Came across this interesting article in the NY Times. Apparently buying popularity is rampant, especially in the music industry. Unfortunately, its the kind of thing that, once it's being done by a few, everyone else must go along or risk becoming invisible
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018......ers.html

This is not new. Everything that can be monetized based on interaction will have people try to circumvent it. From people creating fake ad hits on websites to purchased followers/likes.

The other side is that it's easy to program systems to locate this sort of thing and nuke the monetary benefits of doing it. People with solid content and social media skills will always rise to the top and those who are buying that aspect of things will always be obvious.

If you let others tell you that social media likes matters then OK. Never has been my business model.

Fake"likes" and "views" just lead to fake bookings. Clients really don't care how popular someone may seem to be on social media. Clients are more concerned about, "What will you do for me."

Let's look at Facebook for a moment as an example of how so many people don't even know how to take advantage of having a business page. First, most magicians will ask other magicians to like their Facebook business page. They want to get as many "likes as they can because they actually think it will make them look cool and popular. Some of them have over a thousand likes. Some even pay Facebook to get likes. Then, they complain that all of their "likes" don't even get them any bookings. Well, no da! 80% of their Facebook "likes" are other magicians, 10% family and close friends, 10% paid for.

I will admit that I have some magicians on my Facebook business page, but about 10%. I have about another 10% of close family and friends. I don't have 1,000's of "likes", nor have I ever paid for any. I currently have less than 500 likes. Most of those likes are from clients. But not just any kind of clients. Clients I network worth. Many of my bookings have come from my clients. My facebook business page is used as a way to stay in touch with my preferred clients who know and understand what networking is all about.

That's just plain false. If you are doing business with any type of event planner or venue that is going to depend on ticket sales based on a performer's draw, you better believe they are going to look at how many likes you have on facbook, how many followers you have on Instagram. They want acts that have a big fan base to promote their event and insure a big ticket buying crowd.
Now, that being said, the way to do it is organically, To make sure every single fan and follower is engaged and active. You want at least 10,000 to show up on most public event/venue's radar. Millennial buyers make decisions based on social media popularity. Time to get with the times.

I'm not sure if it's a regional thing - but out here in PA, the event organizers do not put much weight in social media presence because they know the number of people who like a page or say they'll go to an event is only very loosely related to the number of people who actually show up to said event.

And again, this could be my area, but the people I see working regularly have next to no web presence. They focus on word of mouth and building personal relationships with the few companies that do events regularly and basically become 'preferred vendors' so they get chosen first.

When I first came back out East I tried to find the local magic/performance community and, honestly, couldn't. There were 3 guys who covered everything from Gettysburg, up to Harrisburg, over to Lancaster, and down to Baltimore. I've since met a half dozen or so that cover the same area, but they're not really online at all.