The #1 reason you should NEVER pay for likes, fans, views, or subscribes

When MySpace was the dominant social media platform for independent musicians (remember George W. Bush’s second term?), people got obsessed with numbers. How many friends do you have? How many times have your songs been played?

The higher the number, the more legit you seemed. Labels, bookers, even other bands were all staring at your stats and judging you accordingly.

And it was all B.S.

Why? Well, because some bands paid services to boost their numbers for them. Some bands held pizza parties and had all their friends clicking the play button all night long. Other talented bands didn’t have any MySpace friends or plays yet, because they were brand new acts. While other brilliant musicians were never going to see those kinds of giant stats simply because their music was more niche and wouldn’t have broad appeal. Take any of the examples above and you quickly realize — numbers alone have little to do with talent.

And yet… almost a decade later, musicians are still concerned with their numbers: Facebook fans, YouTube subscribers, Twitter followers, and more.

I get it. Our egos, giant and fragile as they are, are wrapped up in trying to manage impressions when we’re promoting our music. We want to seem bigger than we are because — to some degree — that’s still how you get taken seriously.

And it’s STILL B.S.

Quality over quantity: your online music promotion depends on it!

A fake fan is worthless. There’s no one on the other end of that empty statistic who’s excited about your music, who’s going to share your music, who’s going to buy your music. You’re an INDIE musician, damnit! It’s about quality, not quantity. Better to have 500 true fans than 50,000 disengaged (or fraudulent) followers.

But there’s another reason why you shouldn’t be worried about boosting numbers for the sake of appearances, and it’s this: fake or purchased social interactions will actually HURT you in the long run by making it more difficult to share your music and message with your actual fans.

An artist named Alexan O’Brien posted this comment on a recent blog post:

I’m not verifying the claims in this video, but it does raise some good questions — and, if true, supports Alexan’s advice that if you pay to promote yourself on Facebook, you promote your posts and NOT your page.

I would add to this discussion, while we’re talking about boosting numbers, that YouTube monitors plays (sources, frequency, etc.) to ensure your video stats are accurate and… actual. YouTube needs to protect their advertisers too, and companies don’t want to throw a bunch of money behind an ad campaign that “might” be seen be real humans. So after a certain point, YouTube discounts views that seem suspicious.

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So, still worried about your social media stats? Here’s a bit of advice I know is easily given (and less easily followed): create songs, videos, concerts, and fan experiences that are WORTH sharing. Do that and you won’t just see your numbers rise; you’ll be at the center of a growing community of real fans.

Have you had experience paying for likes or boosting your stats in a fraudster kind of way? What came of it? Did it hurt or help? Let me know in the comments below.

[Superhero photo from Shutterstock.]

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Source: Musician Resources