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Like many modern artists, Sawyer Hill is constantly scrutinizing the social media platforms that impact music discovery. In January, the 24-year-old singer-songwriter sensed a shift in the digital winds.
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“I used to scroll through TikTok and my whole feed was musicians,” he says. “And then I started noticing all my videos on Instagram were getting distributed at a way greater rate — for the same video, the ratio of likes to views was way higher on Instagram than it was on TikTok.”
This was true despite the fact that Hill was treating Instagram Reels as an afterthought at the time — often just re-posting TikTok clips there, as many artists do. “I wonder what would happen if I really put effort into an Instagram video,” Hill remembers thinking. He started promoting his 2023 single “Look at the Time” – a caustic, grungy rocker delivered in somber baritone – on the platform, and it rose to No. 1 on Spotify’s Viral 50 chart in the U.S. in February.
This sort of breakthrough would be an exciting moment for any musician. Hill’s story has also taken on additional weight at a time when the music industry is casting around for marketing alternatives to the app that’s been ground zero for pop virality for a half-decade now. Some artists are unable to use TikTok to promote their recordings since negotiations between the platform and Universal Music Group fell apart at the end of January.
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Historically, YouTube Shorts and Instagram Reels have not been able to match TikTok’s impact on streams, so most artists and marketers have not prioritized them to the same degree. (Even with the success of “Look at the Time,” Instagram users’ passion hasn’t led to the type of streaming explosion enjoyed by TikTok favorites like Djo’s “End of Beginning.”) Some optimistic marketers believe that, in a world where TikTok is no longer an option for many acts, artists will finally be able to figure out effective strategies to use elsewhere. It’s like a point guard being forced to tie his right hand behind his back to build strength dribbling with his left.
“Focusing on one or two platforms instead of three could result in better impact,” says Johnny Cloherty, co-founder of digital marketing company Songfluencer.
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This climate helps explain why, after “Look at the Time” began to take off on Reels, “all these people on the industry side were like, ‘this is unbelievable,’” Hill says.
Virality was far from Hill’s mind when he started playing guitar as a kid in Fayetteville, Arkansas, using an instrument abandoned by his brother. By the time he was a freshman in high school, he was good enough to join a band full of seniors. “Whenever they all graduated, they’re like, ‘We’re playing bars now, so you’re either going to do that with us or hit the road,’” Hill recalls.
The choice was easy: He started playing bars around the age of 15. “I was always hanging out with 30- and 40-year-olds at the bar who were telling me their whole life story,” Hill says.
But he eventually realized there was a ceiling on the local circuit. “We’ve been playing all these bars for years, and it hasn’t really gotten us very far,” Hill remembers feeling. “We want to play for the masses. And the only real way we saw to do that was through social media.”
He started with TikTok, since “all music-related things were extremely TikTok-specific at that point.” It didn’t come to him easily. “I started out feeling what a lot of musicians do: ‘These social media platforms are lame, and it seems so fake,’” he says.
But the imperative to reach a wide audience eventually overruled the cringey moments. “There are people making their careers on these platforms,” Hill says. He wanted to be one of them: “I became borderline obsessed with figuring out these platforms.”
His first popular video was popular for the wrong reasons; users were making fun of his singing. Hill remained calm. “One day you can have thousands of people in your inbox telling you that you’re the worst thing in the world, and then the next day you have thousands of people in your inbox telling you that you’re the best in the world,” he says.
His equanimity was rewarded not long after, when he posted a live performance video of “Look at the Time” that was well received on TikTok. (At the time, he had not recorded the song.) After a few more successful videos, Hill caught the attention of AWAL, a label services company acquired by Sony in 2021, where he signed last year. When he turned his attention to Reels earlier in January, he wanted to push “Look at the Time” again because he already knew it was “super reactive.”
Many artists who benefit from a sudden surge of attention on social media and get record deals then have to go and learn how to perform. For Hill, this is not a problem. “I’m so grateful for having spent my teenage years playing all these bars,” he says. “We’re ready to take advantage of the moment and to go on tour.”
