I used to love Facebook as a very efficient and affordable promotional tool for artists but I am starting to change my mind. There are still many good reasons to have a presence on Facebook, but I don’t think it is worth making a lot of effort anymore promoting my work as an artist there because of the time and money investment it requires. Here are the reasons why I am rethinking my Facebook strategy.
Facebook is by far the social network with the most important number of users
Facebook had 2.07 billion monthly active users all over the world in the third quater of 2017. So many people are now on Facebook that no other network can compete with it. It will probably be that way for a very long time. This is still the place where artists can connect with a huge number of people all over the world in a way that traditional advertising never allowed. But the consequence of that ubiquity is that so many people are posting on Facebook nowadays that the information overload is getting worse. We could waste days looking at our feed and there would always be something new happening. It has been designed that way, we get notifications throughout the day so that it is highly addictive and we can get a small release of dopamine multiple times in a day.
The huge amount of posts and content being published every day makes it impossible for Facebook to show all your friend’s and pages posts in your news feed. So Facebook developed an algorithm to select what you see and what you won’t see on your feed. What you will see depends on many factors, including your recent interactions, your centers of interests, but also how much money people are ready to pay to promote their content.
Frankly sometimes posting on Facebook feels like being in a room full of people where everyone is talking simultaneously but no one is listening.
Over the years, Facebook changed its algorithm with the purpose of making more and more money with paid advertising. The result is that owners of Facebook pages who spent time, effort and sometimes money to aquire a lot of followers are seeing the organic (free) reach of their posts diminish over time.
Facebook pages used to be a free way to connect with an audience and an awesome community building tool, but not so much anymore.
I have 4455 followers on my page. Often I will post something and only between 100 and 400 people will see that post. That is about only 2 to 9% of the people that are following me!
Facebook lets me know that only 314 people saw this post and at the same time is offering me the possibility of “boosting” my post, in other words pay for people to see it.
I don’t have the budget to pay for people to see my posts when I want to share something on my page, and frankly I am getting tired of the continual suggestion that I should pay to be read. I also noticed that every time I am posting something that is more promotional in nature, these are the posts are more likely to get less visibility.
I still like most of the interactions I get on Facebook with other artists and will continue to post pictures of my work in progress, my studio, events and interesting posts I want to share, but I am carefully monitoring the time I spend on social media. I am not sure Facebook is helping my business in a significant way and feel my time might be better spent at something else.
Are there alternatives to a Facebook page?
Facebook groups
An interesting alternative to Facebook pages is to make a Facebook group. People get a notice when a post is published to a group way more often than when a post is published to a page, so what is published on a group is seen by more people. There is an important difference though: A group is more about a community than an individual artist, you are not the only person posting the content, so you have to give away some control over what is being published. I still want to keep my Facebook page so I can control the look and feel of what is being published there.
I like to use Facebook groups for my online classes participants, this is a community of artists that can interact in the group, post pictures of their art and support each other. I can moderate the group and block spammers or delete comments that I would find not acceptable.
If you decide to transfer your business page to a group, unfortunately there is no direct way to transfer all your followers into the group. You can only post on your page or contact your followers to let them know your page is going to be replaced by a group. So you most likely will loose some of your followers in the process.
Posting on your Facebook personal profile
You could also use your personal profile to promote your art, posting there definitely gets more visibility than posts on a page. The drawback of posting on your personal page is that posts about your personal life get mixed with posts about your professional life and I like to keep the two somewhat separate.
Instagram
Instagram is an interesting alternative to Facebook because the interactions on this network seem more direct and less influenced by advertising and how much money people are willing to pay to get their content seen. But as you probably already know Facebook bought Instagram and is starting to implement business profiles and paid content. So I think it won’t take long for Instagram to feel exactly like Facebook.
This is an interesting tendency by the way: All the social networks are starting to look very similar. Twitter recently increased the number of characters from 140 to 280, Facebook has now a live feature and Instagram has stories that make them look a bit like Snapchat. All the social networks are starting to look very similar.
My personal use of Facebook
I was doing some research and read that there is an increasing number of people doing temporary “social media detox” or closing their account permanently. The general reaction being that they feel way better and less stressed after doing so.
I am not surprised, the more time I spend on Facebook, the less happy and energetic I feel. I don’t like that it feels like a competition for attention, measured precisely by the number of likes and comments. It makes us crave for constant external positive reinforcement. The pressure to show only our good side and pretend that all is always well start to feel like an imposed misrepresentation of reality.
