Do you really need to be “everywhere”?
Episode 011 of The Indie Musician Secrets Podcast
TRANSCRIPT
What’s up? What’s up? What’s up everyone? Welcome to the Indie Musician Secrets Podcast. I’m your host Jamaal aka Boss Eagle, Billboard-charting hip hop artist, and music business coach at Business Minded Musicians. I want to welcome you to Episode 11, where we’re going to be talking about: Do you really need to be everywhere? But first, I want to remind you that you can stream the podcast on all of your favorite platforms and don’t forget to download, rate and review. Help us to push the podcast forward, help us get seen more. And so I’d greatly appreciate if you wouldn’t mind giving a five-star rating! And also download the podcast wherever you would like to download podcasts to. So without further ado, the topic for today is: do you really need to be EVERYWHERE?
I know that sometimes it feels like we have to be in all places at all times as musicians, because you never know where people are gonna find you or discover you. And what I’m not talking about on this episode is when it comes to streaming or YouTube. I think your music should be available everywhere. You should be on Spotify, Apple Music, Deezer, TIDAL, YouTube. But what I’m really referring to today is: Do you need to be everywhere in terms of your presence, your social presence, your personal presence, so that you can be a part of all of these things that are that are going on.
I think that sometimes what happens is it causes maybe more stress than it does good, right? One of the big things that at this time is social media, and all of the different platforms, with all of the different things, to be involved with. Sometimes it can feel like you’re behind the eight ball, or you’re you’re not keeping up. There’s always something new. The way I learned was looking at the Big Four: Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube.
YouTube is a little bit interesting because YouTube is not traditional social media in the sense that the other ones are. YouTube is actually a search engine. It’s the second largest search engine in the world, second to Google. And YouTube is actually owned by Google. So between Google and YouTube, you have the one and two largest search engines in the world in terms of usage. But YouTube gets thrown in there because it is important.
But when we’re looking at the Big Four, I think sometimes we we feel like we have to be on all these, and be present, and then some. So if we’re not on Facebook all…the…time (because we’re always hearing “you have to show up, show up, show up,” that can be hard sometimes if we’re being honest.
And the thing that you have to remember, too, is that all of these social media platforms don’t necessarily speak the same language. What works on Facebook is different from what works on Twitter. What works on Twitter is different from what works on Instagram. What works on Instagram is different from what works on Pinterest. And so you have to also keep those things in mind too. Otherwise, you might be doing yourself a disservice if you’re trying to speak the same language, so to speak, across all these platforms. Again, YouTube being different because it’s content that lives forever — people are searching for things. The way that it’s used as a little bit different. But the question I think that we need to be looking at is: Do we really need to be on all the socials?
Second to that is: Has the Big Four changed? Has TikTok come in and supplanted itself as one of those Big Four? AND how are we utilizing them? TikTok is similar to Instagram Reels and YouTube Shorts. So are you creating more short content (which can honestly work better for you)? Again, I’m not saying not to utilize these things. I’m just saying that for us as musicians, as music creators, we need to be thinking about: Do we need to be everywhere? Do we need to be on all of these different social media platforms? And are we doing them all well?
Then you also have things like online communities/social networks, like Clubhouse. I remember when Clubhouse came out a couple of years ago it was like EVERYONE was on Clubhouse. And you had to be invited. It was all the rage! I joined and never did anything with it. It’s not even on my phone anymore because I just didn’t use it. I’m not saying that there wasn’t value in it. I’m not saying that it wasn’t a good thing. I’m not saying that it’s not still a great tool. But I wasn’t using it. It just became another thing to think about. It became another thing to worry about: “Am I missing out on something because I’m not actively involved over here?”.
You [also] have your traditional Facebook Groups, and now there’s Circle. I’m part of that community that’s on Circle. But I know that I’m not super active. I know I’m not in there every day.
Side note: I just recently joined that community, so I haven’t been a member for very long.
And I never really have been even with [even] private Facebook Groups that I’ve been a part of. And so when you start to step back, and you’re thinking about writing and creating music, recording, performing, making sure you’re collecting your royalties, making new music videos and collaborations, your merch and all these other things that you have to think about as an artist, these just become another thing to have to figure out how to make work inside your music business ecosystem.
Looking back at that first question: Do we need to be on all socials?