His advice to others hoping to crack the code on Instagram promotion boils down to “try hard” and stay flexible. “They’re pushing musicians like crazy on Instagram for now,” Hill says. “But that can change in one software update.”
On Feb. 15, a snippet of Post Malone singing along to a forthcoming collaboration with Luke Combs surfaced on TikTok. Post Malone is signed to Mercury/Republic Records, Universal Music Group labels, and UMG’s catalog has been unavailable on TikTok since the start of February. This means that preexisting videos made with his hits now play without sound, and users can’t make new clips with his recordings. The video of Post Malone lip-syncing to the track was originally posted on Instagram Reels, but it migrated to TikTok anyway — most clips do — and the audio remained unmuted, skirting the UMG ban because the song has not been officially released.
“We can still use the platform to tease new music because until the master hits TikTok, nothing will happen” to it, says Tim Gerst, CEO of Nashville-based digital marketing agency Thinkswell. “We’re not really going to change our strategy much.”
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Artists silenced by the UMG-TikTok impasse have used this and other workarounds during the first month that they’ve been walled off from what is arguably their most effective marketing tool. Indeed, digital marketers say they haven’t noticed an exodus from the platform after the negotiations between the two companies fell apart.
“Artists impacted by this are just being more creative on TikTok about how they’re getting music out,” Shopkeeper Management digital marketing manager Laura Spinelli says. “People are doing acoustic versions of songs; they’re changing up the tempo [so that songs don’t trigger TikTok’s sonic fingerprinting system]; they’re talking around it.
“It’s not, ‘TikTok’s gone, so I’m going to go on [YouTube] Shorts,’ ” Spinelli continues. “It’s, ‘The masters are gone from TikTok; how can I still get my music out?’ ”
While there are plenty of digital platforms that artists can use to market their music, the reality is none have been able to consistently replicate TikTok’s impact over the past four years. “There’s really no other comparable digital marketing strategy or platform for exposure of new music,” says Tyler Blatchley, co-founder of Black 17, The Orchard’s top label on TikTok. “Trends are tied to songs on TikTok in a unique way. On Reels and Shorts, the audience cares less about the song, more about the video content.”
“TikTok is No. 1 for music discovery,” adds Johnny Cloherty, co-founder of digital marketing company Songfluencer. “These other platforms don’t lead to consumption the same way TikTok does.”
It’s also not clear that Reels and Shorts are even trying to challenge TikTok in the way they once did. When the two platforms were launched in 2020, they both seemed positioned to compete for TikTok’s market share — the app had recently been banned in India, and President Donald Trump was threatening to do the same in the United States.
In the years since, however, “both of these products, which came out as TikTok competitors, have evolved,” says another digital marketer who has worked with artists and brands. “They’re different from what they were, and the focus of the companies behind them have shifted.”
The digital marketer points to a recent blog post in which YouTube CEO Neal Mohan announced that “YouTube’s next frontier is the living room,” suggesting the platform was increasingly interested in competing with a company like Netflix rather than other purveyors of short-form video. “It might not be what you’d expect,” Mohan wrote, “but people like watching Shorts on their TVs.”
Reels and its parent company, Meta, have also made significant changes over the last 12 months. In 2023, the company shut down the bonus system it had put in place to financially incentivize creator activity. (That program seemed like another attempt to compete with TikTok, which had announced its own $200 million creator fund in 2020.) A couple of months later, Meta launched another platform, Threads. Just as Reels once seemed aimed at capitalizing on the misfortunes of TikTok, the timing of Threads’ arrival seemed an attempt to capitalize on the troubles of Elon Musk’s X; Meta’s new platform also appeared to signal a shift in company priorities.
Even so, most artists have been, at a minimum, cross-posting TikTok clips to Shorts and Reels for several years, eager to find exposure wherever they can get it.
Shorts has helped artists grow their subscriber numbers on YouTube, and subscribers can be monetized in other ways. Harrison Golding, who oversees digital marketing for EMPIRE, has seen it function as “a discovery tool in countries where YouTube is their primary streaming platform,” like India.
