It's nigh impossible to promo on social media but we need social media to promote

[maseba]

social media is a business like any other. Instagram makes money from professionals and artists paying to advertise.
If you want my advice: there are three ways to get followers (and clients) if you are an artist: pay Instagram, make drawings of youtubers etc that they recommend or put you in their stories (or the challenges of other artists such as "draw this with your style "), or go to manga / comic conventions and have visitors see your contact cards.
But do not follow fashions or trends, the tips above are for more people to see your art and the ones they like are hooked.
PS: my instagram is the only social media that i have so is not like a big problem to me, because i use it to contact my friends apart of upload my drawings.

[PapaDom]

Maybe the real social media was the friends we made along the way.

[ratscout]

I really feel this thread. XD I don't really do much promoting on social media anyway. Like, I have a twitter account, and I post excerpts from my story on their from time-to-time, and sometimes I get retweets from my writer buddies, but I don't think any sort of famous person is gonna get on there and retweet an excerpt from my weird little story, LOL, and that's what you would really need if you intend to use twitter to advertise your stuff. Not only that, but I consistently log onto to Twitter, see something really stupid is trending that makes me want to vomit, and then I log off before I make myself too sick, hehehe. People who post their awful political takes on that site when they should just be advertising for their art are silly--like, that's a good way to alienate potential audiences.

Honestly, probably the most effective way to advertise is to make a website for your story, hire someone to do marketing for the story, and hope that the marketer is really, really good and can direct people to your website. This is actually something that I plan on saving up for in the future, along with a really good editor. You'd be shocked what a really good marketer can do: My sister hired one for her business and her business has been booming ever since.

I think the best way to stay passionate about what you're doing is to find good people--like, REALLY good people--who are willing to consistently read your stories in return for reading theirs. Don't waste your time on people who clearly don't intend on reciprocating; you need to save that energy for the lovely people who DO reciprocate, and of course, save it for writing your story.

[DokiDokiTsuna]

Oh man...I was just thinking about this last night and managed to get myself out of it; now I'm gonna get depressed all over again...
It's too late now, though, so I might as well dig in...

like i have a little over 500 followers which i'm very happy about; hell i didn't think or know if i'd even get that many but to stay in that range for this long is more than a little maddening.

I think it should be said that Twitter is actually a terrible place to try and grow an art following. Many of the artists I follow have said as much, even the bigger ones...one artist in particular was so frustrated about it that I had to unfollow them: all the constant negativity, while understandable, was really painful to watch.
Anyway, I think the main reason is because nothing 'translates'. You can go viral for one week and go back to getting 20 likes the next. You can have thousands of followers and still make posts that just a handful of people bother to like, let alone retweet...I don't know WHY it's like this, but it's not uncommon, and it really hampers any linear notions of 'growth'.

i know people say "dont look at the numbers, it's not everything just work on your stuff and keep at it and you'll grow" and yet i'm doing that and ???? like i literally have come to just avoid those little advice threads and motivational posts because a lot of it at this point just feels empty

Yeah, I know that feeling...it's not realistic, but I've taken to thinking that people who say stuff like that don't actually know how it feels to be in that position. For them, a lack of growth is just a temporary bump in the road, not something you've been watching happen to you for years, largely due to factors outside of your control.

For example, Eclipse basically shattered my presence on DeviantArt...which was 7 years in the making and really the only one I had. It wasn't my fault, there's nothing I could have done to stop it, and now, a year later, it doesn't look like there's anything I can do to fix it. I'm just stuck waiting for things to change. =/

And even before that, I was already losing traction...I remember hearing once that stories and fleshed-out characters (my bread and butter) were good for OCs, and even for fanwork. 'Everyone loves a story...give them something to form an attachment to, and they'll keep coming back.'
Well, in reality (at least, my reality) they don't. Often they just inexplicably stop caring.
Everyone is excited when I announce a new project or AU but before I'm even halfway through telling the story I wanted to tell all fan engagement slows to a trickle. And it's like, 'I thought you wanted this? I thought you were interested and eager to learn more?? What did I do wrong; did I explain too much? Too little?? Am I boring you???'

Of course, I can't actually ask...and to this day I haven't found an answer.

Usually, when I start feeling like this, I go to work on my animations...my YouTube audience is really the only one where I feel like I'm making progress, and where the majority of my fans actually think about and enjoy my work, instead of just a select few.
And it's weird because, as I said once, 'I only average 2 videos a year'. ^^; I wish I could do more to reward them and thank them for their loyalty, but animation is such slow work...all I can do is try to keep them posted on what I'm working on, and corral them over to my Twitter where I usually hang out more. And I feel like it's actually working...whenever I post an animation WIP, there's usually a little club of 12-20 people who like/retweet it.
Sometimes they even comment...and if you're a small artist on Twitter, you know comments are basically gold-encrusted diamonds. For someone like me with just ~150 followers to get more than one on ANY post...that's very rare and special~.

