Some social media advice for Artists

Summary

In this video, the artist shares personal insights on growing a social media presence to boost an art career. Key advice includes prioritizing personal artistic growth over social media metrics, investing in one's equipment and skills, maintaining a consistent posting schedule, and setting clear goals. The speaker's journey from 15,000 to 1.2 million followers illustrates the power of focusing on quality content and self-improvement over chasing engagement. The video serves as a motivational guide for aspiring independent creators and professionals looking to leverage social media for career advancement.

Takeaways

• 🎨 Prioritize personal growth as an artist over social media growth. Focus on the quality of your work rather than just engagement metrics.
• 🌟 Invest in yourself and your equipment. High-quality tools can enhance your work and make it more professional, even if it means making a significant financial commitment.
• 📅 Maintain consistency in your posting schedule. Regularity helps in building an audience and keeping them engaged over time.
• 💪 Develop mental resilience to handle low engagement. Understand that not every post will be a success, and it's important to keep going despite setbacks.
• 🎯 Set clear goals for your social media presence and work backward from them to create a strategic plan.
• 🚀 Use social media as a tool to launch and grow your art career, leveraging it to showcase your work and connect with the industry.
• 💡 Authenticity in your work is key. People connect more with genuine expressions of creativity rather than posts designed solely for engagement.
• 📈 Learn from other successful artists by observing their strategies and adapting them to your own journey.
• 💼 Consider social media as a professional platform where you can market yourself and potentially open doors to new opportunities.
• 🌱 Be prepared to adapt and evolve your social media strategy as you grow, always focusing on what serves your artistic and career goals best.

Q & A

What is the main focus of the video?

The main focus of the video is to provide tips and advice on how to grow on social media and how it can help launch an art career.

What is the speaker's experience with social media growth?

The speaker started their Instagram account in 2018 and grew from 15,000 followers to 1.2 million over the past year and a half.

What is the first tip the speaker gives for growing on social media?

The first tip is to prioritize personal growth as an artist over growth on social media, focusing on the quality of content rather than just engagement numbers.

Why is investing in oneself important according to the speaker?

Investing in oneself is important because it shows commitment to one's art career and can lead to better quality work, which in turn can help with social media growth and success.

What does the speaker suggest about the frequency of posting on social media?

The speaker suggests maintaining consistency in posting, finding a schedule that works for the individual, and holding oneself accountable to that schedule.

How does the speaker handle low engagement on their posts?

The speaker advises to mentally prepare for low engagement, accept it as a part of the process, and not let it deter consistency in posting.

What role do goals play in the speaker's social media strategy?

Goals play a significant role as they provide motivation and direction, allowing the speaker to work backward from their end goal to create a plan for growth.

How does the speaker feel about the opportunities social media has provided?

The speaker feels that social media has opened many doors, allowing them to connect with other artists and industry professionals, and has been instrumental in their art career.

What advice does the speaker have for those who want to pursue a career in social media or content creation?

The speaker advises to go for it, prioritize personal growth, invest in oneself, and stay consistent, as these actions can lead to achieving one's dream job.

What is the significance of the Wacom Cintiq Pro 24 in the speaker's journey?

The Wacom Cintiq Pro 24 was a significant investment for the speaker, which they purchased despite being a broke university student, and it played a crucial role in their growth as a digital artist.

Outlines

00:00

🎨 Growing on Social Media as an Artist

The speaker shares their journey of growing on social media, particularly Instagram, and how it helped launch their art career. They emphasize the importance of prioritizing personal artistic growth over social media growth, focusing on the quality of content rather than just engagement metrics. The speaker recounts their own experience, shifting from creating fan art to focusing on personal expression and skill development, which ultimately led to a significant increase in followers. They stress that while social media can be distracting, it's crucial to invest in one's own growth and authenticity to gain a genuine following.