I think the answer is clearly no. If you look at where you are investing and spending your time you have to ask yourself, ‘is it really making that big of a difference?’ Are you really utilizing those things effectively? Because I’ll be honest with you, anyone who knows me (and I don’t mean anything negative against the social media platforms, I think they serve a purpose and all that), but I personally don’t care much for social media. I think that it’s more of a necessary evil. That’s the way that I look at it. There is some value and benefit, but we have to use it correctly. And if you remember from a previous episode, I talked about that idea of being a producer and not a consumer, that idea that came from that I learned from master-marketer, Russell Brunson. We need to be the ones putting out the content and not just scrolling and getting “sucked into” social media.
Learn more about being a social media producer, not a consumer, plus so much more with a FREE copy of Russell’s book “Traffic Secrets” by clicking here (the book is free, you’ll just cover the small shipping fee).
I don’t think we need to be on all the socials, but I do think that they serve a purpose — we [just] have to know how to use them well, if that makes sense. We have to know how to get the most out of them. You have to use these the way that they’re intended to be used. And I think that’s why a lot of people don’t have success on say, TikTok, for example. They’re trying to make TikTok speak their language, instead of speaking in the language of TikTok — operating the way that the environment has set itself up. Instagram has really put a lot of emphasis on Reels to kind of combat TikTok and now YouTube with YouTube shorts. So there is a way to do them, but you have to make them work within the framework that they are created.
I want to talk about where should you be on all these different platforms and options. And before I talk about where you should be, I want to talk about a couple of other things…
FIRST. Don’t compare yourself to someone who seems to be everywhere. Don’t compare your beginning to someone else’s middle. Don’t compare your context to someone else’s context, because they may have a team. They may have other people working on things. They may just simply have more time than you. And that’s okay. You have to be where you can, when you can.
SECOND. Think about how much time do you have to invest in this. How much time do you have to give to your social media and to these social networks and communities every day, every week, etc.? Consider automation or bulking your content. Consider repurposing as well. How do you take a short form video [and] use [it] for TikTok, Reels and YouTube Shorts? At least in the beginning, so that you can start to build some traction and get some momentum. Then maybe start doing different things on different platforms. But consider automation or bulking your content. (Automation just basically means you’re scheduling it so that you don’t have to be sitting at your computer or your phone at that moment. There are a lot of automation tools out there that can help you.)
And also consider doing bulk content, which means creating a bunch of stuff at once, instead of one-off type of things. Make five or six YouTube videos and scheduling them. Create 10, 20, 30, 50 Twitter posts and then scheduling them to go out. Yes, you want to have some of those organic things, you want to pop in live. You want to have some of those native posts, but at least you can have those other things rolling while you’re not actively engaged.
So what platforms should you be on? I would say look at where is your audience? Is your audience on TikTok? Maybe, maybe not. You may be saying, “Well, I don’t have an audience on TikTok because I haven’t started to TikTok,” and that’s fine. But where’s your audience already? Where are the people that are already engaging with your stuff? Maybe that’s Instagram, maybe that’s Pinterest, maybe it’s Twitter. I’m not saying disregard the other networks, but maybe consider prioritizing your best areas. And that’s where you put the most time and effort and energy. It might be better to to prioritize quality in a few areas over quantity and being scattered in a lot of areas if that makes sense. So, should you be everywhere? I don’t think so. Should you be in a handful of things. Yes, I do believe that. And I also think that you should consider your audience when you’re trying to decide where you should put your time. #boomshakalaka
ACTION ITEM
The action item for this episode is to decide what is your Mount Rushmore?
What are those top two to four different social platforms that you can be on? Is that the Big Four: Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, YouTube? Maybe you swap out one because maybe Facebook really isn’t your place and TikTok is instead. Maybe it’s just TikTok and Instagram, and that’s fine. Doesn’t have to be four places.
Then I would say also start with one community to be active in, whether that’s a Facebook Group or something on circle or Clubhouse. Or consider creating your own community that you can oversee and interact with at your leisure. But it gives you that ability to stay connected.
I hope this was helpful for you. If you are looking to grow your fan base online, I am offering the Fanbase Growth Accelerator course right now for only $7!
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The reason I dropped the price [is] so that I can offer ongoing group coaching for $7 a month, because I know a lot of people coming in (as laid out as the course is) still might want help walking through those things, plus having community as well. So if you want to join the Fanbase Growth Accelerator course you can do that today for only $7. There’ll be a link in the description or the short show notes. And then you also have the option to join group coaching for $7 a month. No contract, cancel anytime.
If you have any questions or topics that you’d like to discuss, feel free to send me an email to: Questions[at]IndieMusicianSecrets.com. Don’t forget to rate and review this episode and all other episodes. And please, please, please, as always, share this podcast with anyone else that you think it would be helpful for. Thank you again for listening. I hope you all are doing well and growing your music business. God bless, and I’ll see you when I see you. Peace!
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