I’m thrilled that Dave Carroll of the band, Sons of Maxwell, interviewed with me. Dave was kind enough to provide us with his perspective on how his recent YouTube video, United Breaks Guitars resulted in passion and enthusiasm from people around the world. The video has over 4.4 million views and more than 30,000 reviews! Dave answered my question that I posted earlier: Are you ready for social media?
Here’s my Q&A with Dave:
Q: You did a fantastic job with the video, United Breaks Guitar. Did you ever think that it would receive so much attention and so quickly?
A: I don’t think anyone could have predicted this response by people all over the world. It’s not just the number of views that are impressive, but the enthusiastic response and passion behind the subject.
Q: How did you come up with the idea for the viral video and how long did it take for you to produce the segment?
A: The video itself took one day to shoot, but I spent time thinking about the shot list and the look. I also had a couple of meetings with Lara Cassidy (Director) and Steve Richard (Director of Photography) of Curve Productions. The idea came following my last correspondence with Ms. Irlweg, where she informed me that United Policies were such that no further discussion on the matter would be had. So, I promised three songs with videos about my experience with them and wrote the first song in January, I think.
Q: How has social media changed your status and recognition as a musician?
A: I’m the same musician I was before all of this. I think I have a great body of work to stand behind, but this opportunity has exploded my name and Sons of Maxwell’s name onto a world stage. My music is now being heard by people who would have never been exposed to it in the first place and I continue to receive piles of email asking why it’s taken so long to get such great songs into their ears! It’s certainly been the biggest lift in my career.
Q: Will you continue to use social media (whether it’s viral videos, blogging, social networking, etc.) to keep close to your existing fan base and to build relationships with new fans? If so, what social media strategies will you use to build your music community?
A: I am far from being a social media expert, but I will continue to rely upon it to get my messages and music out. I started using Facebook primarily, but the beauty of social networking is that one person doesn’t need to know everything about how it works. It’s about plugging yourself into “network hubs” or people who know more than you and feel compelled to join you in getting your message you. I’m learning more every day about how this got to where it is and I’m as amazed as everyone else.
Q: If you could give other musicians advice on promoting themselves through social media what would you recommend that they do?
A: Social media works best I think if you a) cast a wide net and (b) cast your net in over people with knowledge and influence on how to promote your message. By reaching out to as many people as possible you increase the odds that one of them will be that “network hub” with access to other “hubs”. Join groups yourself and become interested in what others are doing.
In my case the biggest factors that made this successful were that I happen to touch on a hot button issue (airline customer service) and I was pretty clearly wronged by a big company with a poor customer service record. Most of all, I chose a funny and light-hearted approach to dealing with my frustrations, which brought people together (laughing does that better than complaining). And finally the quality of the songwriting, music and video production were all high on this project, which is often not the case on YouTube indy productions, so it was easy to watch and enjoy. With all the competition these days musicians cannot afford to be associated with poor quality on their productions. I was lucky to have the support I did.
Tags: Dave Carroll, PR2.0, Sons of Maxwell, United Breaks Guitars