A very common saying, is “there’s no right or wrong way to do something”. But when it comes to social media, blogging, and tweeting there is a right and wrong and not using best practices to implement in your use of social media can do more damage than it can do good.  As we’ve already learned from my previous posts social media is integral in the music industry, and has become pertinent to the evolution of the industry. According to Aaron Agius, “33 percent of millennials today say social media is one of their preferred channels for communicating with businesses, I expect it will become even more important over time (2016).” Though social media, blogging and tweeting are important to large music industry companies, it is far more important for individual musicians and bands. One of the most important things an artist or musician can do is to implement a social media strategy. Even if you are a large musician with a full PR team, or just starting out, implementing a plan and tracking your results will help you in the long run (Rubright, 2017). With all of this in mind, I have come up with some best practices for musicians, who rally want to get the most out of their social media platforms.

General Best Practices

1. Cater to or know your target audience.
2. Utilize the correct channel or social platform that caters best to your target audience.
3. Create great content that your followers and music listeners want to listen to
4. Make sure to post at good times—you can do this by using apps like WhenToPost
5. Post frequency—try starting off with one best a week and then see if two a week attracts more readers/followers.
6. Clean up your blogs and social media accounts so that everything is consistent on every account.
7. Measure your success and adjust accordingly

Now that we have identified some of the general best practices for social media and blogging, lets talk more specifically about Twitter. I used Mark Schaefer’s Tao of Twitter to compile a list of Twitter best practices below (2014). These rules are also general and can be applied to any musician, artists, band, or companies Twitter page.

Twitter Best Practices

1. Targeted Connections
2. Meaningful Content
3. Authentic Helpfulness
4. Learn and understand the Twitter language
5. Utilize Hashtags, but don’t overkill
6. Try Twitter features like lists
7. Balance your personal and professional accounts

Now that we know some best practices to use towards optimizing our blogs, and Twitter accounts within the music industry. Now let’s go out in the world and apply what we have learned and do social media the right way. Please remember that these are just suggestions and are not by any means something that you must agree on. In fact, I encourage anyone reading this post, to leave some of their tried and true ways of optimizing their social media accounts.

 

Agius, A. (2016, August 01). The Right (and Wrong) Way to Do Social Media. Retrieved January 19, 2018, from https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/278848

Rubright, N. (2017, November 24). How to Develop a Social Media Strategy for Effective Music Promotion. Retrieved January 19, 2018, from http://blog.dozmia.com/social-media-promotion-for-musicians/

Schaefer, M. W. (2014). The tao of Twitter: changing your life and business 140 characters at a time. New York: McGraw-Hill Professional.