Social marketing

Relationships for sale

I’ve been actively online for some time; with my first self hosted website in 2000, back in the heady days of IRC and BBSs. Yet outside of those text based mediums, which were generally about a specific topic, I avoided social media, which was all about you.

Never on the cutting edge of early adoption, as the platforms weren’t something I was interested in, I was instead, an early unadopter, one of the first users to leave. Quitting, before it was trendy.

I joined facebook in ‘05, flickr in ‘07 and twitter in ‘09. I used each for a few weeks before deciding they weren’t for me. Facebook I actively deleted, the latter two accounts are still online, as I long ago lost access. I occasionally lookup how to mend something on one of the video platforms but have never had an account, never subscribed, or commented. And didn’t have the slightest interest in instagram; photography is a slow medium, images take time to produce and should be given time in review.

A few months ago, slogging through a work project that would have had Sisyphus questioning his efforts, I yearned for a creative outlet. I had continued to have my own website, and over the years made a few stabs at blogging, but it never took. Approaching a milestone in life, with an ever growing number of grey hairs, I thought I should review the state of social media.

At first I was enamored with the small web. Being allergic to advertising, it seemed the perfect non-commercial technology to use as a creative outlet. Somewhere to put my photography and ramblings that fit my sensibilities. Text first, free from commercial potential and easily self hosted. I setup a site (gemini://8by3.net/~sbr/) and started writing. The rub being, you need a special browser to actually view any of it, something the vast majority wouldn’t have, or the inclination to setup. In some ways this was part of the appeal. As it was a space to share my creative output, safe from the rampages of AI bots. On further reflection, it was shouting into the void. The sub section of the already tiny user base, that might have been interested in my musings, was minuscule. Does an artist need an audience, no. Not need, but a conversation is more rewarding than a soliloquy. The small web is a delight, though ultimately poorly suited to my mixed media needs. Its primarily a space for the technically inclined, as it requires a degree of DIY’ism and as such the subject matter is slanted towards the technical. Something I have little interest in discussing.

My next foray was into the video platforms. I had low expectations, having long ago removed big tech from my life, with the sole exception of a five year old phone. Nevertheless, I wanted to see what others with similar inclinations produced. With the requisite ad blockers in place, I ventured forth.

This is where I got my first whiff of social marketing. Without exception, people creating content in the photography space were producing marketing material of one shape or another. There are the very obvious gear driven videos, either directly sponsored by companies or indirectly by loaning the gear for review. But the more insidious content sells the lifestyle. How to grow an audience, how to be authentic, et cetera. Everywhere I looked, the same formulaic, click bait ploys leveraged. “Dont buy until you watch”, “What I was wrong about”, “How I learned”, “The mistakes”. The promise of a real human connection, only to be provided with a listicle and reasons why brand X or thing Y is the best purchase they made. For those few who managed to avoid brand sponsorship, why you should pay them for their artistic wisdom, by taking a workshop, buying their book, etc. To their credit, I don’t think any of them are bad people, they have simply learned what the algorithm rewards and one assumes, feel they have no choice but to play the game.

Which leads to my current experiment, substack. In many ways it has a much more transparent commercial contract. Creatives can charge for access, or request donations. Though one assumes there are the same influence campaigns at work, individuals provided with favours of some sort in order to quietly endorse products or services, even to their paid up readers.

Substack is also littered with the same elusive promises of freedom. Social marketers, who provide the secretes of how to grow your audience, quit the rat race and make a living on the platform. The X easy steps, how they were doing it wrong for Y years and can now share the secret. Those deriding the grind, hustle culture et cetera, only to follow with their highly priced coaching business, their course, their book. One wonders how their clients are going to earn a living, if they all follow in their footsteps and become social marketers.

Fundamentally this isn’t new, these are advertisers and motivational speakers of yesteryear with a slightly tweaked model. What is perhaps new are those currying popularity without anything genuine to offer. Countless accounts posting inspirational quotes, or other peoples art work (with our without a byline) all to garner likes. Turned to eleven, with posts containing AI generated content. Perhaps the idea is that by doing so they can grow a large enough following to gain the attention of advertises and start to inject products into their feeds of drivel and stolen creativity.

Having entirely avoided the drudgery of social media, never with any inclination to doom scroll, why partake you might ask?

At least for now, with judicious use of the block and mute function, I’ve found a small community of people who share some of my sensibilities. Those who see beauty in the world around them, and are able to capture a sliver of its essence in their art, and writing. Considering the tens of millions of users on this platform, finding a few dozen such people feels like a success. Being able to keep up with this small number, via delightful images and long form writing is a rewarding experience. Is it without risk?, no. One needs to diligently curate relationships of trust. To sip from the well and not let the firehouse loose.