Reels is still an engine for increasing followers as well. “If you want to grow on Instagram right now, Reels is the way to do that,” Spinelli says. In addition, manager Tommy Kiljoy says Reels helped drive listeners to his client ThxSoMch’s latest release, “Hide Your Kids,” as well as Sawyer Hill’s “Look at the Time,” which recently topped Spotify’s Viral 50 chart in the United States.
But “we see more trends on TikTok,” says Hemish Gholkar, a digital marketer who works with all of the major labels. “We hardly see trends to a record on Reels or Shorts.”
While UMG’s catalog remains officially unavailable on TikTok, it has always been the case that any user can upload audio to the platform. Many viral trends start thanks to unofficial bootlegs, and “some artists are just putting up songs as original sounds,” according to Nima Nasseri, a former vp of A&R strategy for Universal Music Group.
Artists “are speeding up their songs a little bit, doing different edits,” and posting them on TikTok, Kiljoy notes. “I’ve seen people lean into [the absence of the music] more than anything and get a rise out of it.” (UMG artists’ music may also be still available if they collaborated with an act on another label: TikTokers can find Drake rapping on Travis Scott’s “Meltdown,” for example.)
In addition, artists have devised ways to keep seeding their music without the official recording. Singer d4vd, whose breakout hits got traction on TikTok and led to a record deal with UMG’s Darkroom/Interscope Records, recently posted a video labeled “d4vd songs that sound better live,” which shows him performing “Leave Her,” his latest release.
Gerst has had success promoting his clients’ older music in cases when it was recorded outside of the UMG system. “We’re going back and pushing a bunch of the back-catalog content,” Gerst says. A video his team posted soundtracked by “I’m Gonna Miss Her,” Brad Paisley’s goofy tribute to fishing, amassed over 30 million views across TikTok and Reels. The song was originally released through Sony in 2001, but a throwback that’s earning millions of views still keeps Paisley top of mind for fans as he moves towards a new album.
Even UMG artists who have expressed disappointment that their music isn’t available on TikTok keep posting anyway. “Two massive companies deciding what goes on with people’s art; it’s a bit f—ing daft,” artist Yungblud said in a TikTok video after the negotiations crumbled. “Everything can be taken away at the touch of a button.”
Still, he continues to post every few days, uploading a mix of onstage and backstage videos, an acoustic performance of “When We Die (Can We Still Get High?)” and interview footage. The same goes for Muni Long, who posted an interview to TikTok in which she called her music’s absence from the platform “a bummer,” and another clip of a group of fans screaming along to her single “Made For Me” at a basketball game.
The stand-off between UMG and TikTok is about to enter a new phase where any songs that have contributions from Universal Music Publishing Group songwriters disappear from the platform, meaning artists and marketers will have to adjust once again. “We’re not going to abandon TikTok,” Gerst says. “We’re just going to find new ways to do it.”
If you don’t live under a rock, you are likely aware that Beyoncé released a pair of new songs earlier this month. One of them, “Texas Hold ‘Em,” has blanketed TikTok in recent days: Around 74,000 users had made videos incorporating the sound on February 18; this more-than-tripled over the course of a week, pushing the total number of clips using the track past 224,000 on February 25. “Texas Hold ‘Em” climbed from No. 2 to No. 1 on the latest Hot 100.
TikTok’s ability to help drive this kind of ubiquity has diminished in recent years — much to the chagrin of the music industry. “In 2019, you could catch a trend and go top five on Apple Music in like a day,” says Harrison Golding, vice president of strategic marketing at EMPIRE. “Now the platform is so mature that even if you get trends and user-generated content, the numbers may not correlate to streams.”
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And yet: “The virality of this Beyoncé record shows you the power of the platform,” says Nima Nasseri, a former vp of A&R strategy for Universal Music Group, where he worked on a team that ran TikTok campaigns for resurgent catalog hits like Trinidad Cardona’s “Dinero” and Phantogram’s “Black Out Days.” “It’s still there. You can’t discount it.” (Not that anyone was discounting it — more like lamenting the good old days when outcomes on TikTok were far easier to influence.)
