A musician friend of mine, Gorm Helfjord (an excellent guitarist) put up a facebook comment:
It’s sad to see musicians or bands begging for facebook likes or sms votes like little bitches. It’s so not rock’n’roll.
I was amazed to see some of the responses that came flying in. Everything from “adapt of die”, a to ” The record companies are all greedy conmen”. I found the comments quite puzzling for one simple reason. Musicians are supposed to be creative.! Why don’t they harness that energy and find creative solutions for getting fans! My solution, although it is more of a model answer, is quite simple.
Musicians and their fanpages, are like businesses and their fanpages!
If you want to get likes, and you want to attract fans, and you want to sell tickets and albums and…..
think like a business
Try and learn from these profit-making marketers! Run competitions, give freebies (free tickets to your show perhaps), talk about things that interest your fans!that is: Give people a real reason to like you.
There are tons of insights into this on the interweb. From collaborating with other artists to expand reach… to sharing your personal views and not just your music. But most importantly…
… Get Creative and be proactive. Ask yourself this: Who are my potential fans? Who really are those people that would like my music? What do they do? What do they talk about? What do they think about? What interests them?
… I’m not going to lie, this is a perfect example of “not begging for a facebook like”. You, the reader, have spent a minute of two reading this blog. And you have probably been listening to the background music. So… if you’ve enjoyed reading, enjoyed the music, and want to get updated on more blogs/music, then you just might click on LIKE button. Perhaps you’ll subscribe to the mailing list. Point is:
People “LIKE” only if they benefit from it.
Now Mr & Mrs Musician… ..go get creative and start engaging peoples’ interest.
