Twitter is all about engaging and creating conversations. The social media platform boasts a rich source of followers for artists, musicians and content creators who are looking to build a fan base.
Twitter has continued to create value through its ability to help users organize information. Twitter lists, search and the use of hashtags have allowed content creators, businesses and public figures to form deep connections with users through one-to-one communication.
Twitter’s Advanced Search feature allows users to track hashtags and create lists based around a number of criteria. This includes location, words, phrases and accounts. This creates a number of opportunities for brand association or targeting fans of artists within your genre.
Feel free to checkout Twitter’s Advanced Search option. It is one of Twitter’s less known hacks that can create a plethora of value for content creators. The feature acts essentially like a search engine that can pin point phrases and events. Advanced Search is also perfect for networking and located like-minded individuals.
One of the earlier knocks on Twitter is that it used to be hard to follow. Overtime, the Twitter UX team has addressed those issues by making the Twitter experience more enticing for the casual user.
It used to be that if you weren’t on Twitter and someone tweeted something, you wouldn’t be able to see it until you accessed the app later. Then you could either search for the user’s Twitter profile or scroll through your timeline.
Scrolling through your timeline produces a different dilemma after a certain point. Once the number of users you follow increases, it becomes harder to backtrack through your timeline. This is why Twitter lists are more efficient at tracking conversations and topics from the offset.
The overall idea of Twitter is that you are online with other people at the same time (in real-time). Keeping in mind, that you won’t be able to see what everyone is tweeting at a given moment. This is why lists and hashtags are key to the flow of communication and increase engagement.
Twitter is essentially a giant public chat room for all to see.
Twitter provides a setting for you to filter your timeline by ‘Latest tweets’ or ‘Top tweets’.
The ‘Latest tweets’ setting will display real-time tweets and the ‘Top tweets’ setting will display tweets from the accounts that you interact with the most.
This timeline setting can be switched back and forth. This is a great way that way to stay up to date with everything that is happening while you’re not on Twitter.
In addition to using these timeline settings, here are some tips to help make your Twitter experience more efficient.
- You can go directly to the page of the person you want to follow and see what they’ve tweeted or ‘set up alerts’ to get a notification every time they tweet.
- Search for the hashtags of the event or conversation you want to join, then select the “Live” tab to see ‘real-time tweets’ that are a part of the larger conversation.
- Turn on your push notifications. Download the mobile app on your phone so you can get push notifications, such as ‘Popular Tweets’, Network activity and related news when it breaks. This is a great feature when you are trying to keep an eye on certain topics or content creators and can’t be online at every second.
Now, lets deep dive into 20 facts that make Twitter a go-to social media platform for artists, musicians and content creators.
Facts About Twitter
- Twitter has 145 million monetizable daily active users.
- 30 million (or 20%) of Twitter’s daily users are American.
- 92% of the U.S. population is familiar with Twitter (even if they don’t use it).
- 22% of adults in the U.S. use Twitter.
- 44% of U.S. 18- to 24-year-olds use Twitter.
- U.S.-based Twitter users are younger, have more education, and more income than the general U.S. population.
- The most active U.S. Twitter users have 20x as many followers, on average.
- 12% of Americans get their news from Twitter (71% of Americans on Twitter are using it to read news.).
- Twitter’s site referral traffic is up 6%, year-over-year (Instagram: 56%, Facebook: 29%, YouTube: 22%).
- Twitter users are more likely to like brands that are inclusive and transparent.
- Twitter ad engagement is up 23%.
- Twitter ads with video are 50% cheaper in cost-per-engagement.
- Twitter users spend 26% more time with ads than other social media users.
- Twitter users spend 24% more time with ads posted by ‘creators’.
- 25% of Twitter’s most prolific users use scheduling software.
- Tweets with hashtags gets 100% more engagement.
- People watch 2 billion videos on Twitter per day.
- Watching video is the #3 reason people use Twitter.
- Tweets with video get 10x the engagement.
- 93% of video views on Twitter happen on mobile.
Twitter’s biggest advantage is that it allows artists, musicians and content creators the opportunity to interact with their fan bases directly.
“I think you lose a lot if you outsource your social communication to third parties. It only takes a few minutes a day. There’s a very big upside for artists that invest their time in getting it right.
