Hey guys, Damien Keys here.
Welcome back to the channel. Hope you’re safe and well. When it comes to social media, it can be an absolute minefield. What should you be doing?
What should you be doing?
What’s cheesy?
What’s not cheesy?
How much is too much?
How much is not enough?
What’s dull?
What’s interesting?
Wouldn’t it be great if we just had a team of people around us, like the huge artists, who just took care of all of this, so that we could just concentrate on the music itself and let everyone else do the promotion?
Well, today we’re gon na look at an artist who takes control of their own social media, who is just naturally good at social media and runs what I consider to be the perfect social media campaign.
In fact, as far as I’m aware, I haven’t seen any artists in 2020 who have got a better social media campaign driven by themselves.
Today is a lesson in how to do amazing social media as an artist or a band, because today’s case study is the artist Youngblood. If you don’t know Youngblood, he’s a 22-year old artist from the UK, now probably residing by the beach in Los Angeles, because he’s got many, many millions of absolute loyal followers, and hardcore super fans.
But whilst he hasn’t been doing this for very long, he has absolutely mastered social media, to the point where he is now growing his audience incredibly fast, because of how he looks after his audience, and how he shows that he is the voice of a generation.
So before we go into these tips, and the takeaways that you can start to implement into your social media, there is a step before which is absolutely crucial, which is a thread that goes right the way through his social media, and it should go through yours, which is that he stands for something.
And that’s so crucial, because it’s not even a new story about what he stands for.
It’s the age-old message of I don’t care, I don’t give a shit, I’m gon na do what I want, when I want, because that’s who I am.
But at the same time, he absolutely goes out of his way to care for his audience, to show his audience that he values them more than anything else in the entire world.
So let’s dive into his socials and see what he does so well, that you can take away and implement into your social media strategy.
So you can get the same kind of growth.
Tip number one, the jumping off point, is probably the most important thing when it comes to social media and putting together a really great social media strategy, which is, it’s interesting.
So his social media doesn’t have to be.
Now that’s such a weird thing to say.
But he’s done all of the hard work before he goes to take a picture of himself.
He’s weird.
He’s interesting.
But he captures your attention. You see something going.
That’s remarkable.
That’s interesting.
And because of that, it doesn’t matter what’s in the background, it doesn’t really matter what he’s doing.
Just him just himself in a picture is enough for people to take note and go, Oh, you’ve got my attention.
What is it that you are doing? He’s put so much hard work into his image, what he stands for, and what he genuinely looks like, that the rest of it is easy, which means he can take a picture of pretty much any time of day, any time of night, anytime of the year, and you will get a decent, interesting image that you can put on your social media. Whether we like it or not, the music industry is a fashion-based industry, even if we are rebelling against certain fashion.
And it doesn’t matter whether the demographic that you’re representing is 15-year olds, or 40-year old housewives.
And the thing with Youngblood is, he’s saying, I am just going to be interesting and so many people have this idea that I don’t know what to do with my life because I’m not that interested or because I’m not doing stuff that is that interesting. Youngblood just says, I’ll be interesting, and therefore, whatever I do at that point will be interesting because I’m weird and interesting.
So if he drinks a cup of coffee, the picture is interesting because of him and what he looks like.
Tip number two is something that I said earlier, that he stands for something, which means he represents a generation of people who feel the same way as him.
And this is summed up in his Instagram bio. If you look at most bands and artists’ Instagram bios, they will kind of sort of say, this is who we are, this is the music that we like, and then they’ll promote something.
Whereas he has got one very simple slogan, which just sums up his Instagram bio.
And that bio just says, if we fight, we win. You have a voice and then, after that, it allows the pictures and the visuals to do the job for him.
He’s not worried about anything other than telling you the story of who he is and actually getting you to buy into what he stands for and what you stand for together.
So what can you put in your Instagram bio, which just isn’t the obvious, like a rock band or a band from Chicago? What can you put in there, which gets people behind you, gets people behind your movement and what you stand for? Tip number three: he is not scared of doing things that other bands and artists would find cheesy because he knows that when he does them, he’ll do them in a way that doesn’t come across as cheesy
So, for example, he is putting out a documentary series which he shot himself. He is literally documenting what is going on with this lockdown.
I was mostly in LA for about a month to finish this record. When all this started happening, it was the weirdest time I’ve ever lived.
So why don’t we just document now, whereas most artists and bands are using it as an excuse and saying, well, everyone’s on lockdown, my life is boring.
He was saying, Well, I’m going to document my journey through lockdown.
And I’m going to make it very, very exciting.
And that’s exactly what he’s done.
And that is coming out tonight on his YouTube channel.
