Social Media Strategy for Musicians: Avoid These 10 Killer Mistakes

Your music should be just about the music, not you. Don’t promote your tracks by telling your audience that it will “mean a lot to you” if they check it out. Not to sound harsh, but why should anyone care about you? Why should strangers that have never heard of your music or your brand care that it will mean a lot to you if they check out your song?

Instead, phrase it as something that will mean a lot to them. Ever wonder why people search for terms like chill summer music? It's because they're focused on the gratification that song will bring them.

If you tried to do every single task manually on each social media you'd literally be at your computer all day. Especially when you start gain some traction on your music business. It is impossible to keep up with.

This is why it's important to have some sort of automation or scheduler in place for your social media channels.

Personally, we use Statusbrew. Here are some of the key features:

• Can integrate Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram all in one place.
• Schedule posts in advance all in one place
• Post recycler (If you have blog posts, memes, or a song you'd want posted on a continuous basis for a period of time, this allows for you to make one schedule and it will put it on repeat)
• Follow conversion metrics (With Twitter, a way to grow a channel could be by following other channels. If you don't want to do that with your personal channel, you could make a blog account and do it from there to drive traffic to your music). This will keep track of which channels have the best followers and you can copy them.
• Automatic DM/Welcome message option available

Speaking of promoting your music, there’s such a thing as being too eager. If you want to reach a lot of people with your music, start a Twitter, gain followers and tweet your tracks out with a mix of other scheduled content. Don’t constantly send your music to everyone on your email list or all your Facebook friends. Not everyone wants to hear your music, especially if it’s pushed on them. Let them come to you.

Is there a time and place to let people know about your new music? Of course, but don't bombard them.

Take a look at some of the artists you follow on social media? What do you like about their channel? How often do they tweet their music? Do you they use more videos or links when posting?

Think along these lines.

Speaking to those that can promote your music on a personal level can be the stepping stone to gaining more recognition in the market. When promoting yourself to a person, concerning music or otherwise, don’t blindside them with solicitations. Show them that you care and wait until they’re comfortable to hear your music. This isn’t a guarantee that they’ll like your music, but they’ll listen.

When creating your headline, make it something someone will likely click. Think of the links you’ve clicked in the past hour; what did they have in common? Find it, and do that for your music.

Speaking of creating a desirable headline, don’t post your music without one. You want to give listeners an idea of what they’re about to listen to. Make the headline your own and have your embedded SoundCloud track below it.

Humility is a good trait; don’t be cocky especially when you’re just starting out. Kanye West can say that he’s the greatest rapper around, he’s gone platinum twice. You’re not at that level yet.