I also don’t like what is called the “echo chamber” effect of Facebook. The fact that I see mostly what I already agree with and am less and less exposed to confronting or challenging opinions. It gives me the false reassurance that the rest of the world thinks exactly like me. The trouble is that anyways discussion is almost pointless on Facebook as people get upset and agressive really fast, way faster than if they had a person to person discussion.
Despite all these negative constatations, I am not ready yet to quit Facebook. I enjoy the fact that I can keep in touch with many friends and relatives and many posts still move, inform or educate me. So the positive is still outweighing the negative, but as I am doing for my Facebook page, I am carefully monitoring the time I am spending on Facebook.
Are you using a Facebook to promote your work? Do you think it is helping your business ? Did the way you feel about Facebook changed over time? I would love to hear from you in the comments.
Originally from France, I have been living in North Vancouver, Canada for the past 20 years.
My work has been collected and exhibited extensively in Canada and internationally. I am also part of the Art Rentals and sales program of the Vancouver Art Gallery.
Many of my paintings have been published in Art books and magazines (Artist Magazine, Watercolor Artist Magazine, Acrylic Magazine, International Artist Magazine). I wrote 2 art instruction books with North Light/F+W Books.
I have been writing for the last 5 years for my blog: paintingdemos.com, that has a mailing list of about 10 000 subscribers and about 20 000 visitors per month.
I am an active member in the community, as a co-founder of the North Shore Art crawl, a co-founder of a weekly life drawing group, a board member of the North Vancouver Arts Council, and have been invited as a juror for public art, art grants and juried exhibitions. You can read more about my collaborations here.
I always resist to temptation to open a Facebook account, and I’m not found of other social networks as well. Posting is somewhat as bottle at sea, and the time lost tends to expand. There are also ethics questions around FB.
I truly do understand and am sorry that anyone has had to deal with copyists – it bother me a lot too.
But then again, I sing other people’s music. The aspect of paying royalties for that luxury is open for discussion – because for decades, many bands played cover tunes. No one wants to hear original music, unless you are famous.
I look back on other artists from centuries ago – it was a sad and often difficult task to get noticed. And THAT in itself is quite a story.
To find a person who will pay for your skill – was always sought after. Only those of Royalty could Afford Real Art – many times in portraitures, etc.
Take Van Gogh… the poor man shot himself and you have to wonder, what angst did he go through to be noticed? Suffering many times from depression.
IF we make Art a Living – it hasn’t changed much in the way of progress. WE may have new tools to play with – but the bottom line is still – Can others afford our Work? How much do we think WE are worth? $10 an hour, or $25? and so forth.
And it’s not easy living in this world – rent has to be paid, food on the table – the whole gamut of living an Artful Life is a dream…but not without sacrifices.
The sad aspect of our Society – is that Life will always be full of stresses to live. Without ART – what would life be like? Maybe just plain and dull? ha ha
I just look at our Creator – the one who designed the universe and the world we live in – all the many beautiful seascapes, mountains, animals, birds, intricate colors and plumes…
And not one person ever Gives HIM the credit he deserves over such Magnificence…
for the gifts we have whether music, art, minds that are full of science that I couldn’t even imagine?! 🙂
We actually should be humbled by this <3
Take it all in stride – I give thanks for what little I have been able to accomplish, and meeting people like yourself – who still are willing to Give.
You are a GIFT, Sandrine… thank you for being Here.
We are all very fortunate to even have the Internet… period. 20 years ago, IF you wanted to market yourself…you HAD to do the legwork. I used to be in a Band, so I know that in order to get a following, You had better be good OR have excellent Venues in which to perform. and eventually, the advertising helped further your career – or maybe you cut a record deal. OR maybe nothing ever happened, you just did it because a Restaurant needed a decent Band. Any stars in your Future had to be realized Might never happen! SO LOVE what you do, and that might be the best YOU will ever get.
Now with Facebook…the self promotion actually annoys me. NO one is All that great – but it comes across so self serving, with no real concern over Who is watching you? Sort of like a Peeping Tom, with no contact on either end.
I like to know my Audience – which is why “SOME” public performing is incredibly satisfying…it makes me feel connected. Once you hit the BIG Time…that close connection is lost. And bottom line, YOU have to feel very secure about yourself too. Being pulled (for example) by someone you don’t know because they admire or are a Big Fan…can be a bit intimidating, and sometimes downright scary.
