Managing Social Media For Artists

I'm Adam from Lucidpixul and welcome back now, today. I want to talk about. Social networks, a topic that is not foreign to this channel. I've talked about it numerous times in the past, but today I want to talk more specifically about how to manage it more specifically, how to manage it at different stages of your career at different stages of growth, because it wouldn't be fair of me to say that the way that I approach

social

media

and the way I handle it today in my own life is the same as when it was. Early in my career, because as your platform evolves, so do you, and most of the time, unless you're working with a team of people, which is usually not the case, we usually work alone, then you will be, you I quickly begin to realize that.

If you want to continue

managing

it the same way, it means a big sacrifice for your productivity. And that is the main focus today. Here's how it affects your productivity and how to manage it. How to remain a productive artist. While we are still within reasonable limits and aware of everything online, there is a reality we have to face, some people may consider it an unfortunate reality. I do to a certain extent, but it's a reality anyway. And that's the fact that if you want to be successful today, if you want to get there, if you want to build a business, if you want to make a name for yourself, the modern world is on

social

media

.

So are the things. The scope you have is substantially different. If you are in a gallery showing your work, or if you are online showing your work, you will simply have more reach and more people will engage with your work. So. Depending on the type of

artists

you want to be. If you want to make a name for yourself, if you want to find a broader audience, that's probably the way you want to do it, but not all

artists

feel the same way. In fact, there are a large number of artists who simply like to do their own thing.

They don't necessarily want to make a name for themselves. They don't want to be popular online. All they want is to create art for the pleasure of creating art. I have great respect for people like that. Trusted. You can support yourself financially, right? Because there are two sides to your life. There is the creative, there is the expressive, but there is also the thing that you want to pay your bills. It's very difficult to be happy if you have debt collectors chasing you, which I'm sure is something we're all familiar with now, or at least at some point in our lives.

Good. So there is a healthy perspective. It is necessary to adopt a realistic perspective. However, because social media is such a powerful tool, it is such a popular tool. Today it is subject to abuse, abuse by the creators, abuse by the algorithm. And if this abuse is not controlled it is not recognized. Then you fall down a rabbit hole that doesn't benefit you. Benefits the platform. It benefits the application, the developers. It benefits the advertisers on these channels, not you. And this is something I've talked about quite a bit in the past, in previous toxics, you can go and watch it on my channel.

So the first thing I want to talk about is the first major facet of social media, and this is something I realized very early in my career. Something that overwhelmed me very quickly was choosing specific social networks, carefully selecting, a limited number of social networks, from different platforms on which you want to advertise your work. And the reason I say this is because early in my career, I believed that if I threw as many hooks into the water as I could, which is kind of an analogy that reminds me of Bobby Chu's book. Perfect bait, great book by the way.

Sorry for the tangent, but it's a good book. Um, so go and check it out if you can, but, you have a very beginner's perspective. Very often, growth consists of throwing as many lures into the water as humanly possible and hoping something catches. And as you gain more professional and artistic experience, you start to realize that it's not about the number of lures in the water. You can knock a thousand doors into the water and not catch anything. It's more about being objective and focused. It's about having a limited number of lures in the water, but making sure they're rock solid, that's it.

To reach the right audience, make sure you have the best reach possible. So instead of focusing on quantity, you're focusing on quality, which, in my opinion, and if you've followed my channel for a while, is a philosophy that I adhere to quite a bit. I've always been a big advocate of taking your time and producing something quality rather than trying to produce as many units as possible. Well. So that first aspect, that first element of social media is. Don't try to post everywhere and instead look for platforms that are valuable to you. They have a good range, but not too much.

And what I mean by too much is all the apps I've ever encountered. If you start noticing the trends, the apps, you launch a few releases and you get really popular, the early adopters usually tend to thrive a little bit more if they jump into it quickly. And then, sooner rather than later, that platform becomes saturated. We are also oversaturated. And as a result, you end up feeling like you're throwing your piece on top of a huge pile of rice. You are a small grain of rice on top of a huge pile of them. And at that point, the chance of you getting noticed, the chance of you reaching out and building a substantial, loyal audience, gets smaller and smaller.

It's simply reality. Pewdie Pie said he had done it himself, he started the channel five or six years later. He wouldn't have gotten where he is now. He turned out to be one of those early adopters who figured something out through talent and a little luck early in the game. And things got better. Does that mean I'm saying you're a grain of rice on a huge pile of rice? No, I'm not saying that at all. What I'm saying is, understand what you're doing. If you're trying to hustle, hustle, you get to the top of a pile and I call them the kind of popularity pile, which I can't stay on at all.

And that shouldn't be what motivates you artistically. But if you're trying to gain popularity online and you're on a platform that's saturated with artists, obviously being another artist in the pilot isn't going to get your attention. So what will we do? Well, it's about quality, it's about producing works of art that you've put a little bit of thought into, you've put your back into, you've put all your talent into it, you've put a lot of passion into it. . You've made sure to go from corner to corner on your canvas and do it. Putting a little thought and effort into everything you do.

