5 Stupid Mistakes Bands Make When Using Facebook

Posted on 13. Jul, 2011 by Captain Spaceman in Social Media

If you don’t have a facebook page and you are in a band..stop reading right now…go on facebook.com, click on the link at the bottom that says “create a page for a celebrity, band, or business” (see fig. 1.1) Create a page for your band…and you will have successfully avoided the first major mistake that many bands make when using facebook for digital marketing.

Bottom line, facebook is the jumping off point for every band to introduce their music and themselves to the internet. It’s free, it’s (relatively) easy to use, and it’s chock friggin’ full of the exact same cute girls you want attending your shows.

But a word from the wise: There are ways to maximize your facebook usage, and there are ways to screw up your digital marketing campaign before it even gets off the ground. Accordingly, here are my five favorite screw-ups that almost every band will make at least once when setting up a facebook band fan page.

1. Making a “Profile” instead of a “Page”

This one goes for more than just bands (I’m looking at you My Beating Heart Show.) The best way to shoot yourself in the foot before you even get started is to limit yourself by accidentally creating a page instead of a profile…so be sure to click the right button (see figure 1.1)

Fig. 1.1

Why create a profile and not a page you ask?

A) a band profile allows you to share events (otherwise known as…your shows?) with all your friends via a calendar, and…

B) A facebook profile allows for all sorts of nifty integration of your facebook into your band website that I’m not gonna get into just yet, but take my advice…facebook page…do it…now.

2. Writing “Notes” in place of a Real Blog

Now don’t get me wrong, there is nothing wrong with keeping your facebook profile fresh with a little update here and there. “Hi How you doing fans, the tour was great, my sexual reassignment surgery was a success, I can now fit in my pants” sort of message is fine for facebook notes. but as far as show or album or website promotion is concerned they are the internet marketing equivalent of paying someone to stand on an empty street corner wearing sandwich boards…they blow.

Why do facebook notes blow you ask? Several reasons…but here are the highlights:

Only Your friends can read them…bad

They are not indexed in any of the major search engines…very bad

They cannot be freely shared by you with anyone outside of your “like” fanbase…poisonously bad.

Do yourself a favor and start a wordpress.com blog and fill it full of updates and upcoming shows and your favorite flavor of ice cream and pictures of you and your dog and whatever ese the fuck until your heart’s content…and then share it on your facebook page…

This is done in an effort to maximize your online real estate…and it applies to bands as much as it applies to any business.

3. Neglecting the Facebook Page

Honestly, one of the things that sucks the most about a facebook page is that it doesn’t run itself. Because so many fans use this service daily, they expect each of their favorite bands to do the same. If you don’t give them personal updates and that special sort of personal accessibility from your facebook page that they can’t find anywhere else but gigs…then you might as well have not even started one at all…ignore your facebook fans and they are going to feel cheated…bottom line.

4. Over-Using the Facebook Page

I know…this sounds like a contradiction in terms, but sometimes bands (especially newer bands) will lean on their facebook too heavily to get the word out and use it as a substitute for all the other promotion that they should be doing. Fans (especially potential fans…ones that haven’t really made up their minds about you yet) are a fickle bunch…and they will drop you like a fat girlfriend from a third story building if you annoy them with constant status updates….keep it simple…one status update a day at the most…upcoming shows and the occasional personal message.

5. Linking to Their “Facebook Page” and not their “Website”

This sounds like a good idea in theory…you want people to check out your facebook page, because (for the time being) it is king of the mountain and it’s the easiest way to get people to check out your band…but what if you woke up tomorrow morning and nobody was using facebook? All those links would be completely wasted. One of the most important tenets of search engine optimization is that you always link back to your money site first. And don’t think a website disappearing can’t happen (Myspace? anyone remember friendster?) do yourself a favor and maintain as much control over your web real estate and your backlinks as you can…set-up an actual band website…the sooner the better…and start driving traffic there.

That’s all for now folks: enjoy this video of some of Canada’s finest cook’s making delicious food courtesy of Epic Meal Time:

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