05:02

💼 Investing in Your Artistic Journey

The speaker discusses the importance of investing in oneself and one's equipment to succeed as an artist on social media. They recount their decision as a university student to invest in a high-quality drawing tablet, which was a significant financial commitment but ultimately paid off. The speaker also mentions investing in a camera and microphone, emphasizing that while not everyone needs top-of-the-line equipment, it's important to address any shortcomings in one's setup that could hinder progress. They also express gratitude for their collaboration with Wacom, highlighting the value of using quality tools that enhance their work.

10:02

⏰ Consistency and Goal Setting in Social Media Growth

The speaker highlights the importance of consistency in posting and the psychological challenges of dealing with low engagement on social media. They stress the need for artists to maintain a regular posting schedule and to be disciplined in holding oneself accountable. The speaker also talks about the mental resilience required to overcome disappointments from poorly received posts and the importance of setting long-term goals to guide and motivate one's journey on social media. They share their personal goal of growing their social media presence to a point where they could support themselves, and how they used that goal to plan and work backward, setting smaller milestones along the way.

Keywords

💡Social Media

Social media refers to digital platforms where users can create and share content or participate in social networking. In the video, it is emphasized as a crucial tool for artists to showcase their work, grow their audience, and potentially launch a career. The speaker shares personal experiences of using platforms like Instagram to gain a significant following and how it has impacted their art career.

💡Engagement

Engagement in the context of social media denotes the level of interaction between users and content, such as likes, comments, shares, and views. The video discusses the importance of not solely focusing on engagement metrics like likes and follower counts, but rather on creating high-quality content that resonates with an audience.

💡Growth

Growth in this video script refers to the expansion of one's social media presence and influence, as well as personal development as an artist. The speaker highlights the importance of prioritizing personal artistic growth over mere social media growth, which is illustrated by their journey from 15,000 to 1.2 million followers.

💡Consistency

Consistency is the regular and persistent effort to create and share content on social media. The video emphasizes the need for artists to maintain a consistent posting schedule to keep their audience engaged and to build a successful online presence, as irregular posting can lead to a loss of momentum and followers.

💡Investment

Investment in the video script is used to describe the resources, time, and money an artist should put into their craft and tools to improve their skills and the quality of their work. The speaker shares their personal story of investing in a high-quality drawing tablet, which was a significant financial commitment but ultimately paid off.

💡Quality

Quality, as discussed in the video, is the excellence or superiority of the artist's work. The speaker stresses that the quality of content is paramount to gaining and maintaining a social media following, as it is the primary reason people follow artists, rather than just the frequency of posts or other superficial metrics.

💡Authenticity

Authenticity in the context of the video means being true to oneself and expressing genuine emotions and experiences in one's art. The speaker shares that focusing on authentic self-expression rather than chasing trends or popularity led to a more profound connection with their audience and a more significant following.

💡Mental Health

Mental health in the video refers to the psychological and emotional well-being of the artist, which is impacted by the pressures and stresses of maintaining a social media presence. The speaker advises finding a manageable schedule to avoid burnout and to ensure that the creative process remains enjoyable and fulfilling.

💡Goals

Goals in the video are the objectives or targets an artist sets for their career, such as financial independence or professional recognition. The speaker talks about setting long-term goals and working backward from them to create a strategic plan for growth and success on social media.

💡Accountability

Accountability in the video script refers to the artist's responsibility to themselves and their audience to maintain a consistent and high-quality output. The speaker uses the example of a strict posting schedule to demonstrate how holding oneself accountable can lead to discipline and success on social media.

Highlights

The importance of prioritizing personal artistic growth over social media growth.

The realization that quality of content is key to gaining followers and engagement.

The shift from focusing on fan art to expressing personal style and emotions in art.

The personal story of growing an Instagram account from 15,000 to 1.2 million followers.

The advice to invest in oneself and one's equipment for serious artistic pursuits.

The significance of maintaining a consistent posting schedule on social media.

The psychological aspect of dealing with low engagement and the need for mental resilience.

The strategy of setting long-term goals and working backward to achieve them.

The motivational impact of having clear goals in the face of setbacks.

The transformative power of social media for artists to reach new opportunities.

The personal journey from being an unknown artist to connecting with industry professionals.