So you can just see what he’s been up to whilst he’s in lockdown.
Now that’s amazing, because the number of bands that say, I have logging, it’s just a bit cheesy, isn’t it?
It’s not for me.
Whereas for him, he’s made it great.
He’s made it interesting because he’s interesting, and therefore, his audience wants to get behind it.
Tip number four is his YouTube show.
That’s right.
He’s done the Youngblood show on YouTube.
Why did he do it?
Because he was stuck inside, he just thought, Well, I want to do something.
And so, therefore, he has made a show which goes on YouTube, which he can then start to promote around his other social media.
And when you watch it, wherever you are, wherever you’re from, wherever you want to be, welcome to the young show.
Okay, so the aim of the game is like, it’s like Saturday morning TV when I was a kid. It’s him presenting, it’s him performing.
It’s him doing covers, it’s him doing interviews, it’s literally everything that bands would find cheesy and money. He’s done it and wrapped it up into this parcel.
All of his audience absolutely loved it.
And even though the show is high-energy, and fun and quirky, and feels quite young, it’s still got quite a lot of adult themes in it.
He’s also still working with artists who are adult themed. He’s still doing collabs with Machine Gun Kelly, Travis Barker, and other people.
He was still swearing all the way through it.
He’s still talking to young people, not like their children.
He’s still representing that generation, even though it feels like it could come across as cheesy.
And what I love about it is that it is a lot of work.
And I’m sure he has got an assistant who’s got people that he can actually get to bring in and help, but you can feel it with his socials. He’s the one driving it along.
It’s real.
His Instagram is real.
It’s him, his YouTube is real, it’s him, and therefore, everything feels like you are on his show at all time.
Tip number five is his lack of perfection is perfection.
He’s not scared to perform 15 seconds of a track. How many artists are thinking of themselves, or I’ve recorded that and it’s just not quite right.
And I’ve got to get back into the studio, and I’ve got to tweak it.
And then I’m going to record something 300 times and tell us right, and then at that point, I’ll put it on my social.
And the way he looks at it is, it’s a moment in time. I’m just going to record it on my phone.
And I’m going to record 15 seconds of it, because that’s how long Instagram stories are, and I’m not going to play the whole song, I’m just going to literally press record.
And I’m going to I’m going to literally sing you that part of the song.
And whatever I capture, I’m going to cut it down and I’m going to stick it on there.
So when you go through stories, you don’t have to feel like there’s this new release or this new song or an entire performance.
You just go on there.
He’s singing a bit of a song.
And it might be his song, it might be someone else’s song.
But the idea that perfection doesn’t have to be perfect.
It’s a moment in time. I happened to be there at that moment, feeling this, and therefore, I just performed a little bit of that song.
And then I’ll go about my day and I’ll come back later.
Tip number six.
He is a great storyteller.
And he crafts these stories in small analogs, and he places them very cleverly, all over his social media.
And whether that is on his Instagram in a feed in a story on his YouTube, whether it’s him discussing it with the camera, whether it’s in the actual description, he’s just fantastic at telling a story.
So let me let me just read you this.
This story that he wrote underneath some of the artwork he’s got, he just says, “I wrote the song about the weirdest time in my life ever imaginable.”
It felt like the ground beneath me was amazed that it was continually shape shifting, and I felt like I was gon na fall down the cracks at any moment.
However, I learned something new about how the rest of my life was going to be. I pictured everything that I had seen.
And then everything I was going to see, in a moment of vertigo.
I accepted everything that was wrong with me and celebrated everything that was right and figured out that everything that was out of control. The world feels exactly like that right now. I want this song to make everyone feel unified in the feeling that everything is going to be alright, no matter how weird things get, as long as we remain together.
Weird out tomorrow. I can’t wait to hear it.
What an amazing description.
How many people do that? Most people put it on their social media. Here’s the album artwork, or here’s a song I wrote called Wavy. Here it said, “This is the feeling, this is the emotion that I was feeling.”
This is what I want you to know about this song.
And then he crafts a story to go with the description.
A picture tells 1000 words, but he says, I’ll go further than that. I’ll actually tell you the story, as well as the artwork.
And therefore, he is constantly telling these stories.
And that’s why people listen, because he’s an amazing storyteller.
Tip number seven, he breaks the rules when it comes to social media.
And by this, I mean, he does not care what tradition on social media should be.
For example, if he wants to release a song, the way he wants to release a song, he is absolutely fine.
And if that means he’s going to release it on Instagram stories, or YouTube or Spotify, then he absolutely will.
And if he decides it’s going to be done live with him playing acoustic guitar or a full version, he just wants the audio to go on Instagram or the audio to go on YouTube.
