Hello, everyone. Today we’re going to talk about Tumblr, and how it can be used to promote your creative project or personal brand. Here’s the short answer: you can’t… but someone else can.
The thing about Tumblr (and for that matter, Twitter, Facebook, and all other forms of social media) is that your page is obviously created by you. Therefore, when you promote your own brand, your efforts have a clear bias to them. If you’ve already got a following and you’d like to keep them updated, then Tumblr is a good way to do it for a couple of reasons.
1. It’s quick, easy, and convenient for you to do.
2. It’s quick, easy, and convenient for people to access it.
3. Tumblrs tend to have more “cold media” (videos, images, etc) than text, so people see it as easier and more interesting than a text-based blog.
You can probably come up with more reasons on your own. Point is, it’s good for updates. However, even if Tumblr gives you the tools to talk about how good your brand is, it might not convince the unconverted. You know how when a commercial says, “our product is better than our competition’s product,” you automatically raise the skepticism shield? That’s what your audience of non-fans is going to do. Therefore, you need someone else’s help.
If I go to my friend’s Tumblr and I see them plugging someone else’s song/video/fanfic, I want to check it out. If it’s good enough to get a disinterested party’s unbiased approval, then it must be worth a look.
Although this could happen on any blog, the structure of Tumblr allows it to act more like a display case than a newspaper. There’s no wading through information. There’s just straight-up media, hand-picked by a friend. It’s the second-best thing to word of mouth advertising.
How do you get featured on a Tumblr page? For one thing, be as awesome as you can (not that you weren’t doing that already). It doesn’t hurt to add a message of “please pass this along” towards the end of your video either, so long as it’s subtle. If that doesn’t work, you and a friend could make arrangements to promote one another.
Thank you, and happy Tumblring.
-Tamara Hecht