The encouragement to pursue a dream job in content creation or leveraging social media.

The anecdote of the first day receiving a Wacom Cintiq Pro 24 and the decision to invest in it.

The closing advice to bet on oneself, invest in oneself, and believe in one's potential.

Transcripts

what's up guys in this video i'm going

to be talking to you about how to grow

on social media and how it's helped me

launch my art career i want to give you

guys some tips and pointers here and

there about things to look out for and i

think this video is going to be very

helpful for people who are looking to

pursue an independent creator kind of

career as well as for people who might

be in the professional industry who want

to leverage social media to showcase

their work a little bit about me i

started my instagram account back in

2018 and

never really gained too much traction i

posted fan art for a good while and over

the past year and a half or so

i've been able to get from 15 000

followers all the way up to 1.2 million

that you see today so all of the

learning experiences that i've had on

social media are still very fresh in my

mind and i want to share some of that

with you guys because whether you like

it or not social media is a huge part of

being an artist nowadays for most people

and it's something that we've all

thought about at one point or another so

i have a few key pieces of advice that i

think helped me out the most things that

i wish i knew about when i started on

social media tip number one you got to

prioritize your own growth as an artist

over your growth on social media this is

something that i always preach to

everybody who asked me for advice this

is the one thing that i think is really

not talked about enough especially in

the social media scene where people are

so focused on engagement it's always

engagement engagement engagement how

many likes what's the engagement ratio

what is my subscriber count what is my

follower increase there's too much of

this looking at the numbers and not

enough of looking within yourself it

sounds extremely cheesy but this is the

number one tip that i can give to

anybody who's looking to pursue a career

on social media you have to remember

that when you strip everything down when

you take out all the fluff people follow

you for the quality of your content

that's it so if the quality of your work

is not at the highest level that it

could be you're not going to get

followers and engagement

just by trying new things like for

example posting at a different time

posting at a different frequency

none of that is going to help you if you

don't have the foundation of quality

from my experience on social media you

know it's very hard to block out the

distraction of looking at the engagement

thinking what are other people gonna

like you know this is something that's

always gonna be in your subconscious is

something that you're always gonna think

about when you're drawing but you just

gotta work to make sure that you're not

letting that

take a higher priority than your own

growth as an artist so here's my

personal story okay back when i started

my account i was doing a lot of fan art

i was focusing on characters i was

trying to look for characters that i

think would be very popular i was

looking for you know do i do a white

background or do i do a colored

background do i do light or dark what

gets more likes what gets shared more

what gets more followers i was focused

on that and i was thinking okay what's

the next character i could do that's

really popular that most people are

gonna know and that's something that i

focused on for you know a couple of

years and i was pretty stagnant but what

really clicked for me was when i decided

okay you know what screw this i'm going

to focus on myself on my own learning i

know i've got a long way to go in my own

skill set so i am going to work on this

and i'm going to try to express myself

in an authentic way and that's where you

get the paintings that i have today

that's where people really are able to

connect with it you know i really pour

my heart out into these i put a lot of

feeling and emotions behind them basing

it off you know just very raw human

emotions and experiences and it's just

stuff that i care about and in the

process i'm also learning i'm trying to

build up my skill set because i know i'm

not the best artist i can be i know that

i could get better and that's something

that i want to work on and it just so

happens that people connect with that

way more than the artificial attempts at

boosting engagement long story short

don't do it for the gram do it for you

don't let nobody tell you what to do

here's a snapshot of your priorities

okay growing

as an artist

growing on social media this comes first

i think this leads perfectly into our

second point you know talking about

prioritizing yourself you have to also

invest in yourself i think if art is

something that you want to take

seriously this is something that you

want to do every single day and this is

something that you're going to make

money off of and make a living off of

you have to invest in yourself and for

me when i started doing this i was a

broke university student so it was very

hard for me but i decided to get myself

a

wacom cintiq pro 24 this is a painful

memory but it basically wiped out my

entire bank account but i told myself

this is what i wanted to do and i wanted