He will say there are no rules.
Whereas no one does, everybody sticks to these rules on YouTube.
That’s the long form video. Instagram, okay, well, that’s for pictures and smaller videos, music.
Well, that goes on Spotify.
And he says no, in my life.
Because if I want to release a song of me just playing you that song, and that’s a moment in time, then I’m going to do it.
And if I record something on my phone, I think that’s really good.
And I feel like posting that on my Instagram feed, so I’m going to do that as well.
And because of that, you’ve just got an amazing abundance of social media, so much great stuff everywhere.
And you never know what’s coming, which makes it weird.
But it is also very interesting.
Tip number eight is going live.
Now, obviously, we are in a time where everyone’s going live, everyone’s doing the live stream thing and everyone’s performing.
But I think he goes a step further.
Because he doesn’t have to set anything up.
And then make it spectacular and fantastic.
And then perform something, perform a gig or a track. He’ll just go live and say hello.
And he’ll stay there for five seconds.
Or you might stay there for 20 minutes because there are no rules.
He does it because he wants to connect with his audience, not because he wants to promote his new song.
He does it because he wants to tell a story or because he wants to connect in a way that he can’t do any other way.
As opposed to saying, by the way, can you go and buy this from me?
And then barking orders like everyone does on social media?
I’m a marketer. Do this, do that, go there and buy this.
Listen to that.
Watch this.
Instead, he just goes, “alright, just want to say hello.
That was it.
And because of that, every time he goes live, everyone tunes in.
Everybody wants to say hi, everybody wants to thank him for forgiving them.
It is just such an amazing empowerment.
Now you probably find live streams quite daunting.
I know I do.
I know I should go live much more than I do. I find it terrifying the idea of actually going live.
Who’s going to be there?
Will they be there?
Will they ask questions?
Will I be on my own?
Well, I get the question, right?
Will I know what to say?
Well, I look silly with all of those questions and the anxiety that goes through my head.
And then after a while, I go. Maybe I’ll go live later, or maybe I’ll go live tomorrow.
And then the next day, I really really really should have done it. I really should have gone live yesterday.
But today, today, I feel like I really need to do it.
And how many times have I done it? Where is he doing it all the time?
He doesn’t care.
He knows that the people on the other side of that phone are just happy to see him.
And so, therefore, he wins.
He’s a total winner and, therefore, he lives all of the time.
Tip number nine.
He is one of the only artists who recognizes YouTube for what it is.
And he utilizes YouTube, which is why he has one and a half million subscribers.
Because if he wants to do a show, he’s going to do a show.
If he wants to do a live stream,
He’s going to do a live stream if he wants to put his music out.
He’s going to put his music out there.
But what it means is he’s not using it as a storage space for his music videos.
How many artists, and I’m not talking about up and coming artists, how many of the biggest artists in the world don’t do that?
They YouTube is literally a place to go if you want to go and watch some live shows. If you want to go and watch my music videos, then they’re there on my page.
But they’re not using it to connect.
They’re not using it to build, they’re not using it to give value or look after or do something new.
They just say none.
It’s just a storage space.
It’s just a library.
Whereas Youngblood says, “No, it’s not.
This is my TV channel.
This is where I can go and I can connect with people.
I can give them something different on YouTube than I can on Instagram or Facebook, or tik tok, or anywhere else.
This is a platform that needs to be utilized.
And then he does. He makes stuff which is specific to YouTube, YouTube, which will carry on growing, being shared, building his brand and building him as an artist.
And number 10.
He gives so much more value than he expects.
And yes, he does want you to watch his new video.
And yes, he does want you to listen to the songs.
But he also realizes that for every question that he’s going to ask, “Would you mind doing this?”, he’s going to give you 10 or 20 or 30 pieces of value to make it worthwhile.
So, in that way, he’s building up superfans that when he comes for the ask, they’re already there.
They’re already saying, of course, I’m doing this for myself. I’m not doing this for you.
And that is the power of a big artist.
So guys, thank you so much for watching.
But I would like to know who you think is the best at social media in 2020.
And I’m not talking about marketing.
I’m talking about an artist.
What artists are smashing social media right now? A year ago, but right now, who’s smashing it?
And why?
Tell me in the comments below.
I would love to know because I can learn by going and studying that stuff as well.
But more importantly, thank you so much for watching.
If you can do me a favor, if you’ve enjoyed this, if you can, like subscribe More importantly, just come and be a part of this community because I’m so proud of what we’re building and I’m so proud of what you’re working on and seeing you grow.
So thanks for watching, and I’ll see you guys tomorrow.
