No Social Media?

I've gone back and forth and round and round about this. Social media. What to do?

As a professional musician, it can feel like you really have no choice. We have to let people know about upcoming gigs and when we release a new recording, right? Where else are we going to do that?

Sure, it can seem as if we have no choice, but I'm starting to think that's a misunderstanding.

We Have a Choice?

I've recently been intrigued by Louis Stigell's thinking on this. She's a painter from Sweden who used to work at a social media marketing agency and has some unique insights... namely, that we don't need it.

I can relate to her assertion that the quality of connection, even if someone clicks like or leaves a comment, is not on par with someone who reads your newsletter and maybe replies from time to time, or someone who buys your album and sends a message to request an autograph.

Most of the time if we post something on Instagram or wherever, the most we can hope for is that it temporarily slows their scroll.

Of course, there are examples of listeners who found me on social media and went on the buy an album and/or join my email list. But that's rare. Around 90% of my subscribers come from Bandcamp.

Bandcamp

Most of my hardcore supporters are either on Patreon or Bandcamp... and Bandcamp gives customers and option to join my email list. They also make sure to notify past customers whenever I release new music.So even if a Bandcamp customer passes up the subscription, they still get those announcements.

In contrast, someone scrolling on social media has to achieve a tiny psychological victory if they get the urge to follow their curiosity for a moment and perhaps visit my website or "link in bio" to find out more about who I am.

The truth is we remember very little of what we see when we're scrolling - and ironically, there is evidence that scrolling on social media is having detrimental effects on our memory. So it's only getting worse.

Still, there is a notion that musicians just need to learn how to play the game better; that we need to resort to all sorts of attention-getting gimmicks. And let's not forget that we need to pay Meta. That's right, it's not enough to tailor your message to stand out, now you need to convert all of your content into paid advertisements.

Feel icky yet?

The Good Old Times

It wasn't always this way. At the beginning of the social media revolution, which wasn't even that long ago (Twitter is only 19 years old, folks) there were no algorithms. You could follow someone and be fairly certain that you would see postings from them if you checked Twitter or Facebook.

I actually met a bunch of people through (old) Twitter. It was fun.

The photographer from my album Remote Location I met on Twitter and eventually in person in London. Sunna met bass clarinetist Martin Ornstein through Twitter and ended up recording and touring with him.

But somehow that just wasn't good enough. It was working too well.

My guess is they figured out that if they made it harder for creators (artists, musicians, etc.) to get their posts seen they would be willing to pay for it.

But did they also factor in how much people dislike being advertised at?

Shouting in the Wind

Stigell compares trying to get attention on social media to standing on the side of the road yelling and throwing flyers at cars driving by. But there are tons of people beside you doing the same thing.

And, like I said, I've gone back and forth with this argument about there being no better place than social media to promote your work. There are success stories, for sure. If you master the art of conversion campaigns and give away the right music to the right people, target people who like more aggressive jazz with your most aggressive track and the people who like mellow jazz with your most mellow track... maybe you can trick enough people to make it worthwhile.

But something is lost.

I don't want to trick people or manipulate them. I just want to make music, etc. that is honest and put it out into the world. Of course, if it becomes wildly successful that would be great. Not likely, but even a small audience can be heart-warming.

Let's not forget, I'm a jazz musician. I'm used to small audiences.

An Exception

There’s always an exception.

You might have noticed the little butterfly icon on my website. I’ve recently opened an account on Bluesky, which was spun off from Twitter before the crazy South African bought it. It reminds me very much of Twitter in the early days, before the algorithm.

I’m hopeful that, because of the way that it’s structured, it will retain its organic nature for the long haul.

However, I’m not looking at Bluesky as a way to grow my own audience. It’s fun… for now.

An Alternative

The alternative, as Louis Stigell points out, is growing an audience slowly by doing what you like, having an email list and a website, blogging or posting on YouTube or both... and implementing SEO (search engine optimization).

Looking back, I think one of the biggest mistakes I made was not blogging. I love to write, obviously. :-P

Why wouldn't I blog? When you write about subjects that are interesting to you and optimize with keywords so that search engines have an easy time finding it... people searching for those things with find you!

Or at least, there's a better chance they find you.

And when someone joins your mailing list there is a much better chance that when you send a newsletter, they will see it. They might not read it, but at least they will know that you sent it and have the option.

So that's where I'm going to put my efforts from now on. And if you found this from a search engine, thanks for stopping by.