And then there is the reality, it will become Just a Job like everything Else. You HAVE to love what you do – to keep it a part of your Life. BECAUSE there is No guarantee of FAME.
When they talk about 15 minutes of FAME – yep, that could be all you will ever get. Love what you do, is more important than the $$$ or lights that never happen.
Thanks Juliana,
I totally agree with you that if you decide to go in a creative career like artist or musician, you will be happier if you do it because you enjoy what you do as the first reason to do it.
But then any art needs an audience, musicians without listeners or artists without a public are missing an essential part of their raison d’être. So even if I am sure the vast majority of artists would be perfectly happy just creating and having someone else promote their work, the reality is that most of us have to do some marketing, gain some exposure, not for fame but to reach an audience.
Comments (4)
Serge
I always resist to temptation to open a Facebook account, and I’m not found of other social networks as well. Posting is somewhat as bottle at sea, and the time lost tends to expand. There are also ethics questions around FB.
Juliana
Had another thought …
I truly do understand and am sorry that anyone has had to deal with copyists – it bother me a lot too.
But then again, I sing other people’s music. The aspect of paying royalties for that luxury is open for discussion – because for decades, many bands played cover tunes. No one wants to hear original music, unless you are famous.
I look back on other artists from centuries ago – it was a sad and often difficult task to get noticed. And THAT in itself is quite a story.
To find a person who will pay for your skill – was always sought after. Only those of Royalty could Afford Real Art – many times in portraitures, etc.
Take Van Gogh… the poor man shot himself and you have to wonder, what angst did he go through to be noticed? Suffering many times from depression.
IF we make Art a Living – it hasn’t changed much in the way of progress. WE may have new tools to play with – but the bottom line is still – Can others afford our Work? How much do we think WE are worth? $10 an hour, or $25? and so forth.
And it’s not easy living in this world – rent has to be paid, food on the table – the whole gamut of living an Artful Life is a dream…but not without sacrifices.
The sad aspect of our Society – is that Life will always be full of stresses to live. Without ART – what would life be like? Maybe just plain and dull? ha ha
I just look at our Creator – the one who designed the universe and the world we live in – all the many beautiful seascapes, mountains, animals, birds, intricate colors and plumes…
And not one person ever Gives HIM the credit he deserves over such Magnificence…
for the gifts we have whether music, art, minds that are full of science that I couldn’t even imagine?! 🙂
We actually should be humbled by this <3
Take it all in stride – I give thanks for what little I have been able to accomplish, and meeting people like yourself – who still are willing to Give.
You are a GIFT, Sandrine… thank you for being Here.
Juliana
We are all very fortunate to even have the Internet… period. 20 years ago, IF you wanted to market yourself…you HAD to do the legwork. I used to be in a Band, so I know that in order to get a following, You had better be good OR have excellent Venues in which to perform. and eventually, the advertising helped further your career – or maybe you cut a record deal. OR maybe nothing ever happened, you just did it because a Restaurant needed a decent Band. Any stars in your Future had to be realized Might never happen! SO LOVE what you do, and that might be the best YOU will ever get.
Now with Facebook…the self promotion actually annoys me. NO one is All that great – but it comes across so self serving, with no real concern over Who is watching you? Sort of like a Peeping Tom, with no contact on either end.
I like to know my Audience – which is why “SOME” public performing is incredibly satisfying…it makes me feel connected. Once you hit the BIG Time…that close connection is lost. And bottom line, YOU have to feel very secure about yourself too. Being pulled (for example) by someone you don’t know because they admire or are a Big Fan…can be a bit intimidating, and sometimes downright scary.
And then there is the reality, it will become Just a Job like everything Else. You HAVE to love what you do – to keep it a part of your Life. BECAUSE there is No guarantee of FAME.
When they talk about 15 minutes of FAME – yep, that could be all you will ever get. Love what you do, is more important than the $$$ or lights that never happen.
Sandrine
Thanks Juliana,
I totally agree with you that if you decide to go in a creative career like artist or musician, you will be happier if you do it because you enjoy what you do as the first reason to do it.
But then any art needs an audience, musicians without listeners or artists without a public are missing an essential part of their raison d’être. So even if I am sure the vast majority of artists would be perfectly happy just creating and having someone else promote their work, the reality is that most of us have to do some marketing, gain some exposure, not for fame but to reach an audience.