The TikTok takeover of “Texas Hold ‘Em” carries extra weight because it feels like a potent reminder of the platform’s impact at a time when the music industry is eager to look for alternatives. Licensing negotiations between Universal Music Group and TikTok fell apart in January, which means that no official sounds from UMG artists have been available on the platform during February. And whenever TikTok faces a potential obstacle — U.S. politicians threaten to ban it, for example, or a massive song catalog is removed — music industry attention turns to Instagram and YouTube, which also have their own short-form video delivery systems (Reels and Shorts, respectively).
It’s possible that more music will come down from TikTok at the end of February — not just tracks by UMG’s artists, but also any songs that include contributions from Universal Music Publishing Group’s songwriters. It makes sense, then, that “artists and their teams are putting more strategy into all three platforms now,” according to Jen Darmafall, director of marketing for ATG Group. “Before, they would just make content that works for TikTok and then post it on the other platforms.”
Although recent history is littered with songs that exploded on TikTok and saw a correlated jump on streaming services, it’s always been much harder to find comparable examples associated with Reels and Shorts. “Reels is more self-contained,” Nasseri explains. “You can get 100,000 uses of a sound on Reels, and that won’t impact” plays on streaming services.
Historically, success on Reels creates “more of a passive following,” adds Ben Locke, director of A&R and marketing at the label Disharmony.
When it comes to Shorts, Golding includes it in all his rollouts, as do most music marketers. “Is it changing a record like TikTok can?” he asks. “No, not yet.”
Nasseri agrees: “You don’t see creates grow at the same rate on YouTube Shorts as they do on TikTok.” (Neal Mohan, YouTube’s CEO, recently wrote on the company’s blog that “Shorts is averaging over 70 billion daily views, and the number of channels uploading Shorts has grown 50% year over year.”)
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This all makes the recent success of Sawyer Hill’s “Look at the Time” that much more noteworthy: The song topped Spotify’s Viral 50 chart in the U.S. last week thanks in large part to listeners coming from Reels. “I’ve never seen virality from Reels like this that drove consumption in a meaningful way,” says Locke, who signed Sawyer Hill to Disharmony.
Locke actually found Sawyer Hill on TikTok (of course) late in 2022; “Look at the Time,” a parched power ballad riddled with reproachful guitar riffs, came out in June 2023. In the past few months, Locke says, Sawyer Hill “pivoted his strategy more to Reels, because he felt like there was less of an over-saturation of music on that platform.”
And recently, Locke continues, “his content is starting to get a ton of engagement.” The top comment on Sawyer Hill’s “Look at the Time” YouTube video is “Instagram brought me here, I’m glad the algorithm showed me this gem.” The second comment is more amusing — and more revealing: “Usually the songs that are advertised on insta SUCK but this is actually gorgeous.”
Tommy Kiljoy, who manages ThxSoMch, calls the success of “Look at the Time” “a major win for Instagram.” The platform “is still a little bit weird — you get more followers than engagement,” he says. But ThxSoMch’s latest single “Hide Your Kids” also recently enjoyed a boost from Reels. (Sawyer Hill and ThxSoMch are not signed to UMG labels, so their music is currently available on TikTok as well.)
It’s too early to know if this activity on Reels is an aberration or the start of a trend. On Friday, “Look at the Time” enjoyed its fifth day at No. 1 on Spotify’s U.S. Viral 50. Sitting nearby at No. 3 was Djo’s “End of Beginning.” Unlike Sawyer Hill, though, Djo’s success can be attributed directly to TikTok users, who have embraced the 2022 song in droves.
This just goes to show, “in the digital space, no one has the formula right now,” as Golding puts it. “We’re constantly trying to figure out what type of campaign is going to actually convert a new fan. It’s a few drops in a bucket here, a few drops there, and hope you catch a viral moment.”