One of the main advantages Twitter has for artists is that it’s more open than Facebook or any other social platform. Artists can follow any band they’re into and connect with them easily. This is a big plus.”
– Mike More, CEO & Founder of plagood, a social streaming platform.
Amanda Palmer of The Dresden Dolls has built up some cache on Twitter. The Boston-based musician has created a reputation on Twitter for being one of the most active and engaging musicians on the platform.
Palmer dives into everything, from chats with fans to seeking input and feedback about creativity like t-shirt designs and songwriting.
This creates the opportunity to connect and work with other like-minded artists, if you can combine the right formula of getting followed, retweeted and becoming relevant. You can build a massive following.
Different content creators utilize Twitter in different ways, the overall advantage it continues to have that it has made artist-to-fan communication much more accessible than ever before.
It all depends on who you are as a content creator. Your brand or content may require you to be ‘strictly-business’ and more so broadcast-esque. While other artists and musicians are generally more intimate with their fan bases.
The value on Twitter continues to lie with the fans. Everything from free previews from unreleased material, promotions of albums, mixtapes and/or new music videos. All the way down to the personal thoughts of their favorite artists. Twitter definitely has a created a deeper connections among artists and their fan bases.
Keep in mind that all of the communication on Twitter is happening in real-time, so it provides a sense of spontaneity. This creates an immense amount of value on a number of levels. As artists can build their brands and fans can connect with their favorite content creators.
We all know that social media is an important asset to artists, musicians and content creators.
The real question is — does the extra effort actually pay off?
It all depends on the artist and how they approach social media. For anyone starting out, you will have to define what your “value” will be. Are you giving fans a behind the scenes look? Or are giving them valuable information to use in their daily lives?
The primary basis of social media marketing is establishing a line of communication with your fan base and building your brand. The end result may be a record deal or cult-like following to support you through your creative endeavors. Whatever your goals may be — Twitter is the perfect platform to get started.
You may not see the immediate results in more followers or selling out more shows, but the art of developing those key relationships with your fan base will it make it more likely to achieve these objectives.
Mike More of plagood says asking people to make a purchase is probably the least effective approach.
“That doesn’t provide any value for your fans. It’s a demand.”
More recommends creating conversations with your fans, getting their input and doing things like hosting open chats via Twitter.
He advises that when it’s time for fans to make a purchase and invest your brand, your fan base will be more likely to do so if they have a deep connection to your brand.
Going back to Amanda Palmer, she experienced this lesson firsthand. She used her influence on Twitter and the feedback from her fans to create a t-shirt design.
According to Twitter, the proceeds from the t-shirt brought in $11,000 in the first two hours.
Other artists have had similar successes whether it be selling out an upcoming show or getting more people to stream their new music.
Keep in mind, these results will vary depending on how big your following is on Twitter. Over time you can create a legitimate, real-world fan-base. Whether you are independent, local or Worldwide, Twitter is a great place to engage fans.
Tools like Facebook and Twitter are very powerful when combined with real-world connections such as networking with other artists or having your fans join you for a live performance.
No matter what social networking tool you choose to use as an artists or musician, the Internet will always be complimentary to creating those human connections.
Twitter just happens to be one with extraordinary potential.
“To this day Twitter is still the best communication platform for artists and fans, I love instagram but the comment section is so limited versus here we can talk about anything extensively.”
— Afrojack
For artists, musicians and content creators your brand is the first encounter with potential followers. Whether through Twitter lists or an associated hashtag.
Fans will make make the decision to follow you or engage with your content based off of your visual image, content and overall Twitter profile. This fact alone is why your personal brand should take the lead when developing a social media strategy for your career.
A solid online brand is crucial when building your professional network and creating rapport with other artists, labels and industry regulars. The ultimate goal is to have your brand resonate with your target audience, no matter it be fans, label executives or concert promoters.
Although, there is a lot of noise when it comes to Twitter — with over 9,000 tweets per second. There is a wealth of creatives, artists and content creators to connect with through the sharing of blog posts, websites, news, videos, photos and podcasts.
The convenience at play is that there are millions of people using Twitter as a marketing platform. So there is plenty of examples to take note of, as well connecting with artists, musicians and content creators with similar mindsets.
If you’re interested in learning more or joining the conversation feel free to sign up for our monthly Newsletter, join our Facebook group. You can also follow me on Twitter!
227 | Social+Digital 