It is not a sloppy job. It is a reflective work, perhaps consider having some type of narrative associated with your work. So you can, so you have a little bit more of an emotional or social connection to something. I think that's recognizable. You don't need 50,000. Works of art to attract attention. You need a couple of good ones. You need a couple of solid pieces of art that will catch people's attention. And sometimes you can recognize a person by a single work of art. This happens all the time. I remember the first time. I was on Facebook and Carlos Ortiz had posted something about Walter Everett.

He had never heard of Walter Everett. Maybe you've never heard of Walter Everett either, but I looked at this piece of art and said, Holy cow, this is incredible. Like, wow. It was an exploding white piece that I, I, I, share with my students all the time, uh, from a nun, a whole field of nuns. And there's this girl who's sitting on the left side of the painting and you. As your eyes begin to disperse across the painting. You start to notice all these figures hiding behind the branches. And I remember seeing this and saying, wow, that's well done.

A work not only artistic, but also academically solid. And what did I do? Well, I went out and started looking for Walter Everett. Now, did I look for Walter? Did I ever notice Walter? Because he appeared on all social networks. No, I noticed it and I didn't even notice it because Carla posted it. I noticed the art before I realized who published the piece, but it was that piece that was the hook. It was a really good hook that drag that grabbed me and pulled me in. Now, if you are an artist new to the game.

If you are, if you're just starting your journey as an artist and haven't gained that much experience, you haven't mastered those fundamentals yet. And you haven't necessarily built and developed a style. Well, then be patient. These artists have spent many years marketing their art, dealing with it, the good and the bad, perhaps finding some popularity and wealth, and then other days being completely poor. That's part of the game and it's a fun part of the game. And when I look back on my career, when no one knew who I was and I knew no one gave a shit about what I produced, I look back at those years and say, oh, thank God, that's over.

No, I see my career as a series of good and bad, exciting and boring experiences. And I kept going because it was something that mattered to me. And that's where the passion comes in. That's why I keep referring to passion in art, because when you leave aside all the technicality, the training, the fundamentals, the practice and all that, what sustains you is the passion. And when you are passionate about something, every little growth is felt, every little achievement is felt. Marvelous. It feels wonderful. Every time you achieve something. So rebel in the moment and enjoy your work.

Keep going. If you are passionate about it and keep moving forward and aiming for quality. You will find much success. And one day you're going to post a piece of art that you're really proud of, or maybe not even, but somehow, for some reason, that piece really gets a lot of attention. And suddenly, people start talking about you and word starts to spread around you. And before you know it, there will be people coming up to you and letting you know what a wonderful job you did. And that's when you know it. Well, for starters, that.

The patients you had for yourself, the perseverance you had to get through the tough times, always focusing on quality, building your character and resilience in the face of disappointment and also

managing

success. Like a champion. When you get that kind of recognition, you've earned it and you're proud of it. They didn't hand it to you like a lottery ticket. You earned it with hard work and passion. That's my main advice here. Number one, don't spread yourself too thin. Don't try to update on all platforms. And the reason is that that will consume all that valuable time that is needed to produce quality; quality takes time.

Quality. It requires concentration. Quality requires you to sit, think, reflect, experiment, fail, succeed, grow and evolve. That takes time. So if you're trying to post a painting, some piece of art, just for the sake of posting it every day, because Instagram or the art station algorithm encourages you to post daily. Don't fall into that trap that only pleases advertisers who don't like you. And also a good work of art will attract a lot of attention. You will get a lot of love and that in itself will boost the algorithm. Now, the second and last point I want to make today is reaching out to people, messaging other people, and responding to people who contact you.

For me, this is an incredibly important way to show other people the appreciation they show you when you leave me feedback in the YouTube comments below, or if you reach out to me in person on social media, that to me is precious. To me, that means I shared something with you that moved you in such a way that you felt the need to express it. There are thousands and thousands of people who could look at your stuff and they don't necessarily say anything. So remember that every time someone reaches out to you to say something nice, give you a word of encouragement, or offer you some constructive feedback, they are doing their best.

Van, they are using their time to share a thought with you. And that is not something that should be taken for granted. And some things that I always felt were extremely precious, but that being said. The more you start to make a name for yourself. The more your channel grows, the more people respond, the more comments you get from people, and the more you need to manage. And the reason I say this is because, at the beginning of a career, there may not be as many people commenting on your stuff. So, every person who comments about you, about your things, is.

A big problem. It's the first time you've had that kind of interaction. So you want to go back and you can go back. You have time to respond to two, three, five, 10, 15, 20 people, but you can see how quickly that number increases. And when it gets to 15, 20, 25, 30 50, a hundred or whatever crazy number that social media can throw at you sometimes, you become overwhelmed very quickly and really, at a certain point, you just can't manage to respond to every person substantially in the same way. The same way they could respond to you and still allow yourself the time you need to grow artistically, it's just not manageable.

