Like them or not, social networks are among the Internet’s most important promotion tools for musicians. We dedicated an article to that in the past, which you should check out if you haven’t. The gist of it is social networking lets you reach out to your fans and industry people, share more than just your art, build a fanbase by being proactive, and benefit from word of mouth. When done right, it’s an indispensible tool. Done wrong, it’s a waste of time and effort.

Some Drooble users are struggling to get noticed just as much as you are, so they launched a discussion on the topic – and, as it usually goes, some genuinely useful knowledge was shared! Here are 5 great tips we extracted from the conversation

1. Each platform has different crowds, so figure out where your most loyal fans are hanging out and focus on managing that network first.

Brilliant advice by J Smo of BUNKS. If you are on multiple social networks, direct your strengths towards the one where you get the most attention! Why would you want to ‘conquer’ network XYZ if there simply isn’t that much potential interest in your tunes there? It’s common sense.

It may take a fair bit of time and experimentation to figure out where your social networking efforts prove most fruitful. But it will pay off – once things are clear, you can proceed to build your online fan base with laser-sharp focus. How does one manage a social network profile, though? That’s a whole different undertaking – here’s more about that!

2. Don’t only post things related to your music. Your goal is to connect and build relationships – so make sure you are sharing other music you listen, news stories that interest, new gear you want, and other things you know will resonate with fans.

J Smo of BUNKS continues dispensing solid knowledge with another tactic that usually goes over most people’s heads. Social networks are for socialising – not aggressively bombarding your followers with your unhinged musicality. Thus, offer your fans glimpses at your unique personality and interesting life as a musician. Engage them as a human being looking to connect and you will see them heartily respond, checking out your music, and being more enticed by it, too. This segues nicely into J’s next piece of advice.

3. Build a community around topics and things you enjoy about life, and the people who resonate will eventually find you and support your music.

If you keep sharing more than just your music, studio geeking-out, and half-finished lyrical ideas, you will become the center of a community that shares and understands – partly, at least – your ambitions, struggles, and visions for life and the world around you. These people will respect you, hold your music in high regard, and spread the word. Get this right and you are definitely on your way to success.

4. Engagement is key! If you can get people liking, sharing and – best of all – commenting on your posts, you will have an edge with the algorithms.

J Smo of BUNKS’s final piece of advice is gold. The most important metric for your social networking activity isn’t the number of likes and shares, but how much your fans comment on your posts. While likes and shares can be easily faked with bots and profiles, genuine discussion takes a fair bit more effort to “recreate”. Thus, Facebook considers comments as the most important metric for a post success – the more discussion they get, the more news feeds they show up on and more popular they become. So get people talking and bask in the exposure!

5. Quality product is half the job done.

Gradient Boy gives out a nice reminder about something at the very heart of your social media presence. On the Internet, content is king! If the stuff you share is plain good, with thoughtful and competent work put into it, it will draw more fans. This goes for everything you do – the music, photos, videos, written work – all of this is your product, and quality is a must for it to fare well. So give personal creations your best, and for those sides where your skills fall a little short – artwork, for example – hire someone to help. In the meantime, go do what you are best at!