The Dos and Don'ts of Being a Musician on Twitter

If Elvis was alive today, not only would he most definitely have a Twitter account, he’d be creeping in your girl’s DMs right now. And why not? Twitter is a great place for musicians of varying degrees of fame to use their celebrity to get free stuff, boost their delicate egos, and even fire off the occasional vaguely racist rant. Here’s a handy guide for all you musicians on Twitter. Whether you have 1,000 followers or over 1,000,000, stick to these DOs and DON'Ts and you’ll be tweeting like a #pro…

Hey look, some jagoff in Nebromaha tweeted at you to say they like your album. Terrific! Take the compliment, fave it, and move on. Do not retweet compliments about yourself to your followers. This is sad and pathetic. You might as well post a Vine of a fan giving you a BJ.

Don’t add an additional layer of thirst by searching Twitter for your name and then retweeting those compliments. That says to people: “I am so desperate for public validation that I will actively seek it out.” As a matter of fact, do not ever search for your name on Twitter. It will never, ever, ever lead to good.

When people like your music, they’re willing to show their appreciation. Maybe that means buying a t-shirt. Maybe it’s writing you a fan email. Or maybe it’s sending you a sexy-ass nude selfie. So if someone wants to send you a nood, don’t be rood, dood. Take it. Reap the benefits of being a semi-famous person. May your inbox overfloweth with dick pics and twat shots!

(This should go without saying, but for god’s sake, DO NOT pull a Franco and engage with minors. Look for Twitter bios that say things like “proud dad” or “mother of two.” A little bit of saggage and a few extra stretch marks are a small price to pay to avoid jail time.)

You have other interests besides music, right? Maybe nerd out once in a while about your fantasy baseball team or livetweet a binge-watch of Scandal or something. But also…

This goes for everyone on Twitter, but you, especially, are a rock star and rock stars are supposed to be cool. You don’t want people confusing your timeline with that of their Republican Aunt Linda.

The hierarchy of the online music goes:

musicians > musicians’ significant others > people who tweet their top last.fm songs > people who beg musicians for retweets > drummers > Pharrell’s hat parody accounts > music writers

So definitely don’t legitimize some blogger dipshit who gave your album a bad review on www.zack'sbrainfart.blogspot.schmuck. You end up looking like an asshole and they feel legitimized. And especially never engage with bloggers if you are a mega creep.

Nothing says your publicist forced you get a Twitter quite like something that was clearly auto-tweeted from Facebook or Tumblr. Turn that shit off and be a goddamn human.

Never listen to a social media manager trying to lecture you about your "brand" or "maintaining a strong social media presence." These are people with made-up jobs. If you're a frigging weirdo in real life, let that shine on the interwebs!

People follow you because they want 140-character glimpses at what your life is like. And since you’re stuck with your idiot bandmates in a van for 10 hours a day, you might as well amuse your followers and yourself by using social media to take away their dignity. Maybe tweet that your guitarist wants everyone at tonight's show to come up and tickle him. Or possibly expose your bassist’s secret fear of balloons. And there’s always the time-honored classic: tweet a photo of your drummer passed out, with a big ol’ dick drawn on his face.

Holy fuck, this is annoying. Either change your band name to Stubhub or knock that shit off.

Remember: You want to perpetuate the illusion that you are a hard-working artist who doesn’t lay in bed until noon, dicking around on Tweetdeck (even though you most definitely are). So let’s cap it at 100 tweets per minute, OK there, Lil B?

(Pro tip for Twitter users: Turn off retweets from musicians.)

Put your glorious verified check to use and try to engage in @-to-@ convos with fellow Twitter elite. Don’t punch above your weight though—chances are, Justin Timberlake won’t respond to your crappy little emo band. But hey, who knows? Harass him until you get marked as spam and find out.

When you reach a certain level of Twitter stardom, people will inevitably look to you to get the word out about their Kickstarter to raise money for orphaned diabetic endangered koala pigs or whatever. Don’t do it. For a very simple reason: Every single person on the internet is full of shit. They don’t care about the koala pigs, they just wanna see their dumb little faces in your timeline.

There should be a Guantanamo Bay of Twitter for these people. You deserve to have your albums burned if you do it.

You look like a straight up narcissist if you’re not following anyone, plain and simple.

Once in a while, you’ll have something to promote—a new album, a video you made, a Kickstarter to fund a podcast you’re starting (terrible idea, by the way)—and that’s fine. Once in a while. But if the only thing you use Twitter for is to peddle your crap, you’ll start to look like those deadbeat friends who only call when they need to borrow money.

If you are a big enough celebrity, occasionally, a #cool #brand will ask you to do a Twitter takeover and tweet from their account for a few hours. As soon as they hand over that password, go buck fucking wild. Tweet pictures of your sack, threaten to fight their followers, tell off-color jokes. Do whatever you gotta do to get their follower count down to zero. That’ll teach their 22-year-old social media director a lesson about strategizing outside the box.

“Big announcement coming tomorrow.” “We’re so excited about our upcoming announcement.” “We’ll be making our announcement later today. #announcement” “ANNOUNCEMENT: This is the announcement. #announcement” “Thank you for making our announcement such a success. #thankyou #success #announcement”

This goes for everyone—from big important musicians to the filthy non-music-playing online masses: No one wants to read your whining about your ex or your first world FML problems. Be positive and positive things will happen to you. A positive Twitter presence is a positive life, yo! (Oh, but don’t go overboard with that #PMA shit.)

Twitter tip: DON'T follow Dan Ozzi - @danozzi

Also check out:

How to Ruin Your Band Name

How to Survive Being the Only Dude in a Band

How to Survive Being the Only Girl in a Band

How to Be a Band In a Van

On Taking a Shit on Tour

Reasons Why It's Impossible to Get Laid on Tour