How to shrink your brand - Lessons from Vinnie Vincent

[Genebaby]

So Vinnie told us recently that there were just toooo many people in his Facebook group, at a time when there were under 1000 people in the group, though he said he was battling with turning away thousands.

Today the group is down to 36 members.

It's safe to say a few of these members are Vinnie himself, some admins (probably won't need them anymore, there's nobody to admin!) and a few people that paid for the latest event and thus were "allowed" to stay in the group and not pay the $200 fee for the privelige.

Why, why, why? Who does that to their fanbase? To their brand and image? What is the point?

[aeroflott]

Absolutely mental.

Mind you $7,200 in cash isn't a bad payday (assuming they're all paying members - which they're not).

Its just incredibly limiting. What he should have done is a Patreon. That way he could have sold a positive story, and made it more inclusive, instead of calling everyone a troll and kicking them out. I'd pay something for exclusive access to Vinnie sharing tunes, doing a live stream and all that good stuff (see Steve Vai's Patreon - its amazing). Vai charges $5 a month and plays live, does live Q&As and deep dives into his catalogue.

Fans will pay for what they perceive to be direct access to an artist like Vinnie. Unless they're not quite right in the head, they won't pay what amounts to protection money, with no idea of what they're actually getting, other than being let through the door.
Sure it gets rid of the riff raff, but it also alienates his potential market. I don't appreciate being blocked from the FB Group for no reason whatsoever and for that reason, I won't be putting my hard-earned into VV's pocket - ever. As you say Genebaby, he's damaged his already battered brand and in the long run, this will cost him more revenue than this short term windfall.

The sad thing is, this move from VV doesn't come as a surprise now.

[Genebaby]

Will he even get a short term windfall? The deadline has not passed yet, and if most of those still there have access due to buying a show ticket then he will have gotten nothing but an even more pissed off fan base, and more ridicule across the internet.

Steve Vai charges $5 for very cool stuff on Patreon. $60 a year. Vinnie tries to charge $200 a year for nothing, on an otherwise free platform no less. If Vinnie was on Patreon doing similar things to Vai, what would he be charging? I can only imagine what he thinks his time of actually doing something would be worth. A lot more than Steve I'm sure.

[Genebaby]

Hang on. Is it just me or is the Official Euphoria group now gone?

I was going to have a look at the member number but it seems to be gone now?

[Genebaby]

Strange, I cannot see the group at all but someone is telling me they are still in it and it's alive.

[Genebaby]

And then I see this, so the mystery continues.....

Euphoria down.png (54.56 KiB) Viewed 1069 times

[teej]

Probably got reported to meta for charging for access .. I'm sure it must be against their rules ... the "man" is a walking fucking train wreck

[Genebaby]

Possibly, and that should really have happened hopefully as it has to be against the rules, so hopefully someone did.

Is it possible for a group to go invisible and not be seen in a search? All I was interested in was the membership numbers.

Here's a comparison someone did shortly after the announcement:

417784568_10228929052024020_7330199242245034233_n.jpg (94.14 KiB) Viewed 1008 times

You can see membership was never over 1000, yet Vinnie lies and says over three thousand people had been let in just prior to the announcement. Why lie?

The last I saw it was down to 36 before it stopped appearing in searches. Looking for things with radar, when the blip is gone, the object is gone, but who knows.

Vinnie is a rolling train wreck, and building up speed every day!

[VLADIMIR]

You can put a group on "secret" mode on facebook. Only the members will be allowed to see it. When a group goes secret, it will not appear in searches.

[Genebaby]

Good to know. Now he's going to keep the numbers to himself, but let's all assume it's very, very low!!

[aeroflott]

I've not been able to "see" the group on Facebook for months now. One day I was a member, the next I wasn't. I don't think I even posted anything even remotely contentious.

[aeroflott]

In other news Vinnie's website appears to be down this morning.

[Genebaby]

I've not been able to "see" the group on Facebook for months now. One day I was a member, the next I wasn't. I don't think I even posted anything even remotely contentious.

I could see it if I cared to look until the other day, and then I was going to track the downward spiral in members.

It sounds like not only were you cast out, you were blocked on top!! Nice!!

[Genebaby]

Vinnie's website was being strange. It gave me a "can't reach this page" type of message, and as I was looking for another way to check I had the correct address the page loaded up.

[Genebaby]

Ok, now the website really does seem down. The can't connect error is staying around, reloading doesn't help.