Why bands should stop whining about Facebook and Spotify [*click here*]

The only thing that band idiots like doing more than listing their occupation as “Guitarist at [crappy local band]” is complaining about Facebook and Spotify. If ur one of these obnoxious knowitalls, please take a break from flooding the internet with ur poorly-informed opinions and read this post (i know the concept of actually listening to someone else is challenging for u, but u can do it just this once). Unlike u, a basement-dwelling neckbeard without a 401k, I am an actual expert on digital marketing and I am here to help u.

In this post, I will outline the premise of the most common complaints about Fb and Spotify, why they are inherently dumb, and some advice on how 2 make the most of both platforms.

FACEBOOK
Teh complaint: Basically, “Wah wah Facebook took all my reach,” usually followed by some longwinded and inaccurate rant about how it is a conspiracy to screw u, the hapless little band who is simply trying 2 spread the word about ur ‘art’, out of your hard-earned money.

Reasons why this complaint is stupid:
1. This would ruin facebook
If fb worked the way you wanted it to (which is that every one of your followers would see every one of your posts), it would quickly turn into a stream of spam from every other asshole on the internet who wants free advertising for their stupid thing. Which means nobody would use it and it would be useless for everybody, including people like you who want to promote their crap. As the number of pages on fb increases, and the number of pages each user increases, this becomes even more of a problem. So actually, fb’s filtering algorithm which “kills ur reach” is the the key to keeping it alive.

2. Good content is all that rly matters
If u have good content, ur reach and engagement will be just fine. Just for ur reference, “good content” does not mean a constant stream of links to buy ur shit, go to ur shows, etc. That is really just digital panhandling, and who wants 2 get bombarded with that when they log into fb? “Good content” means posting shit that people will actually be happy 2 see in their feed.

As u can see, great content = great reach and engagement. These two memes on my Sergeant D Facebook page had a total of 22.5k organic reach even though my page has a pathetic 900 likes.

On the other hand, when ur crappy band posts crappy pics of ur crappy set at some crappy fest in the woods, u get crappy reach/engagement. As u can see its rly pretty simple: garbage in, garbage out. Why in the world would u expect people to be excited about this content?! How can u possibly be surprised when your reach sucks?!!

3. U probably dont know how 2 use face book
For example, sending an event invite to ur show in Michigan to everybody on ur friends list even if they live in Florida is not how 2 do it. The good news is that it is actually pretty simple: think of it like a game, only Facebook tells u all the cheats (via their “Facebook for business” section). Key concepts here are targeting (lookalikes and retargeting are really useful) and knowing when 2 spend money.

Basically, spending money 2 buy Facebook likes is very stupid for a lot of reasons I will not go into here. Do not spend money on that. But spending money on ads for something that generates revenue is a great idea provided that a) ur product doesn’t suck and people actually want it and b) u keep an eye on ur metrics and make sure that ur ROI positive. If u do it right, for every $1 u spend on fb ads for say ur new album, u should be making $1.25 or so (at least for a while, eventually ur returns will flatten out). So basically, if ur smart enough to understand how fb works, it’s almost like free money.

If u want to learn more i suggest putting down ur stupid guitar for a weekend and reading Digital Marketer, Hubspot, and Moz.

SPOTIFY
Teh complaint: “Wah wah spotify only plays $.00001 per stream theyre screwing the artists.” This is a much simpler discussion than facebook because it is just so comically stupid 2 complain about spotify.

Reasons why this complaint is stupid:
1. It’s not fucking mandatory
Nobody put a gun to ur head and made u sign up for spotify, so if u find the terms of their contracts unappealing it is very simple: don’t sign it. If u signed a publishing deal that gave ur label or someone else the right to put ur music on spotify, well, that’s ur fault too. U should have read the fine print instead of watching zany djent covers of top 40 songs on youtube.

2. Ur band wasn’t going to make any money anyway
Since nobody gives a fuk about ur band in the first place, we are basically just multiplying zeros here. I put together this helpful diagram explaining the economics using real sales data from ur band:

here is how the math works out for ur band

Arguing about the pennies ur band will never earn is dumb, but what’s even dumber is when ppl crusade on the financial behalf of the ppl in their favorite band– people who a) voluntarily signed a contract [see point number 1] and b) don’t even know u exist!! Why are u so concerned about how much money some guy who you don’t even know makes?!? Get a life lol.

CONCLUSION
It is truly baffling to me why band idiots spend so much time and energy bitching about these two things online instead of, u kno, focusing on their music. But if u did that, then u couldn’t blame facebook or spotify for ur lack of success. U would have to admit the obvious: the problem is that ur band just isn’t good.