Social media has gifted musicians a channel to communicate with their fans and potential fans in real time. What a magical time we live in! For many DIY musicians, social media can feel like a chore, and I get it; if you think of it as one more “marketing” task you have to do when you’d rather be making music, it makes sense why you wouldn’t like it. But, at its core, social media is a wonderful medium for communication that musicians can use, mostly for free, to grow their audiences. With my tips below you can hit the ground running towards taking advantage of it.
6 Social Media Tips for DIY Musicians
Reframe How You Feel About Social Media
Did you know, in call centers, customer service representatives are actually encouraged to smile while they take calls? They do this because you can hear a smile and it dramatically impacts the level of service given. Simply put, your mindset about social media matters! If you see it as a means to an end it always will just be that.
Think about social media like being able to group message all your fans (and future fans). Social media is such a lovely way to create intimacy that feels very personal but is also far-reaching. The folks who follow you want you to be successful, they want to celebrate your wins, support you when you need them, and be your biggest advocates. Why wouldn’t you want to talk to those people everyday?!
Create A Schedule in Advance
Setting aside time each month to schedule your social media content will make it a much more manageable task. When it comes down to it, the frequency of social media posting isn’t as important as the consistency of it. It’s perfectly okay to post every day or just once a week – both have merit. The worst thing you can do is post ad hoc.
When you post impulsively, it can be hard to draw up inspiration to create an engaging post at all these random times. When you sit down and think strategically about social media posting, you can riff one idea off the last one and so on. A plan allows you to lead your followers through a funnel rather than just hit them with disjointed messaging. It makes your social media targeted and strategic.
Set A Pinned Post Showing Where to Find Your Music
Each channel does its own version of a “pinned” post a little differently, but essentially they all allow you to highlight something important: making it easy to find your music.
Head over to my Facebook page to watch a video tutorial on how to create a pinned post on Facebook. In the comments, I also have a link to download some pre-sized logos to use!
Respond to comments
The worst thing you can do is ignore your fans and followers. Set the standard that you are accessible and available to your fans. I understand you can’t get to every comment when you have thousands of followers, but try to set aside time each week to respond and engage with them. Engagement has a lot of benefits on social media!
Engagement makes people feel good! It just makes someone’s day to see someone they admire respond to their comments; it feels good to be seen.
Engagement tells social media that you are important to your followers. If you can get your followers to engage in a short back-and-forth conversation, it actually will influence your followers’ algorithms to weigh your page more than other pages
Social media platforms like when you make content that gets a lot of comments. If your posts have several comments, they tell social channels that what your posts are interesting and they actually will appear in more peoples’ feeds.
Video > Photo > Text > Link
Video is the most effective type of content you can create as a musician. A step further is utilizing a live video on social media. Video can feel really scary because most musicians don’t know how to use a camera or audio recording equipment. Luckily you don’t have to be very tech-savvy to reap the benefits of video! Your fans just want to see you and hear you so a simple video on your smart phone will do. Head over to my Facebook page where I’ve done a Facebook Live video on how to create a Facebook Live video (so meta!). After watching my video you will be ready to go on your video-making journey.
If you can’t do video, do photo. Photos get far better engagement than text alone on social media. Photos draw your followers attention to your posts. Simple phone photos will do, just focus on having nice, even natural light for the best results.
If you can’t do a photo, text will be better than a standalone link. When you think about it, it makes sense that social media posts with links perform poorly. Why would the platform you are on want you to drive traffic anywhere but their site? They wouldn’t! That is why social media platforms will deprioritize your posts with links. If you have to link out, I suggest putting the link in the comments or just create it with the intention of putting some money behind boosting it, otherwise, you aren’t going to get much traction on your post.
Use a Linktree on Instagram
Changing your bio link can be a drag on Instagram, especially if you want to share more than one thing at a time. Luckily someone has solved that issue! Linktree is a free tool for optimizing your Instagram traffic. You’ll get one bio link to house all the content you’re driving followers to. Want to see Linktree in action? Head to my YouTube channel for a quick video demo of a client’s linktree.
Social media is really fun and rewarding when it is done with intention. Start with these 6 easy tips and you’ll quickly pick up momentum. Heck, in a few weeks, you might even start looking forward to getting on social media! Love this post? Join my Facebook Live replay where I discuss these tips and more.