to do it well so i had to invest in my

equipment and my setup to make it as

comfortable for me as possible to make

me actually sit down here and want to

work now do you need top-of-the-line

equipment like this

i don't think so okay you can start off

with something very basic but the point

is if there's anything in your setup

that is holding you back

right if your computer crashes every 20

minutes using photoshop

invest in yourself this is something

that you want to do this is something

that eventually is going to pay off take

the l for now

it's going to pay off later hopefully

but this is also one of the things that

i just personally learned from this

journey it's that you really have to

invest in the things that you're going

to be doing a lot you know i bought an

expensive camera that i should not have

been able to afford i bought an

expensive microphone that i should not

have been able to afford but you know

after putting in countless hours of work

these things have all paid themselves

off and i'm so glad that my past self

decided to invest in my presence health

and i've been personally working with

wacom products for the entirety of my

digital art career so if you look at any

of my youtube videos i'm either working

on this big boy or i have them in the

background and honestly it's an absolute

honor getting to know the team at wacom

and being able to work with them it's

like a

childhood dream come true you know the

point is if there's anything in your

setup that's holding you back whether it

be your drawing tablet your table your

computer

your camera or your microphone

invest in yourself make sure that you

give yourself the opportunity to succeed

and that brings us to point number three

which is maintaining consistency i think

this is one of the hardest things to do

about being a social media artist

because you're working on your own

schedule so it's like you can

technically do whatever you want you can

technically post whenever you want

but in order to actually become

successful

you have to do it consistently i think

consistency plays a huge part in

separating the people who drop out

midway through and the people who are

successful now when i say consistency

i'm mostly referring to consistency in

your schedule you have to hold yourself

accountable to a good schedule okay you

have to find something that works for

you do you want to post every two days

do you want to post every three days do

you want to upload a video onto youtube

every single week or every other week

find something that works for you and

run with it and make sure that you are

holding yourself accountable for the

times that you set for yourself for

example when i upload a youtube video

i'm currently doing every tuesday and i

always upload at 11 45 a.m eastern time

now is there any rhyme or reason for

that time

not really

does it

give me higher engagement

not really it's just the time that i

picked for myself

that allows me to really hold myself

accountable having that 11 45 mark there

gives me a solid deadline that i could

work towards it's just something that i

use to stay disciplined and keep myself

on schedule on instagram i'm posting

every three days and i'm posting at

exactly 12 10 p.m now does that mean you

guys have to post at that time and on

the specific days not really it's just

something that i kind of fell into it's

a schedule that i just

made up for myself sometimes you forget

sometimes

life gets busy but having the schedule

here you know writing it down in your

calendar or setting an alarm for it it

just it allows you to maintain it no

room for excuses and we got no room for

laziness here but you also want to take

care of your mental health so if

something is really really stressing you

out

it's probably time to rework that

schedule you know find something a

little bit more manageable so that

you're not stressed out all the time

trying to meet a deadline to a point

where it actually has a negative effect

on the quality of your work and speaking

of consistency there is one thing that i

think really negatively impacts a lot of

people's schedules and that is low

engagement on your work this is

something that you really got to work

with yourself on you got to

play some mental gymnastics to get over

these hurdles uh because

it's tough sometimes you put up a post

uh and it does absolutely horribly it

just

completely flops okay and you thought it

was gonna do well this is gonna happen

all the time this is gonna happen over

and over and over again you just gotta

come to a point where you accept this

and move on you gotta really toughen

yourself up so that every time you

stumble you pick yourself back up you

have to understand that in the grand

scheme of things this is just one small

stumble this is not something that's

going to derail your entire art career

the fact that this one post or this one

video didn't do as well as you expected

it to it's important to pick yourself

back up get right back at it be

consistent and stay on that schedule so

that you can come back and slap that

flop in the face i'm promoting violence

but what can you do so i haven't covered

those points i think there is another

one that was really important to me

personally

that really round this whole thing out

and that is setting your goals okay you

gotta have goals

you gotta know what you're working

