More On How The Biggest Artists Use Social Media
After Famecount published a chart of the top music artists on social networks, based on their friend and follower counts on Facebook, Twitter and YouTube, Stuart Dredge over at Sandbox followed-up and tried to understand what could be learned from what
these artists are doing with their social media fame, and whether there
are lessons to be learned by their peers. His findings are rather counter intuitive, yet maybe they aren't all that surprising.
"If these are the 20 top artists on social media, there’s little to show that this is because they’re doing anything particularly innovative to build their online fanbases. Indeed, there’s a good argument for suggesting that they’re 20 of the most popular artists on social networks because they’re 20 of the most popular artists in the real world. Most fans offline is likely to mean most fans online."
C’mon, it’s just common sense.
Sorry, but the ‘revolution’ is not the only way of life. As with most things in life, it’s a function of multiple factors, and multiple tools are available. Social media is one of those tools, but not the “only way”.
At least for the immediate future – and as long as selling CDs represents revenue measured in billions of dollars – the internet distribution and marketing, meaning the stores selling individul and multiple song files, the blogs promoting individual points-of-view, the abilitiy to reach millions with one stroke, etc. – will be one way of acquiring music in one form. And (making and) selling CDs will be another, whether in a store, or for a band at a gig.
Every new band of teenagers making music does several things immediately (and waay before they’re ready) – they start a Facebook page, a MySpace page, and they record a CD (even if they can only play a few songs). The point of the CD is to sell it to people at any gigs (mostly, if not completely, non-paying gigs).
As the evolution continues, CDs will likely go the way of the horse-and-buggy. But until at least one more generation turns over, CDs (and record companies) will be around.
Much of the entertainment industry is built around selling to teenagers – music and movies (not books, tho) – and the rest of the content fights for second fiddle for funding. That’s the way it’s always been. It doesn’t make the record companies the enemy, although the conglomerate chasing the almighty dollar at the expense of everything else is an easy target. (And let’s face it – in the face of their industry melting away before their eyes, the record labels have done some monstrously stupid things in desperate attempts to maintain their quarterly corporate profits.)
I think you’ll see a few smart record lables use all the tools available, and fine tune them to individual bands based on their target audiences. The “classic rock/singer-songwriter” crowd is going to buy a CD and go to the amphitheater show. The “indie-rock/hardcore” crowds are going to use the methods that those kids have grown up with – iPods, iTunes, internet.
Kind of like the difference between MTV (when they played music videos) and YouTube. It’s not good vs evil, it’s just an adjustment to the world we live in today.
This is waay more topic than I intended, and way to scattered and sprawling – sorry for the soapbox.
BTW: Disclaimer – yes, I’m an older guy who grew up in the 60’s-80’s, and don’t live or die with Twitter. So I get that my viewpoint is informed and guided by the ‘old school’. I freely accept today’s methods – I just don’t think there is ‘only’ one way to do things.