How Social Media Ruins Your Art

now here's a few common misconceptions

number one artists who do well in social

media do well solely because their art

is good the better the art the better

their numbers conversely those who don't

get numbers it means their art is bad

number two it's all about luck it'll

take just one successful art piece to

pop off and then they're set the

commissions will flow in maybe a

scouting to do video game art cool the

why strategy here is to just release

something and hope it goes viral if i'm

an artist and i'm not doing well it's

because i'm unlucky or the algorithm

doesn't like me number three being a

successful artist entails having a great

social media presence raking in the

commissions and being like take that to

my parents who don't think that art is a

secure career path i don't want to be a

lawyer doctor engineer spaceman i want

to draw a deku

with a bunny ears now by the end of this

video you'll know exactly how and why

all of these misconceptions are while

false and what the reality really is

surrounding these observations i have

experience making art social media posts

i've seen both sides of this before i

dive in there is some required

background knowledge going into it now

if you're an artist on social media and

you're not getting any numbers you're

either doing social media wrong or

you're doing the art wrong

maybe both and i have solutions for both

let's start with the case wherein you're

doing social media wrong here's an

interesting fact there's a 99 chance

that the artists on social media are

better than you

yes you how is this seemingly impossible

statement possible let me explain

there's a phenomenon known as the

survivorship bias i'll explain briefly

with an example because it's a bit hard

to explain in generic terms people say

modern music these days is so bad why

were all the classics so good and now we

just have poo

it's because actually there were just as

many poo

music pieces back in the day but you

weren't there to see them the only

things that survived were the non-poo

ones because the poo ones nobody wanted

to remember them and so the ones that

you see nowadays are all the best of the

best the cream of the crop so

survivorship bias is saying old music is

always good and new music these days is

always bad well no you're just around to

see the bad ones but in 20 years from

now only the good music from now is

going to be known social media is

intensely subject to survivorship bias

you might think everyone and their

mothers are popping off on social media

randomly and they just post art and it's

easy money everyone is good except for

me everyone receives attention except

for me i post art just like them

why am i being bullied by the algorithm

i'm making this video for potentially

over

18

000

some people are all 18 000 of you being

bullied by the algorithm there's so many

people that you don't see who are just

like you not getting attention not

getting followers no likes so the

winners keep winning and the losers keep

losing what a system right no what are

you doing wrong on social media in truth

social media attention is not about

necessarily who's making you know the

best art

it's about marketing

but thomas marketing this person doesn't

run ads they just made one drawing that

went viral

well their drawing is good right

their good drawing is a marketing asset

their ability to make consistent good

drawings is a marketing asset just like

how having money to run ads is a

marketing asset just like how funny

tweets

is a marketing asset just like how

having good connections is a marketing

asset when i say marketing i don't mean

you know running ads and like running a

campaign i mean how easy it is to sell

yourself to the public think about it a

lot of big companies pay a lot of money

to get people to artificially make viral

social media posts for them because it's

a marketing strategy

are the artists of viral social media

posts consciously aware they're using

this strategy half of them probably not

back 10

billion years ago when i still had a

twitter and instagram i had some

drawings do relatively well but do you

know what that took me dozens of

drawings that didn't go viral that i

promoted like crazy on reddit replying

retweeting networking on twitter

networking on instagram deviantart even

real life

but you don't see that to you what does

that look like well yo this guy just

made like one drawing and it popped off

and now he has a bunch of likes and

followers no

i was very conscious of my marketing

strategy would it have been easier if my

drawing were better at the time yes of

course would some people be able to do

it in one try instead of dozens because

they're simply luckier yes of course but

that was never the strategy i was

relying on i wasn't banking on luck just

like how you're not guaranteed to become

an astronaut if you study for it in

university you're not guaranteed to pop

off on social media if you invest time

and money into marketing but you're

certainly elevating your chances greatly

let me give you one last analogy on this

what if you had a restaurant where you

make really good food but make zero

effort to actually get customers to come

try it that sounds pretty dumb doesn't

it just relying on word of mouth or some

sort of you know

viral news about your food sure it can

happen but why rely on it you're somehow

going to succeed as a restaurant owner

without like putting signs out out front

or having a nice logo producing some

menus hiring some wait staff being

willing to work long hours at least at

the beginning sounds suspect to me i'd

like to take this moment to say if you

find anything here valuable then perhaps

consider clicking that like button

because not only will it help indicate

to me that this is the kind of video

that you guys like they'll also help

youtube recommend this to other people

so that this advice can spread even

further and we can have more healthy

mindsets about art across the internet

back in the beginning of the video i

mentioned that if you're not doing well

on social media you're either not doing

social media right or you're not doing

art right not doing art right what do i

mean by that do i mean to insult your

art am i saying it's bad no i'm not

necessarily talking about your artwork

or how good or bad it is while it's true

you need to have some foundational skill

in art getting better at drawing is the

easiest part about being an artist the

hard part the part that most people get

wrong is the reason they're doing art in

the first place why are you posting to

social media so you can get famous so

you can get money

is that what you want then why aren't

you investing harder into it

people who want academic careers spend

six hours a day at school

maybe more maybe less but aside from the

time investment a lot of them also pay

exorbitant amounts of money for tuition

at places that will give them a chance

at doing the job they want

are you in a life situation where you

absolutely cannot spend that time to

draw practice and market

are you not committed enough or find

it's not worth it

that's fine and i often find that if you

look deep deep down within you a vast

amount of people truthfully do have time

but they spend it playing with friends

talking to family doing sports watching

youtube

are those bad things

no not at all in fact i would rather be

doing those things i would recommend

doing those things but are some of those

things necessary to sacrifice if you

want to be a social media artist

maybe

maybe

consider that seriously and then

consider

after all that if you're still set on

being a social media artist

it's a serious sacrifice

and not many people are willing or able

to make it and that's just how it is

it might not be worth it it really might

not be i'm not saying this to discourage

you i fully admire the people who are

willing to make the sacrifice so if

anything this is for you the average age

of my viewing audience is uh

low to say the least no matter how

prepped you feel like or how much social

media makes you feel like you're already

late

it's really not late you have time you

always have time i really don't think it

matters how old you are you're gonna be

fine that all being said i can't wait to

see your art around the internet