It’s called social media for a reason, even for artists.

I was surfing around and some new band pages and was struck how bad these pages are maintained. Okey if the artist has a personal page, there it’s all fun and games. A lot of interaction and good stories. As soon they have also a artist page it’s so boring. Even if it is a band the page is very poor with information.

So I decided to make a experiment. I would have to leave a comment on 5 different artist pages, but with some rules.

I can leave a message if the latest post is about an upcoming concert.

I can’t leave a message if the last post was like Thank you Hoboken for last night you were great!

I can’t leave a message if the lasts post is about a song on Spotify, Soundcloud.

I can’t leave a message if the last post is a link to their new video.

So I went into a band that I know looked on their page. From that I looked on the pages they liked and went on to the next band that I didn’t know. I avoided already famous bands like Tom Petty etc.
You know what! It took me 89 artist pages until I have left my five messages. Like 70% of them was a post of a new show. 10 was a thank you of a show. 10% was a new song or video, 10 % was very close to these ones.

I started another experiment. I took famous acts this time, just choosed, Lady Gaga, Talyor Swift, Zara Larsson, Ed Sheeran and Bon Jovi.

Lady Gaga: Just a post of her new single and her performance on Cochella.

Taylor Swift: Talked about Lordes single.

Zara Larsson: A picture with all her dancers.

Ed Sheeran: One funny clip where Ed is working in a recoredstore.

Bon Jovi: Shows Jons backstage outfit.

Actually not that good, but much better than the unknown ones. Sure here it is more gigs, more merch and stuff, still they find to post personal stuff. Only Lady Gaga was kind of crap on this.

It’s called Social Media since it is social. If I just walked into a praty and the only thing I said was
- You know what, I play a gig next Saturday in Stockholm, 8 pm at OBaren.

Well people would be annoyed about me. Same if I just talked about the new single I just released. They would go nuts. And here are the new strategies for artists. You need to have more interesting posts. If you social media suck then I would assume your show sucks. And this is the truth 85% of the meetings I have with labels we just talk about the artist’s social media.

The worst artists are the ones that need to release a new song just to have something to post on their social media. Many of the most famous ones today is using this to their advantage. Like the author Camilla Läckberg. Most of the time she is a phenomena on social media then she adds on when she release a new book. And just a bit of it. That makes her sell so much that she can keep on going being a phenomenon on social media.

Yes social media is about being social.