the engagement your post gets from those followers and, based on those numbers, decides if it's a "worthy" post to be shown to many more, or an "unworthy" post that no one ever has to see.
Based on that analysis, then your post gets shown or buried.
This is, at least, the way social media are supposed to work, even if to me, something does smell extremely fishy and I believe much of the algorithm's work relies on hindering organic reach so that we're forced into using paid advertisement. Twitter under the new Elon Musk rule doesn't even try to hide it, as the new "pay to win" system clearly states that paying accounts will have increased reach.
Getting back at the subject at hand, having a nice base of engaged followers is the most important thing to increase the reach of your posts... but if you just do as everyone else does, chances are you're going to have tons of followers and almost zero engagement.
THE FOLLOW-FOR-FOLLOW STRATEGY
The "Follow for Follow" and "Follow for Follow then Unfollow" strategies are commonly used on social media platforms like Twitter and Instagram.
People often start following others not because they're genuinely interested in their content but in hopes of getting a follow back.
Despite this, many believe that having a few followed accounts but a large number of followers makes them look more "celebrity-like."
I'm not sure how much this occurs in different communities, but I know for a fact that in the Retrowave scene, this is a prevalent issue.
This behavior is one of the most foolish things one can do with their social media accounts, as a follower base built on "courtesy follow backs" will never be engaged, and, without engagement, your content will never reach anyone and be buried by the algorithm.
Instead, I urge you to spend a couple of seconds thinking about how you can build an engaged follower base. Follow accounts that genuinely interest you and that you want to engage with, keep your friends close, and focus on creating genuine connections. Avoid using "social media management tools" that keep track of accounts you're following and make it easy to unfollow those that don't follow you back.
Remember, the goal is to create an engaged community, not just to inflate your follower count.
THE BIG ISSUE
Here are all the problems that get created by this unhealthy practice:
when I follow someone just because I hope for a follow back, I'm definitely not going to care about that someone's content. By being a ghost follower, chances are I'll be part of that first batch of people the algorithms show content to and, since I'm never going to interact, I'm actually preventing that content from reaching people that might really be interested.
when someone follows me just because he/she is grateful that I followed them, chances are that person will never care about my content and will be a ghost follower, preventing my content from reaching people that might be interested in it.
the more "curtesy follows" I give & get, the more I'm lowering the chances, for both myself and others, to increase organic reach.
Now, think about these points and then go see how many accounts with thousands of followers are out there that have an average of 0-1 interactions per post while smaller and more dedicated accounts, like ours for example, can go from 5 to 50 per post (depending on the kind of post).
If you are caught up in this circle, then you can have the best album ever released to the world and no one will ever see it no matter how much you shout, simply because you're shouting to the wrong people.
CONCLUSIONS
Before ending this blog post, let me remind you of a very famous short story:
"A little bird was flying during a cold snowstorm. It was so cold that the bird couldn't fly anymore and fell down, landing near a barn. While lying down helpless on the ground, a cow came by and dropped a big poop on him. The poop was so warm that the little freezing bird started warming up and feeling better. The bird was so happy to feel warm that he started to sing. A cat heard the bird's singing, so he followed the voice until he found the bird, then dug him out of the poop and ate him."
A lot of those people that seem to be helping you by following your account and making you believe you're "important" are actually slowing you down and creating a big problem for you to solve, just as you would be slowing them down by doing the same.
The uninterested ones that'll go away from you, no matter how much you might feel "bad" about losing followers, are actually helping you out big time by removing obstacles to your organic reach.
Just be genuine. Follow people whose work inspires you and you feel like interacting with them. Keep your friends close, and leave the rest outside. Strive to be more than just a number on someone's follow list.
At the same time, try to keep away from you those people that are there just in the hope to turn you into a number and that, by doing so, don't even realize how big of a hassle they are to both you and themselves.
It all sums up to the very simple concept of: just be there for anything and anyone you really like. Stop caring about the rest. All the best,
Luca elxarproductions.com