However, these platforms have this wonderful feature. Instagram Twitter, Facebook art station, YouTube. They have this wonderful feature that allows people. To share your thoughts and feelings about what you've done. And that is one of the main reasons whythat social networks exist: the creator can communicate directly with his audience. But I remember, uh, I've been watching a lot of John Mayer videos and I love his music and I love, love the guy. I think he's amazing. Um, despite all that. Playboy article, something controversial that happened years ago. I still think he's an incredible artist and I really value what he says and he was talking about how his career had to change at a certain point where a lot of his initial audience, a lot of his initial fence of him, um.

She was a little disappointed, probably a little disappointed in him when his tone changed. And when he got really big, really fast and suddenly he started winning Grammys everywhere. And he became a world famous artist, how his platform had to change and how he disappointed people who couldn't hang out with his audience after a concert and chat with them. He just couldn't because his audience wasn't 50 people. His audience grew to audiences of tens of thousands of people. People. And two days later he had another show that he had to prepare for, and he got on a plane every day.

He didn't have time to be with everyone. So the dynamics of your career start to change in your ability to interact with other people, even with help, even with. You know, the people who handle social media and the people who handle editing, the more you grow as a channel, the more impossible your ability to handle all of these logistics on your own becomes. If so, if your intention is to continue producing art that appeals to your audience in the first place. So here's my advice at the beginning of your career: When you're just starting your career, you may have the time, lifestyle, and energy to be able to respond to everyone who responds to you.

But I recommend that, even if you have all this time enough, you don't extend yourself too much again. Don't respond to every comment, on every platform, because what you do by doing so is setting a precedent for your audience. The more you respond on a certain social network, the more your audience will go, oh, she responds on that social network. Let's contact her there. You start to condition that platform and you start to condition your audience to approach you that way. And then if you do that on Art Station, you do that on Instagram, you do that on Twitter, you do that on Facebook, and you do that on any other different platform that you're on.

You suddenly realize that you have people contacting you everywhere all the time and before you know it, and you don't have to be a mega star, like John Mayer, to experience this very, very soon. , you start to realize. Holy shit. I can't keep up with all this. This is overwhelming. This is too much. And you realize you've spent all day responding to people who haven't done any work. You may be very productive socially, but you are not productive creatively. And remember, there is a crossover when it comes to producing art, being productive and being creative overlap.

It's not like you're a lawyer and you're productive and you do your legal work and then you do something creative to relax at the end of the day and work on your social media. No, these two things happen in 10. So your social media feed isn't just a picture of you on your plate of omelet. His social media feed usually consists of paintings that took him days, weeks, or even months to produce. So you have to give yourself time to manage it. Does that mean ignoring your audience and saying, screw these people and not respond? It means managing your time.

So the way I do it, because I have my artwork on multiple different platforms. I focus predominantly on one social network. Youtube. I also post regularly on Instagram. So my Instagram is my kind of 0.5, my art station, which is another, I would feel like I was on another very important platform as well. To be completely honest with you, I only update periodically, maybe two or three times a year. I just threw a bunch of my artwork into Art Station. I hadn't updated anything, I had approximately. Seven or eight pieces of art that I updated. It's a large amount of work that I updated on art station.

Because I'm not the kind of artist who can paint a painting a day. I usually take at least real time. It usually takes me about a full week to produce a single piece of art. So I can't update it regularly, but YouTube is my main platform. So whenever I have a little break, I sit down and have a coffee, you know, I'm waiting in line somewhere in the store or anytime I have a free moment. That's when I go into my YouTube app, look at the comments and try to respond, I always did my best to respond to every comment.

Sometimes comments can be extremely long. I usually leave those for later until I have a little more time. And that's why sometimes it takes me longer to get back to those. But I try, I always want everyone to know that they are recognized, but even that, even with just one platform like YouTube, is a lot. And remember, I don't have a team. I don't have, I don't have a secretary working with me. I don't have an editor yet. I probably will soon, but I haven't delegated any of my work to anyone else yet. I do everything myself, from filming to reviews, research, art, recordings, everything.

That's a lot of work and that doesn't include my full-time teaching job. And the fact that I'm a dad and the fact that I took apart my pool, my destroyed 20-year-old pool, and I had to make six trips to the EcoCentro, to throw out a bunch of plastic and Styrofoam. And I had to cook dinner, take care of my kitten and do many other things. And I go out with my kids and I see a pop patrol. That's why it's very important for me not to get overwhelmed with a single task. So the way I handle it is in my free time.

Or I allow myself, I allow myself 30 minutes a day before I start my main work day to quickly review comments, any type of response to people that I normally do in 30 minutes. And after that I threw myself into my work. I jumped on my art. I jumped into my videos because I have to, because for me, it's the content I create. That is the most important thing because that is what I am communicating to you and it is correct. So if I spend all my time replying to comments, then I can't produce the work of art that made you write those absolutely lovely messages to me in the first place.

And believe me, I love them. I honestly think you are the most encouraging community. Hills. A good-hearted community that anyone could want. So it's an honor and a pleasure to let you know how I feel that way. And to everyone who can leave a comment on this video below, please know that even though it may take me a little while to respond, you are in my heart and everything you share is precious. That being said, I love you all with all my heart and happy painting. Take care.