Facebook is taking a giant $%!+ on its content creators...

[guitaruboy]

What do you think about all this? What is your band doing and what can we do to fight back?

I hear having your fans add you to an interests list doesn't help because they still have to go look in the interests tab. plus, getting them to do this in the first place is hard and is complicated even more because only a handful of fans (the ones who would have already done this or pay attention to the page) would see it in the first place!

i've personally seen our bands page go from 400 people seeing a insignifican comment thats just for fun to barely 75 seeing a brand new song we just released (a week later the numbers have barely changed!)

so hows google+ looking nowadays? or any other social media platform? the reason we use facebook (in addition to our reverbnation page) is because it has become a central hub for friends and fans to see our content, but with this travesty going on its looking like it won't happen anymore



http://mashable.com/2012/10/03/faceb...romoted-posts/

[Pitar]

http://bandcamp.com/

 

Watch the video.

[g6120]

http://bandcamp.com/

 

BandCamp is the ONLY solution. It's hands down the best music hosting and sales point site out there.

As Pitar said watch the video.

 

FaceBook is a waste of time....Soooo much content in people's feeds most of them just click "Like" and do not listen if they even see it at all.

That's the core of the problem with FaceBook. You are competing with too much other content for people's attention.

None of that is a problem on BandCamp. Check it out. BTW...Reverb Nation is way too complex. BandCamp is siample clean and effective. I have sold more music at Bandcamp than anywhere and money comes direct to me!

[guitaruboy]

while bandcamp is good for selling your tracks (i admit i'm not satisfied with reverbnation) it isn't a social media hotspot that i was looking for

from looking it over it doesn't look like a direct conduit to fans like facebook. i'm looking for a place to post things like pictures and what our drummer just ate and when the show is being postponed to so they get that information NOW instead of when they decide to mosey over to bandcamp, which looks like it would only be to buy stuff (not that theres anything wrong with that)

[g6120]

Originally Posted by guitaruboy

while bandcamp is good for selling your tracks (i admit i'm not satisfied with reverbnation) it isn't a social media hotspot that i was looking for

from looking it over it doesn't look like a direct conduit to fans like facebook. i'm looking for a place to post things like pictures and what our drummer just ate and when the show is being postponed to so they get that information NOW instead of when they decide to mosey over to bandcamp, which looks like it would only be to buy stuff (not that theres anything wrong with that)

I think you're missing the advantages. Did you watch the video? BandCamp not only tracks plays but also tracks Buzz and tells you where those hits are coming from! This feature alone is invaluable because then you can go there and develop a fan following.
Keep in mind that you can still use FaceBook, Twitter, etc....with BandCamp....you just post links and the player plays in those social networks so people can listen and click buy right there if they like it.

Another BandCamp advantage is that the Band pages are automatically formatted to mobile devices with all purchase links functional.

So don't look at BandCamp as the social networking hot spot because it does not want to be that.
Social networking at your sales point just distracts away from your band and music.
Best part of all is Bandcamp pays directly into your PayPal account. I'm on Reverb Nation and haven't received one dime and even paid them for distribution which I had to abandon for lack of sales. BandCamp has performed well for me and I have raised money for charity there selling my music.

You have to drive your own traffic to BandCamp but once people are there they are engaged in what YOU are doing and not distracted by advertisements or related artist content at all. That is the real advantage.

Watch the video and you'll see how simple and cool it is.

[Pomerlaw]

Originally Posted by guitaruboy

What do you think about all this? What is your band doing and what can we do to fight back?

I hear having your fans add you to an interests list doesn't help because they still have to go look in the interests tab. plus, getting them to do this in the first place is hard and is complicated even more because only a handful of fans (the ones who would have already done this or pay attention to the page) would see it in the first place!

i've personally seen our bands page go from 400 people seeing a insignifican comment thats just for fun to barely 75 seeing a brand new song we just released (a week later the numbers have barely changed!)

so hows google+ looking nowadays? or any other social media platform? the reason we use facebook (in addition to our reverbnation page) is because it has become a central hub for friends and fans to see our content, but with this travesty going on its looking like it won't happen anymore



http://mashable.com/2012/10/03/faceb...romoted-posts/

Look at the bottom right side of your facebook post. There is a "promote" button. You have to use this option so more people will see your post. People who have not liked, shared or commented on your posts for a while won't see your posts by default. Only those who interact will. To reach those people you have to pay.

Facebook is desperate for money...

[guitaruboy]

Originally Posted by Pomerlaw

Look at the bottom right side of your facebook post. There is a "promote" button. You have to use this option so more people will see your post. People who have not liked, shared or commented on your posts for a while won't see your posts by default. Only those who interact will. To reach those people you have to pay.

