You will often hear people like me say that as part of your marketing you need to ‘storytell’, the act of using social media to document and chronicle your activities. In doing so,  you give people an insight into your musical ‘life’.

Stories hold our interest.

But there is good storytelling and bad storytelling (as anyone who has every watched The Phantom Menace will tell you!).  So how do you tell a good story? Well, a good story needs challenges and conflicts. Entertaining films have trials and ordeals that the hero or protagonist has to battle and overcome.

John McClane has a LOT of challanges to overcome in Die Hard and that’s what makes it a great film.

All too often however, our own social media output is lacking in showing the trials that we face. We prefer to show ourselves at our best with few problems or difficulties. In doing so, we rob our own stories of drama and interest.

Here’s an example of a conflict that a musician might encounter:

You are driving to play at a festival and your vehicle has a flat tyre.  You can’t remove the spare tyre from its rusted bracket so breakdown assistance has to be called for..  A new tyre will need to be found from the nearest town, but the vehicle is an import and the first tyre stockist you visit hasn’t stocked them for years. Another retailer has to be found and quickly. All the while the clock is ticking. Will the elusive tyre ever be found? Would you make it to the festival on time?

See how challenges hold your interest. That story actually happened to my band over the summer.  It was such a good storytelling opportunity we started live streaming by the roadside on Facebook so people could follow our predicament.

Remember, don’t ignore the challenges, put them front and centre of your music marketing.

Got any questions about this post or how you can better market yourself?

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