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New York City is taking a hard line against social media. The mayor has filed a lawsuit claiming TikTok, Instagram and more are responsible for the mental health crisis with kids.
As reported by Digital Music News, the current mayor of The Big Apple is taking social media to task with claims that their apps are causing the youth issues with their mental health. On Wednesday, Feb. 14 Mayor Eric Adams held a press conference alongside New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene Commissioner Dr. Ashwin Vasan, NYC Health + Hospitals President Dr. Michell Katz, and New York City Department of Education Chancellor David C. Banks. During the presentation, the politician announced the filing of a lawsuit against TikTok, Instagram, YouTube, Snapchat and Facebook, citing that each of these platforms are fueling a nationwide mental health crisis.
“Over the past decade, we have seen just how addictive and overwhelming the online world can be, exposing our children to a non-stop stream of harmful content and fueling our national youth mental health crisis,” he explained. “Our city is built on innovation and technology, but many social media platforms end up endangering our children’s mental health, promoting addiction, and encouraging unsafe behavior. Today, we’re taking bold action on behalf of millions of New Yorkers to hold these companies accountable for their role in this crisis, and we’re building on our work to address this public health hazard. This lawsuit and action plan are part of a larger reckoning that will shape the lives of our young people, our city, and our society for years to come.”
According to NYC.gov, the filing allege that the platforms “intentionally designed their platforms to purposefully manipulate and addict children and teens to social media.” Some of the features that the officials say create these conditions include “using algorithms to generate feeds that keep users on the platforms longer and encourage compulsive use” and “mechanics akin to gambling in the design of apps, which allow for anticipation and craving for likes and hearts.”
The Daily News reports a representative from Meta says that Facebook and Instagram have “over 30 tools and features” to assist parents in making social media safe for their children. Jose Castañeda, a spokesman for Google, says that YouTube also offers “parents robust controls” and says that “The allegations in this complaint are simply not true.”
You can view the press conference below.
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Benny Blanco only has eyes for Selena Gomez — heart eyes, that is. The Grammy-nominated producer set up shop in the comment section of his boo’s latest Instagram selfie, clearly too stunned for words. The “Single Soon” star shared a trio of fresh-faced selfies on her official Instagram page on Sunday (Jan. 28) with a […]
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Welcome back to our latest Baes & Baddies update and this one is a bit more classy as we’re featuring the “Bilingual Rappin Educator” known to the world as Just T. How Just T appeared on our radar were a series of viral videos of the teacher and influencer showing off an array of fly fits and her tales in teaching.
Far more than just a Spanish teacher, Just T is the founder of Traplingual, a method of teaching Spanish using the Hip-Hop subgenre of Trap Music. On her @its.sweet.tea Instagram page and also her popular TikTok account, T often shows off her outfits for the week and discusses some of the pleasant run-ins with her students. She’s also a new mother and details that part of her life as well.
Check out Just T aka @its.sweet.tea aka @Miss.Sweet.Tea in the gallery below.
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Photo: @its.sweet.tea
We love when three of pop music‘s hottest young stars link up. On Monday, The Kid LAROI took to his Instagram Story to share a sweet snap of himself, Olivia Rodrigo and Tate McRae.
The adorable picture finds the trio of pop stars posing on a Los Angeles street with a RuPaul’s Drag Race billboard towering in the background. The Kid LAROI throws up a pair of peace signs as he dons a black beanie, long-sleeve white tee and a statement red scarf. Rodrigo — dressed in a black biker jacket and heather-gray turtleneck — similarly throws her arms up and sports a huge smile, while McRae cradles her smiling face and dons a large black coat.
Some dating rumors have swirled around LAROI and McRae, though neither has confirmed their relationship status, while McRae and Rodrigo have been longtime friends, with Tate co-starring in Olivia’s “bad idea, right?” music video.