Facebook is desperate for money...

thats what i'm saying! we can't really afford $5 a post and thats a huge jump compared to free (though nothings free, the ads on the side and everywhere else are enough).
i feel like its not a good business model for pages unless they are a large company making enough where advertising like that is just regular prices.

i mean, if someone likes your page and doesn't specifically click for it to NOT show up in there feed, then it should be deduced that they WANT it in there feed.
facebook's algorithm that figures that out doesn't really work that well. hell, theres times when, for a heavy user, i would like more stuff in my feed but i'm only getting that 10 percent number

[g6120]

Originally Posted by guitaruboy

thats what i'm saying! we can't really afford $5 a post and thats a huge jump compared to free (though nothings free, the ads on the side and everywhere else are enough).
i feel like its not a good business model for pages unless they are a large company making enough where advertising like that is just regular prices.

i mean, if someone likes your page and doesn't specifically click for it to NOT show up in there feed, then it should be deduced that they WANT it in there feed.
facebook's algorithm that figures that out doesn't really work that well. hell, theres times when, for a heavy user, i would like more stuff in my feed but i'm only getting that 10 percent number

BANDCAMP!! My opinion (which could be wrong) is that social networks in general are just not a good place to develop a fan base....YOUR content has to compete with too much other content and it gets buried....forget about paying FB $5 to promote. Facebook makes tons of money on harvesting the personal data of users and selling it (hey both presidential campaigns just paid $13 million for personal data on likely voters...it was in the news the other day...they know details such as what websites you visit and who your friends are etc...)

The answer is not to abandon social networking but to drive traffic from there to your BandCamp page. Once folks are on your BandCamp page and they like your stuff they will share it....YOU can then keep track of where your stuff is shared to and where your listeners are coming from! Take back control....Facebook and other social networks have very little to offer unknown artists especially in the new reality of corporate sponsorship for delivery of new music product (ie: YouTube).

BANDCAMP! BTW, Pomerlaw has an awesome BandCamp page in addition to a cool band website!

[David Abraham]

Facebook jumped the shark, but twitter has always been better for music promo imo

[backtoblue]

This might be of interest to some of you: http://mashable.com/2012/08/30/impro...book-edgerank/

I've seen this circulating around from bands as well. I don't know if it's really necessary (and it's not 100% accurate), but it couldn't hurt:

Facebook now requires page administrators to pay to promote their updates if we want our content to be seen by our fans who have already like our page. If we do not pay to promote our posts, only about 10% of the fans receive the updates on the Facebook home page feed.

To keep RECEIVING REGULAR POSTS FROM US you have to hover the mouse on the "Like" button near our name. In the drop-down menu select "ADD TO INTEREST LISTS". Then create an interest list (and make a name for your favorite sites). When you select that interest list you will again get all of our posts and not 10% of them.

We recommend that you follow the above instructions for ANY Facebook page you care about, so you can continue seeing all the posts from the pages you already like.

I still feel Facebook is at least my band's best tool for getting info out to our fans. We've had a bandcamp page for years, and even though we've promoted it on facebook and have our downloads link on our website directed to it, we've never seen a cent in sales.

[Dr. Tweedbucket]

Originally Posted by guitaruboy

What do you think about all this? What is your band doing and what can we do to fight back?

I hear having your fans add you to an interests list doesn't help because they still have to go look in the interests tab. plus, getting them to do this in the first place is hard and is complicated even more because only a handful of fans (the ones who would have already done this or pay attention to the page) would see it in the first place!

i've personally seen our bands page go from 400 people seeing a insignifican comment thats just for fun to barely 75 seeing a brand new song we just released (a week later the numbers have barely changed!)

so hows google+ looking nowadays? or any other social media platform? the reason we use facebook (in addition to our reverbnation page) is because it has become a central hub for friends and fans to see our content, but with this travesty going on its looking like it won't happen anymore



http://mashable.com/2012/10/03/faceb...romoted-posts/

Beautiful use of smilies


Facebook sucks, forget that dump.

[daddymack]

Tweed...are you lost?

[Londonbus]

Facebook quit being cool (or even fun) about a year ago. I quit in February of this year... Sucked for about a week... Now I wouldn't go back on if you paid me.

With every change Facebook implements, it pushes it more and more away from being anything more than a consumer data gathering machine. Actual functionality and usefulness of that {censored}pile is slowly fading away. I personally don't see how anybody even tolerates that place anymore.

[daddymack]

from he beginning they were at a loss how to really capitalize and monetize that site, and the recent under-performance of their IPO is a perfect illustration that even investors don't see the cash flow side of this bloated juggernaut. FB was never really designed for bands to use, or businesses, for that matter, and eventually the craze will fade and it will go back to being what it was meant to be, a social media site.

