Elbows Music Blog Community

What I've found is that @mentioning artists (or labels or whatever) relevant to your posts in your tweets is a viable way to get re-tweets, I've got a couple of decent (for me) spikes by doing that.

And unless you're absolutely sure your music blog tweets and 'normal' tweets would appeal to the same audience, you don't really gain anything by combining your accounts... (and I don't think I could ever keep my tweets entirely professional :P), I mean, compare http://twitter.com/#!/hoget10 and http://twitter.com/#!/djsilkworm ...

And one of the ways you can get followers is by aggressively following people you think will be interested in your blog, or even using an autofollowing tool. I used one, and with minimal effort got up to my 100+ followers in a day, and could easily exponentially grow that, but it didn't sit right with me, as I realized I was about to become the very sort of twitter account I despised, so I unfollowed everyone, followed people actually relevant to my blog I'm letting it grow organically from there.

Just my thoughts from the few months I've been using Twitter for my blog :)

Yeah, with my blog Twitter, I try to post extra stuff apart from just posts: tracks I'm digging at the moment, retweets of artists I post about on my blog, or whatever. Like Brandon said, if people want a stream of your posts, that's what RSS is for.

Hmmm ... from all of your comments it seems as though your blog twitter account is like a mini aggregator solely for your own website. I find that kind of humorous. Anyways, besides my little observation;

@brandon I completely agree with your comment and I thank you for your very sound point regarding blog via RSS and personal via Twitter. And the support from @looselips.

I also like @caleb's idea regarding retweeting tweets that artists might post (eg. lets say Wintersleep tweets about their new album or upcoming shows, that might be something worth re-tweeting)

OMR - fuck it, if you want to write about the band, write about them.  I still write about REM from time to time, and I think most people have heard about them by now.



In terms of Twitter, I use my personal account, autotweet my blog and Tumblr updates through it, and add whatever aimless chatter I feel like adding.  I don't really make a distinction between myself and my blog in that respect - my site is very personal, and the tone in which I write is very clearly subjective and conversational. 



I agree with mentioning people as being a good way to accumulate followers.  I get five or six new followers a day at the moment, so I can't be arsed checking them all out and deciding if I want to follow them, whereas the mentions I get from people I don't know are far fewer, so I tend to investigate those more thoroughly, and then follow them if they look interesting.



In general, though, the way to pick up traffic for all these things is just to consistently put out interesting stuff over a period of time, and people will slowly but surely find you.  Don't jump up and down demanding attention, just use all of these channels to make it clear that following you will result in good times and good tunes, and let nature do the rest.

lol I think I'm at a steady 1 new follower a day, I've been trying to follow what everyone's been saying, but like Tim said, eventually they will come.

Thanks @songbytoad, I didn't think it would be a problem or anything, I just wanted some clarification just in case if it would have been. I was just being cautious I guess you could say. Afterall, we do truly support the artists.

OH..... and.... just because I do that, doesn't mean you necessarily should. My non-music interest have certainly caused me to lose many many followers. So, if you are trying to amass followers, be nice and focused would be my advise. If you are looking to build a social network, then be yourself.

Right back at you!

I actually don't seperate my blog twitter and personal twitter (mostly because the blog is me). For me, I don't really follow blogs on twitter either, just the bloggers. I read RSS blogs I do follow. Twitter to me was a way to interact and have conversations with other bloggers and musicians and I've met a lot of great ones since I started. As a result, I tend not to follow "blog twitter accounts" if they are just feeds if I could just follow their feed. Interaction is key. They key to genuine followers is interaction and as Tsuru said, be yourself.

Hey guys and onmyradar particularly. This is Chris from IndieFeed, nice to join your group. You are more than welcome to prop music we have featured on IndieFeed or refer/mention a feature. We think great music should be shared, enjoyed, reaffirmed. So long as it moves you, go for it. And we are sure your take is as legitimate and unique as anyone else's including ours ;)

The only area things get tricky is the posting of unauthorized mp3's, but you guys probably know the drill here. To be on the safe side, re-linking the show is fine (eg offering our download link like http://traffic.libsyn.com/hiphop/indiefeed_premonition_kingship.mp3). Or if you feel like linking to the blog post, that's cool too. If you are taking the audio show and integrating it into yours somehow, it is best legal form to get the permission from rights-holder. That way you cede control back to the musicians.

Glad to hear you like some of the choices we make, enough even to give your unique spin on their art. Thanks a bunch!

Best to yous
Chris

I agree with Tsuru--

Stick to one. You shouldn't be tweeting "IM SO DRUNK" anyhow--unless you're okay with people perceiving you that way. Your fans should be no different than your friends. Just ask Kanye.

Meanwhile--if you have a twitter account which includes just links back to your website--who wants to follow that unless you're Gorilla v. Bear or Gawker?

The next time I feel high & mighty with the number of followers I have, I need to remember there's a woman with a craft mom blog who sells stuff on etsy rocking over 15,000 followers.

Haha that mom is a champ!

I agree, a blog twitter is completely redundant. This is what I'm thinking though. I think that I am going to keep the blog twitter, purely for the fact that it is just another way that people can share your blog to other people. I am not going to go on the blog twitter account frequently. I am just going to use those automated tweets from sites like hypem. Basically, it's like a PR thing, just to keep people who mainly use twitter for their updates happy. So if my facebook page updates automatically post to twitter, if youtube likes automatically post to twitter, and hypem loves post to twitter, then there is really no need for me to go on it. Maybe every now and then just to check up on messages. That's just what I'm thinking though, but yeah, it is totally redundant and to be honest, I'm getting a little fed up with twitter all together.