As a fairly skeptical and novice user of twitter, I suppose I never realized its usefulness until this semester. It can be quite fun to scroll and is an excellent time-waster while procrastinating statistics and HR. What I really chose to neglect however, is the incredible power it has on the entertainment industry. It makes sense really – as an industry built around selling yourself, it would be important to market yourself to the consumers (your fans).
Actors, comedians, musicians, writers, it seems that if you work in the business its a requirement to be “tweeting” your thoughts at least 9 times a day.
Its not easy to be gangster if the roof of your mouth hurts.
But I believe the most important industry using twitter is the music industry. From being able to launch Justin Bieber’s career to producing practical wisdom from 50 cent (my favourite being: Yo todays been a good day so far but the roof of my mouth is sore cause I eat something that was too hot) to becoming a self-marketing tool artists can use to reveal their personality while making a direct connection with their fans.
A lot can be said in thosee 140 characters including album reviews, concert updates, collaboration ideas, and just general comments that make the musical individual seem more human and real. I never really understood how personal it could get until the other day.
Blueprintevents is an music event-coordinating company based out of Canada. Yesterday, they tweeted something about a large electronic music festival that is happening in both Edmonton and Vancouver, but the headlining acts are different. Since I have already seen the headlining act for Vancouver (Calvin Harris) and have not seen the headlining act for Edmonton, I rudely tweeted back
@blueprintevents How come Edmonton gets @avicii and we get stuck with @calvinharris who comes to Vancouver 12 times a year to play his ipod
Calvin Harris
I thought this quip was clever considering Calvin (unlike some artists) actually makes his own music and does live shows in Europe but has yet to do them in Canada. I’ve seen him twice and he’s a great DJ but I mean, I want to see him make the music, not hit a play button. I didn’t think much of the statement and started studying. I neglected to realize the power of twitter in my belief that someone with over 350,000 followers couldn’t possibly respond to everyone. So imagine my shock when this comment showed up in my inbox
if you’re going to slate me, do me a favor don’t use my @ name – you’re a nasty piece of work. FYI i play CDs dickwad – Calvin Harris
Beyond the shock and awe factor (OMG CALVIN HARRIS MESSAGED ME DIRECTLY!) it really pointed out to me that this is something that never could have occurred before twitter. A direct connection between fans and someone they regard as almost untouchable (for me unfortunately, the realization came a bit late). It truly demonstrated to me the importance of social media marketing in the music industry to introduce new individuals to your music, interact with your fan base and shut up the haters (that would be me). Now back to stats. And Calvin, if you’re reading this remember:
