Great insight here. Just as someone who loves following other artists on Twitter and other social media....I unfollow anyone who starts getting political I don't care what side you're on. I'm following you because I love your artwork or you are an expert in the publishing world and I want to learn from you.....you should save that stuff for your private accounts. For me I've found it to be a problem lately I've unfollowed at least 1000 accounts.
Tannie Smith, in her new class "Branding for Creatives", had a great analogy about social media. Excuse my summary. It is much better stated in the video...
She said IG was like a Wall where your followers go to look at the work, Twitter was more like a Window where people look at the work but also want to see a bit of you as a person, and Facebook was a Loveseat where you mix the work and personal.
@evilrobot I am with you on the political stuff.
As for the follower vs following: I cannot stand people that follow me only to drop me after a day or so in hopes to have fished me as a follower. My rule is that I only follow people back if I like their art or know them. I have an app that notifies me when someone has unfollowed, and aobut 75% of followers I get end up dropping me a day later.
I also believe that people who follow me are valuable to my art, and their comments on what I am working on hold value, and also helping them out in the same way builds good relationships with a group of up and coming artists that will pay off in the end for all of us. I try to private message everyone that follows me, and let them know I am glad they decided to follow me.
I don't know how much I buy into the idea that our social media presence has a huge impact on getting rep'd. I'm sure it is like having another thing working for you, but at the end of the day, you are either good or you are not. The people that got an agent or book deal that I know have virtually 0% social media presence. My friend just got two book deals with Harper Collins in YA and nobody on social media even knows she writes. My other friend just got a big book deal and rep at the summer conference, and as I was talking to him this last weekend at the SCBWI sponsored illustration show, he has very little interest in social media and growing his audience. I'm sure there is a value in it, but it takes a back seat in my mind to actually being good, and making sure that your craft is getting better and better.
@nowayme Great point - yes, the use of hashtags is almost a science. You want hashtags that are relevant and yet not overused (or you will never make those precious 9 spots!). I tend to err on the side of excess and try to use all hashtags I can think of for an image. There are some that people recommended to me that I never use, like "Illustrationbest" or "Illustrationoftheday" - I feel like a cheater using those. Do you have any experience with these ones?
As for Twitter, I use it much the same way as Instagram - just with less text available. I normally mirror every post to all my channels (apart from Behance, which is a different beast altogether). With Twitter I retweet more and interact more (in terms of entering cnversations) and have met some pretty cool people that way. I also use Twitter for random text-only posts about books or inpiration or work habits - whenever I feel like sharing something non-image-based.
@smceccarelli I do use #illustration_best, #best_of_illustrations and other similar # because they are "linked" to a potential "hit maker" (in their profile it says use XYZ # to be featured) although I do feel like a cheat when I use them haha! (I definitely do not think I am a "best of" anything right now)
Thanks for the Twitter explanation - I just started following you and seeing how you use it clarifies things a lot. I am still not sure I understand how people finds others on twitter since you usually aren't supposed to use as many # on twitter vs IG...
As a very recent Inatagram user I found myself baffled by why people kept unfollowing me ,I felt I had done something personally wrong or the art was so bad I had chased them away (this still might be the case) I am glad to read all your comments and now realise they want me to follow them and then drop me when I do follow them back it all makes sense now.This social media is a complicated business
I only have 201 followers at this moment, after a little over a year on IG, and I average between 35 - 49 likes per post, whether a WIP or "finished" illustration. I will reiterate what others have said that it boils down to content that is good and relevant to those who follow you. For the majority, that is why they followed you. I don't think I would have as many followers if it was a numbers game. My followers vs people I follow gap was wide when I started, and pretty much still is. If I like a person's art, but their non-art posts out-weigh the art posts, I won't follow them, even if they have followed me. I can barely, if ever, get thru the 375+ people I follow, so I want to know that the majority of posts I see are art-related, and I think most other artists feel the same. Hope that helps!
@tombarrettillo - Yes. Thanks:)
@eric-castleman - What app are you using to see who unfollows? Thanks:)
@pamm I use an app called "follow free" on the ios store.
@eric-castleman - Thanks! I'll check it out. The fake follow stuff happens to me a lot too:)
I've honestly never thought about that part of it. Who I follow is purely based on what I want to see in my feed. More and more I pay more attention to the interaction in an artists posts. Do they respond? Is it a real response, or a quick, short response? Take @Jake-Parker for example. I couldn't tell you how many followers he has but I can tell you he has 70 or so comments in around an hour or so, and the guy is really good about responding, and responding genuinely
Anyone know of a good tool/ app for managing twitter. My account is pretty old and I'd like to narrow down a lot of people I'm following but going through two thousand accounts is a bit much. I'd like to narrow it down to only artists, reps, publishers, and people who follow me.
So much insight! I'd have to agree with the general consensus of never really thinking about it when I find a cool artist I like on instagram. It's more about the content. For my page I end up trying to only follow people who inspire me so my feed can just be a stream of creativity. I've been posting up to 8-9 months and just steadily posting everyday for that long has gotten me a decent amount without needed to really follow anyone back JUST for the follow.
@smceccarelli What kind of conversations do you jump into? Ive been trying to grow on twitter and I'm finding it kinda hard. I'll try to find conversations to jump into but most of it is just people complementing the art posted. Is there a specific way you find engaging conversations?
Currently taking on the monumental task of redesigning the first 151 Pokemon!
https://www.cmetzner.com/pokemon-redesign-project
Other social media:
https://www.instagram.com/cmetznerdotcom/?hl=en
https://twitter.com/cmetznerdotcom
@cmetznerdotcom Sometimes I will ask an artist about his/her technique or process (or answer questions to that effect). Conversations about books are also easy to start and jump into. Positive comments on somebody´s work are good, but then they should be something more than "great!". You can mentione another artist you compare the work to, or mention why or what you particularly like the work. There are all good ways to start meaningful conversations, and I am sure there are many more!
Once, my friend try to follow his profile by making a great conctent. He just take photo of his everyday life, post videos where he is playing the guitar. There is nothing special in what he is doing, but he've got 17k subscribers. I was surprised! Of course, he use advertising on instagram. He led an active life by publishing photos, videos and then his page was hacked because he was not protected enough. Anyway, I try to do the same by using servises, make a few post everyday, but carefully. What can you say about this one servise - https://instafollowfast.com/ , is it worth trying?
I am following more people than follow me, but I think that is because I’m learning. So I’m following people who I can learn something from. I have been weeding out some that are not relevant to art recently because as @tombarrettillo says, it’s difficult to get through all the new posts unless you want to spend hours on the internet.
For two years I had about 35 followers on my business feed, friends and family. I was very discouraged, then someone I followed started a blog called smart artist income using Instagram tactics to increase your following and sales. I started off using the hashtag suggestions and doubled my following the next month. Still, 70ish followers was not a lot, but it gave me insight into what hashtags were working. I also abused tagging for a while, it worked a little bit, but like @smceccarelli, I was thinking it was too rude. So I only tag now when a “multiplier” says its okay in their profiles. Seven months later and I have 120 followers. It’s still not a lot, but it is steadily growing now, so I’m no longer frustrated.
I would love to hear how to find the Art Directors and Editors on Instagram and Twitter, so that I can silently stalk them for a while to learn what I need to do to make them love me. Lol. I’m actually serious, though. How do you find them? Exactly? (0.0)
I think @TessaW nailed it regarding the importance & non-importance of the follower/following ratio.
I wouldn’t worry too much about followers per-say. You need to ask yourself what your ultimate goal is… ultimately get paid for you art. I’d prefer to have 100 followers who regularly buy my art than 10K followers where they just ‘like’ my art.
That being said, just putting out good content isn’t enough. Just like @smceccarelli stated marketing your work is important. Leveraging off influencers and curators is always a good strategy for any marketing platform.
There are plenty of paid and free curators on Instagram that you can leverage off. I would hesitate paying, but with many of them if you tag them you go into a ‘draw’ to be featured. I’ve had one of my portraits featured and I got around 50 new followers.
Also, spend time to consider who you are targeting. @smceccarelli mentions they try to get their work infront of childrens writers, editors and art directors – people that will directly contribute to the bottom line. Consider the audience different curators and influencers have. Are their followers your target audience?
The same goes for hashtags. Consider what type of hashtags your target audience will follow.
Regarding @Alexis-Janis question regarding buying instagram followers. I would avoid this. Why? Firstly, many of these services can use bots, and if they don't many of the followers are usually low low quality. I wouldn’t bother. I’ve never had any long term succeed using these shortcuts with client accounts.
Also consider how you can direct traffic outside of Instagram to your Instagram.
Hope that gives you some ideas.
For me, I just try to be the kind of follower that I want to have. So all that means is, I follow only people who are posting things I'm truly interested in, and if I'm not into what I see someone posting, I un-follow them. When I see something I really like or have a thought about, I make a comment. I keep my posts focused on my art with an occasional personal post now and again so they know who I am. I have slightly more followers than accounts I'm following, but a lot of that has to do with me being followed by friends/family who I don't follow back--I prefer to keep my IG feed about art and my Facebook feed about friends/family.
However, I'm not really focused on building a following right now, for where I am I'm mostly interested in networking with other artists. That means I'm following hashtags like #kidlitart and #childrensillustrator and connecting with people using those.
Speaking of, I don't think I've seen many SVS people in the #KidLitArt chat on twitter on Thursday nights, but you all should join in! Truth be told its all I really do on twitter.... someday I'll have a full social media strategy, but for now I just do what I feel good about and let the rest go. (Mothering takes all my focus, guys. 
)
Great insight here. Just as someone who loves following other artists on Twitter and other social media....I unfollow anyone who starts getting political I don't care what side you're on. I'm following you because I love your artwork or you are an expert in the publishing world and I want to learn from you.....you should save that stuff for your private accounts. For me I've found it to be a problem lately I've unfollowed at least 1000 accounts.
