ABOUT US
Blog

What Musicians Can Learn From Instagram’s Story

There are lessons for musicians to take from the story of Instagram. A lot of people don’t know that Instagram did not originally launch as a company called Instagram. They launched as a company called Burbon, which was sort of a geolocation check-in service similar to Foursquare, if you’re at all familiar with them. And really, the concept was that since people finally have GPS on their phones, maybe it will be fun to be able to go to a restaurant or somewhere and check in.

The one little extra feature they had that made it unique was that if, for example, you wanted to take a picture of the cocktail you ordered, they had these fun little lenses that you could choose from. They looked at the data and noticed that no one really cared about checking in. Nobody was checking in, but everyone loved taking random pictures, even of things outside of where they checked in and using these fun lenses.

So what they did was shut it all down. They looked at Burbon and decided they were going to pretend it never happened. However, knowing that people loved the camera part of it, they decided they were going to relaunch their product as a thing called Instagram. It looked to the world like it was a new company, and it looked to the world like it worked overnight.

They basically went through this whole workshop of a failed product that people didn’t want and relaunched with only what they did want. It was a pivot. And you could argue that they almost make marketing irrelevant. Their marketing happened via the failed product and the feedback that they got.

There’s really no correct way or timing to do this, but you do want to think about when in the process of making music you want to do it. For example, is it important to get a lot of feedback before putting it out, and make it look like it’s perfect when it comes out? Or do you go the other route, and have the confidence in the music that it’ll just work? There’s really no universal right answer. Instead, it’s up to you to make the right call for your project.

Online music education is a good way to find out more about effective ways to approach putting out music, and a wide variety of other topics related to the music industry. If you’re like many people who may not have the resources for other forms of music education, you would be wise to consider going the online direction.

Enter your email to learn more and get a full course catalog!

Share:

More from Yellowbrick

Test Unlocked Resource Page

Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat. Duis aute irure dolor in reprehenderit in voluptate velit esse cillum dolore eu fugiat nulla pariatur. Excepteur sint occaecat cupidatat non proident, sunt in culpa qui officia deserunt mollit anim id est laborum.

©2024 Yellowbrick · All Rights Reserved · All Logos & Trademarks Belong to Their Respective Owners