Welcome to the latest installment in my ongoing monthly series Professional Ambitions. Learn alongside me as I pursue a career as a professional fusion belly dancer.
Chances are, if you’re reading this blog, it’s because we’re connected on social media. Facebook, Twitter and other platforms serve as a meeting place for belly dancers from all over the world. If you want to be a professional, it’s important to have a good social media presence to connect you with potential clients, students, and your fellow professionals.
Note that I said a GOOD social media presence. It’s not just about having accounts on every relevant network. It’s about actually being active and posting content that people actually want to see, read, and interact with.
Think about what you want to get out of the time that you put into your social media. Are you primarily looking to advertise your classes or workshops? Then your content should revolve around the educational aspects of belly dance — share articles about the benefits of dance and exercise, and about developing good practice habits. Are you more interested in getting performance opportunities (paid or otherwise)? Then you should share videos of yourself dancing, and talk about all the skills you’re working on to make yourself an even better performer. Are you mainly interested in networking with other dancers? Then be fun and friendly, and share a variety of cool dance-related content.
Try to avoid being too negative on social media. We all have bad days where we just want to vent, and sometimes we do have to share some bad news as well, but if your feed is overwhelmingly full of complaints and criticism, you may find that people are less willing to engage with you. This is especially important if you’re advertising yourself as a teacher or performer. Students want a teacher who is going to have a welcoming attitude, and hosts want a performer who is going to be the life of the party. Even if you are able to turn on the charm in professional settings, people are not going to expect that if your social media feeds are overwhelmingly unpleasant.
It’s up to you how you want to handle your personal profile, how political, religious, and divisive you want to get, and how you handle the balance between non-dance stuff and dance stuff. But any professional profile, such as a Facebook fan page or an Instagram account for your dance studio, should be mostly dance stuff. The occasional cute story about your kids or pets or something that happened in your daily life is a good humanizing touch, but your main focus should be dance-related content.
A big part of having a good social media presence is to interact with other people. Don’t just post content and then wait for people to respond. Read what other people post. Respond. Share it on your own wall or fan page to get other people talking about it. Participate in group discussions. ReTweet things. Join an Instagram photo challenge. Leave nice comments on YouTube videos. Be a part of the community!
A good social media presence is such an important thing. It will help you connect with other dancers in your local sphere, but also with workshops hosts, event promoters, musicians, photographers, students, and more. Some of these connections will even turn into deep, lasting friendships. Social media can not only really boost your career, it can also enhance your life.