So yeah...I'm hanging in there with what little I've got. Sometimes it also helps to remember that, even when it seems like everyone is doing their best to ignore me...I still like my work. I like to read and re-read those heartfelt character essays that no one else seems to care about; I like to go through my comics and look at all the little skillful, beautiful things I've done.
Remembering that helps me feel like, even if I'm not getting rewarded for my efforts, they haven't been a complete waste of time.

[cherrystark]

I made a series FB page for my series and have done some paid ads (roughly 20 USD) and that's about it. The page gives me a chance to show off the digital art I like to do and I guess, doubles as promotion.

Tbh, I'm not entirely convinced that there is no one, perfect platform to grow your audience, no matter your medium. Depending on the platform, I've muted people who post too much or are trying to push products. If the person is nice or their art is up my alley, I follow because I want to and not because of their advertising choices. I'm a big fan of letting your audience grow naturally. I've gotten some stellar reivews from people who happened to stumble onto it.

[AmazementComics]

You're right. It feels like it's damn near impossible to promote successfully on social platforms, and yet that's where a lot of people gain their audience. It's like a double edged sword isn't it?

There's two things I learned from posting online:

1. Posting frequently makes a world of difference.
   That's just the truth. I give mad respect to those who can create content and grow an audience without the use of social media. But the majority of people just aren't that fortunate. So starting a social media account and making sure it's constantly a relevant part of your content has to become second nature in terms of how frequently you stay on there and what you post.

2. Be prepared for that damn social media algorithm and having some of your posts overlooked, even by your own followers.

Obviously it's not ideal to have a really good post not get too much attention, but as creators, I feel that's inevitable. For some odd reason websites like Instagram and Twitter pay little attention to up and coming artists/writers thus making them work three times as hard to play catch up and get to a specific number of follows. I've also learned that even sometimes your own followers will overlook your post, or not even pay attention to it in favor of someone else's (for the record, I'm not making a huge deal out of that, but it's kind of disheartening if your very active only to have your own followers not like your stuff).

TL;DR social media is something a lot of us have a love/hate relationship with .

[VibrantFox]

Sometimes it also helps to remember that, even when it seems like everyone is doing their best to ignore me...I still like my work. I like to read and re-read those heartfelt character essays that no one else seems to care about; I like to go through my comics and look at all the little skillful, beautiful things I've done.Remembering that helps me feel like, even if I'm not getting rewarded for my efforts, they haven't been a complete waste of time.

this is the one thing i've been trying to remind myself to do which sometimes is much easier said than done but paying attention to your own personal growth does help a lot

[frgmnt]

Bruh... I wish I could give good advice but I have similar feelings.
All those tips that come up in this sort of threads, post consistently, bend down to the algorithm, draw fanart of whatever's popular, use hashtags... I tried them, and was getting very little traction from them. So honestly it just killed my drive to create for a while.
Chasing trends, conforming to the almighty algorithm, making yourself draw fanart for traction, posting in hashtags and promo threads - all that has nothing, nothing to do with actually making art and finding enjoyment in it.

I think social media nowadays is just too huge and widespread. You're competing with tens of millions of artists. Unless you're blessed with godly skills and the content that you enjoy creating is just whatever is the most popular at the moment, getting "out there" is pretty much... winning a lottery... Someone wins it everyday - but statistically it's very unlikely it will ever be you.
In the distant era of smaller, less centralized online communities, it was much easier for artists to find an audience, and you didn't have to have thousands of followers to even be seen at all.

On twitter, I have what, 57 followers? which I gathered over two years of painful grind. I can't see myself ever going over 100, maybe 200... Unless I win the social media lottery and go viral at some point. But even that doesn't guarantee a long-term success.
Even when my art was recently retweeted by an artist with thousands of followers, it got only a handful of likes and I gained no followers from it - which is easy to interpret as incredibly demotivating, because does that mean my work sucks this much? It's just this uninteresting? I should've been happy to be noticed by an artist I looked up to for years (and I was), but I mostly got this bitter disappointed feeling.

I know my art isn't amazing but it's not terrible either and there have to be more people out there who could like it. Just, how to even reach them? Most of my twitter followers are from here, or one discord server I'm in. And while I appreciate those a lot, I feel I've no way too grow outside of these small communities.