towards for me personally my goals were

that i eventually want this social media

thing to grow large enough that i could

support myself and that goal is

something you would call a long-term

goal or a stretch goal it's something

that is not going to happen in a very

short period of time it's going to take

a lot of work and it's something that

you can strive towards the benefit of

having a goal like this is you can kind

of work backwards so for me personally i

knew i wanted to do this so i looked at

some other artists who were already

doing what i wanted to do i took notes

on how they make money how they generate

content what kind of content do they do

how often do they make their content and

what kind of work they do in general and

i was able to kind of reverse engineer

that into a plan for myself so that i

knew okay at a certain point i would

probably want to sell some prints at a

certain point i would probably want to

teach people on patreon at a certain

point maybe i'll make an art book you

know things like that that you could

implement into your journey by working

backwards from your end goal so that you

can eventually reach that goal and the

thing is having a goal is just great for

your motivation when i was a much

smaller account i found sometimes when i

would make posts and it would get low

engagement and i'd be like okay why am i

doing this i'm not even making any money

but i'm putting so much effort into it

you know it's very discouraging it could

be very unmotivating but

you know sometimes you just gotta remind

yourself okay like this

is what i'm doing it for like at the end

of the day

that's the goal that i want to reach and

every single thing that i do right now

whether it's a success or whether it

flops

is just another stepping stone to the

eventual goal that i want to reach so

these are the main tips that i can offer

you guys for people who are trying to

get onto social media whether you are a

independent creator or a professional

artist who wants to use social media

these are some of the things that i wish

i knew when i started trying to grow on

social media

well now you guys know them so i hope

they make life a little bit easier for

you guys but honestly guys i think

social media is an amazing thing to

leverage if you're an artist you know

there's it opens so many possibilities

for me personally i didn't know anybody

in the art industry i didn't have a way

into the art industry there was no other

way for me to get my work recognized by

people

other than posting on social media and

now that i have done this i have grown a

presence on social media now people kind

of know who i am uh i've met so many

people that i otherwise would have never

been able to talk to you know like other

big creators that

back then i would have never thought i

would even speak to ever in my life and

you know here we are we're just talking

to each other you know getting to know

each other and it's actually opened so

many doors for me you know with new

opportunities to work on big projects uh

really exciting things and just getting

to know other people in the industry as

well and kind of getting the inside

scoop on a lot of these things so social

media is definitely something that is a

very viable thing to use if you are an

artist or a creative of any kind uh it's

a great platform for you to market

yourself for you to get yourself out

there for people to know you and for you

to potentially reach new opportunities

and for me personally you know

prioritizing myself investing in myself

and staying consistent with this thing

and getting to where i am today uh is

something that i'm super thankful for my

past self for doing this is the dream

job for me and if your dream job is

working as a content creator or your

dream job is working in the industry but

having a good social media presence on

the side you know like an ethan becker

aaron blase snatty ilya kuchenov all the

professionals who happen to leverage

social media on the side to do other fun

projects for themselves there's just so

many possibilities with this and if that

is something that really speaks to you

you are that person who you look at that

and you're like that's my dream job go

for it that's all i gotta say you're not

going to regret trying what you're going

to regret

is not giving it a shot that's it for

this video that i made specifically for

lightbox expo 2021 so a big thank you to

bobby chu for inviting me to lightbox

this year and a big thank you to wacom

for reaching out to me getting to know

me and just being cool people who make

really cool products that have helped me

so much on my artistic journey so with

that being said i hope this video shed

some light on social media and

everything to do with social media i

hope this

makes things a little bit less

overwhelming for you guys and i'm

looking forward to seeing all of you

guys on instagram or youtube or twitter

or whatever it is that you guys want to

use thank you for watching this video

and i'll see you guys on the next one i

still remember the first day that the

cintiq pro 24 was shipped to me

i was like

what have i done you know i'm looking at

my bank account looking at this looking

back at my bank account looking at this

i was like

this thing better work out sam otherwise

you're kind of screwed

it did work out

bet on yourself guys invest in yourself

believe in yourself you got this