[Pomerlaw]

 

Originally Posted by g6120

BANDCAMP! BTW, Pomerlaw has an awesome BandCamp page in addition to a cool band website!

 

Thanks man! I'm thinking about forwarding my band's website directly to bandcamp... I'd save a few bucks (hosting) in the process.

[tementnoise]

Originally Posted by guitaruboy

thats what i'm saying! we can't really afford $5 a post and thats a huge jump compared to free (though nothings free, the ads on the side and everywhere else are enough).

It gets way worse. The pricing is percentage-based on the amount of likes you have. Here is a picture my band posted on our page recently to highlight how ridiculous this is:


Based on that, we'd have to pay $600 to reach the entirety of the people who like our page. Absolutely mind blowing.

Personally, I think it's stupid for anyone to have to pay to reach people who already want to be reached by you. But I feel like Facebook's time is winding down. Something new will come along. Always does.

[David Abraham]

Originally Posted by tementnoise

Based on that, we'd have to pay $600 to reach the entirety of the people who like our page. Absolutely mind blowing.

Personally, I think it's stupid for anyone to have to pay to reach people who already want to be reached by you. But I feel like Facebook's time is winding down. Something new will come along. Always does.

Yup plus all the time and effort you may have spent to drive your fans to like your page to begin with. This has to be the biggest con-job in the history of the internet.

[guitarville]

 

Originally Posted by David Abraham

Yup plus all the time and effort you may have spent to drive your fans to like your page to begin with. This has to be the biggest con-job in the history of the internet.

 

Some one recently said " welcome to con world" referring to the net, anything on the net.

[scarecrowbob]

Originally Posted by tementnoise

Based on that, we'd have to pay $600 to reach the entirety of the people who like our page. Absolutely mind blowing.

Personally, I think it's stupid for anyone to have to pay to reach people who already want to be reached by you. But I feel like Facebook's time is winding down. Something new will come along. Always does.

I know this isn't a popular opinion, but have you priced buying similar web traffic on google ads? It seems similar to me, but I'm not an SEM guy.

[tementnoise]

Originally Posted by scarecrowbob

I know this isn't a popular opinion, but have you priced buying similar web traffic on google ads? It seems similar to me, but I'm not an SEM guy.

Nah, but we don't look into things like that honestly. We'd never pay to promote a Facebook post or gain likes, it was just absurd to see how much it was. On the subject of the google ads, I see why it would be priced that way to reach so many people who otherwise arent going to look into your band or whatever you are advertising. My thing with the Facebook promotion was, for $600 we can reach up to 180,000. Our current amount of "likes" is around 175,000. So for 600 bucks we can reach all the people who already liked our page because they WANT to see our updates (while without paying, not all of them will) plus 5,000. That's by no means reasonable.

In reality, social media is not the be all, end all to promotion so it's not the end of the world as most people are trying to make it out to be. People still won't see your tour dates on Facebook, but maybe on twitter or various music news sites, or just locally through the promoters putting on the show. Or they won't and they'll ask you when you're coming to their town when you just played there the night before. Its just the way it is, haha..

[Kramerguy]

For a cover-band, FB is far more productive than bandcamp, but for originals artists I would agree that FB can work against you, I guess it all depends on how you utilize it. If you see minimum results, then spend minimal time on there. The fact is that most people still consider facebook THE go-to social networking site. Nobody has ever asked me "are you guys on bandcamp?", but we do get asked a LOT if we have a FB page...

 

Just saying...

 

FWIW we also set up FB as a personal page, not a band page. We don't event-spam people, rather we just post on our page and our fans who want to come out and see us see our posts or checks our page where we regularly update our upcoming gigs. It works well enough that we've considered taking down our official website (which sees almost no traffic).

[sventvkg]

Nah, but we don't look into things like that honestly. We'd never pay to promote a Facebook post or gain likes, it was just absurd to see how much it was. On the subject of the google ads, I see why it would be priced that way to reach so many people who otherwise arent going to look into your band or whatever you are advertising. My thing with the Facebook promotion was, for $600 we can reach up to 180,000. Our current amount of "likes" is around 175,000. So for 600 bucks we can reach all the people who already liked our page because they WANT to see our updates (while without paying, not all of them will) plus 5,000. That's by no means reasonable.

 

That's the Crux of it. Hence I deleted my music page. {censored} Facebook..I'm certainly not going use them if I wanted to REALLY market..I was looking at FB as more of community portal as my fans don't need to be marketed to. they ALREADY like what I do..{censored}ing idiots...FB WILL go down for sure.