...I'm honestly at the verge of giving up on social media altogether. I enjoy sharing my work with the few followers I do have that I know appreciate seeing it. But faced with the choice between continuing to painstakingly fight for every follower, and making art for my enjoyment, the latter is an infinitely healthier option.

So like... bottom line is... Social media bad?

[VibrantFox]

a lot of the frequently recycled advice has become little more than static to me especially when it's coming from certain large accounts w/ already established followings

i think aside from social media becoming so large the influx of major corporations hopping on has also made things challenging because how can one individual compete with huge companies with very large advertising budgets

and yeah the viral tweet but barely any new follows thing is something i've just kind of forced myself to get used to since it happens very frequently

overall though i don't see social media as being bad but the landscape has changed very drastically so without platforms that are actually centered on certain niches and algorithms that arent so shoddy it's tough.i'm too bull headed to quit tho but the de-motivation is hard to avoid

[surenlicious]

No problem my dear, I hope everything works out well for you!

[TheDoublekey]

I totally feel you man, that's why I kinda gave up by now. The only thing I currently do is update my comic once every two weeks and that's about it

[Kelheor]

I don't even want to rant at this point. Instagram is not even a pictures service anymore. Just... this all is so annoying ._.

[Iris-Grimoire]

Yup, I was about to bring up this is just even more topical now that it wants to be Tiktok 2. Which didn't stop being funny since I saw that post, tt is cutthroat, but it doesn't tank my views for missing one day.

Social media sucks, but the only advice I can really give, is that you won't get that time back if you continually chase trends, even if it might work, and you'll find yourself hating art if you get stuck there. Be aware of your burnout, don't ignore your urge to take a break and destress, repost your art (since the sites can't tell the difference) when you're feeling nostalgic. The algorithm wants a content machine, but since we're just humans, might as well stick to what's reasonable.

[Zin_Trollborn]

That hits right in the kokoro bruh. (but imma gonna rant on another side of social media as well)
Years ago, I had a good amount of followers on Deviantart and it was really nice because it wasn't just random people pushing the "like" button, people back here were actually communicating with me about art and stuff.
And I think that sort of relationships with others really lacks, I really can't find back that kind of thing and pretty much get bored with all these social media. It's like... so cold.
I tried to get back in social media to promote and share my art but.... meh. I actually have like 2 regular followers that are old friends and that's all, I have no idea anymore about how to get in touch with new people. Sometimes I leave comments on their art when I like it but I never get any answer, not even a "thanks"

[VibrantFox]

that's something i've been desperately missing from the old deviantart era but for a variety of reasons i really just can't see going back (my only reason for even having an acct now is in case of reposters)

I'd say about the only place i can get that kind of engagement or interactions would be here on the forums but as for actual social media platforms not much comes close save for maybe artstreet and artfol but what both of them lack is non artist/creative audiences which places like twitter or instagram do but their failings is in giving people the ability to reach those folks. it's...so many double edged swords now that i think about it...

[samiluu]

can you send me this discord channel please? sounds great

[Zugaikotsu]

Your rant is welcome and I'm sure many people will relate dont't worry!

As many people said, social media in general are going towards videos, and political drama. If you started like 11 years ago, this might not hurt you too much, but if you are new... well... maybe some black magick might speed things up, because you're basically swimming against the amazon river's current of water...

I don't want to be the bitter uncle at the party, but I'll be honest, social media did piles of nothing for me. What really helped me was merge into the platforms (comics and novels) algorythms, and sign contracts where I would get visibility in such platforms. Then my social media following grew.

Do you want a suggestion from this uncle? merge into the platforms and forget about social media, it will be faster. They are already in crisis, anyways.

[joannekwan]

God I feel you, vibrantfox.

What really grinds my gears most is when people say success is just hard work. And they always play down the factor of luck. It's not enough to just work hard and work on your craft and try all the tips in the world and be consistent, because I'm damn well sure most creators do this.
But it's a matter of chance when the right people see your work and have the ability to share it/promote it to new heights for you.

[sarrowsmith10]

I sent you a PM (I think)

[GumshoeComix]

Been on twitter 8 years and just a little over 300 people following me so I feel that
the algorithm favors videos and politics.

I try to do most of my promotion on the forums since its been more helpful with actual engagement than Twitter is. Honestly I feel like social media is optional when it comes to promoting your work since I've seen comics get successful without a twitter or facebook, and only from being social on groups and forums and Discord.
Most social media seems to be turning against artists too, as you've probably heard whats happening with Instagram. I've heard some good things about Artfol though