By James Pew

Five Ideas That Lead To A Successful Music Career

1. Band is just Brand, without the “r.”Become an entrepreneur. Your business is your brand, and your brand is your Band.

2. This is what CD Baby founder Derek Sivers says – “Identify all those things that you don’t like to do. And do them first.”

This is what many musicians say – “I just want to play.” Derek refers to work, and the musician refers to play. Work is hard. And play is fun. Or are they? If you love your work it becomes fun. Hard-fun if you’re ambitious. But fun never-the-less. And playing is not always fun, especially when the room, or garage, you’re playing in is empty. Therefore you must embrace the things that you do not yet love, and learn to love them, so that the thing you really love, playing music, eventually becomes the dominant part of your successful work days.

This is not as hard as you think. I love my work. I’m in the music business. I work hard, sometimes non- stop, long hours. I am not an extremist or an endurance freak, I do it because I truly love what I do. However, I know what it’s like to work at something you do not love or enjoy. In order to finance the construction of Euphonic Sound, and my part in the R&D efforts of Origin Audio Electronics, I worked as an accounts receivable clerk, a waiter, and an interior renovator. Those are all highly competitive businesses full of professionals working very hard to make money. Those who work the hardest do the best. Working hard is a fact of success. If you want success you most go the extra mile, over achieve, and persist with unstoppable determination.

There is a great article on Music Think Tank that illustrates a priority strategy enabling Momentum Towards Celebrity. I find the circle diagram to be very helpful in visualizing the importance of non-music functions (or, the things you don’t like to do) of your music career.

3. Do The Never -Seth Godin.

What’s the always?

Figure what the always is. Then do something else.

Toothpaste always comes in a squeezable tube.
Business travelers always use a travel agent.
Politicians always have their staff screen their calls.

Figure out what the always is, then do exactly the opposite. Do the never.

4. Become a Student and an Expert in your industry. Study blogs and books -and constantly seek out wisdom that empowers and improves your efforts in the music industry. The music industry – learn about its past, present, and what smart people are saying about its future. And for comparison sake, what not-so-smart people are saying about its future. Every day you will become more of an expert, but never will you cease being a student.

5. Engage with humanity. Both in the real world, and the virtual one. Isn’t that why you play music to begin with? To get people’s attention, make them love you, and your brand, and touch them in some way.

The social media movement empowers meaningful engagement with real people, some potential fans. The internet allows access to groups of people, many who make up your target market, who are organized and have willingly assembled out of common interests. One of those interests could very well be your brand. To find your fans you must engage. Go where the people are. Don’t underestimate facebook, myspace, and other social media platforms, or the need for an effective, quality, accessible online identity that actively engages with humanity.

Band Is Brand Without The R by James Pew is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License.

Technorati Tags: CD Baby, Derek Sivers, Do The Never, euphonic sound, indie, James Pew, music, Music Careers, Music Industry, music think tank, Origin Audio Electronics, Seth Godin, Social Media & Marketing, studio manifesto

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This entry was posted on Sunday, August 10th, 2008 at 4:03 pm and is filed under Music Promotion, studio 2.0. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.