The nighttime pic commemorates a massive six months for the trio — each of whom unleashed a new studio album in that time period. On Sept. 8, Rodrigo unearthed her sophomore studio album, Guts, which became her second consecutive Billboard 200 chart-topper, spawned the Billboard Hot 100 No. 1 single “Vampire,” and earned six Grammy nominations, including album of the year. In exactly one month, starting Feb. 23, the “Drivers License” singer will embark on the Guts World Tour in support of the record, taking The Breeders, Chappell Roan, PinkPantheress and Remi Wolf on the road with her.
Just two months after Guts on Nov. 10, The Kid LAROI released his long-awaited debut studio album, The First Time. Reaching No. 26 on the Billboard 200, the album featured star-studded collaborations with the likes of Future, Robert Glasper and YoungBoy Never Broke Again and housed the Hot 100 hit “Too Much” (with Jung Kook and Central Cee, No. 44).
Of course, Tate McRae kicked off 2024 as one of the buzziest names in pop music thanks to the continued success of her smash hit “Greedy.” The song has since climbed to No. 3 on the Hot 100, helping her latest album, Think Later (released Dec. 8), reach No. 4 on the Billboard 200, her very first top 10 placement on the ranking. Like Rodrigo, McRae will embark on a world tour in support of her new record. The 53-date Think Later World Tour is set to kick off on Apr. 17 in Dublin and conclude on Nov. 21 in Wellington, New Zealand.
Check out the cute pic below:
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Happy New Year we’re happy to be back with our first Baes & Baddies entry of 2024, and this lovely lady is one of the rising stars in her respective lane right now. Myah Jane, who hails from Michigan, has a lovely and bubbly personality that will have folks hooked at first sight.
Information on Myah Jane is on the scant side but from what we’ve seen via her social media feeds, she’s a young woman who loves to show herself living life on her terms and having fun.
She also has a very active TikTok page and has a running series of food delivery pranks that you’ll have to check out for yourself. But what remains constant is her award-winning smile, fun-loving charm, and a figure that will turn heads in any season.
We also learned that Myah Jane is on a fitness journey, although she already looks quite delightful in her current form, but health is definitely wealth these days.
Check out our latest Baes & Baddies feature, Myah Jane, and make sure you follow her on everything.
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Photo: Instagram/@myah.jane_
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50 Cent is undertaking something new for 2024 – celibacy, according to a recent social media post.
For most of his career, 50 Cent has always boldly approached everything he sought to achieve. In a new social media post, however, he might have taken it to another level by declaring that he was “practicing abstinence” as part of his preparation for success. The mogul made the statement in an Instagram post showing him seated while dressed in a finely tailored suit, smoking a cigar on Monday (January 8).
“My new idea is so big, I don’t have time to be distracted,” the caption began. “I’m practicing abstinence, I have been meditating and focusing on my goals. I hope this New Year helps you excel to the next level.” He ended it with a plug for his cognac and champagne brands, mentioning their handles on the platform. The “Get Rich or Die Trying” rapper’s declaration got him immediate support in the comments of the post, with many praising him for setting such a positive example to being the year. Brooklyn rapper Scar Lip expressed her support, writing, “Word(s) of encouragement love it !!”. Veteran television reporter and journalist Lisa Evers also applauded the sentiment, writing: “Executive mode, mogul moves, positive vibes only!”
2024 looks to be a thoroughly busy year ahead for 50 Cent. The executive producer behind the Power television series has been romantically involved with fitness trainer Jamira “Cuban Link” Haines since 2019, keeping their relationship private outside of some playful interactions on social media and appearances at events. He’s currently working on a series inspired by Eminem’s biopic 8 Mile and has begun to also work on a new series for Starz, the boxing drama Fightland set in Britain. 50 Cent just opened up a film and television studio complex in Louisiana. And in line with his proclivity for trolling with a purpose, he’s also reportedly working on a documentary focusing on the alleged victims of sexual abuse by Diddy in the wake of that mogul’s recent troubles.
More than three years after Britney Spears accidentally burned her home gym down, the pop star took to Instagram to share the extent of the damage. “Reflecting back remembering when I burnt the gym down in 2020,” she captioned a shocking photo on Monday night (Dec. 18), in which the charred basement is seen full […]
