Music & Marketing: URBANIZED!

If you want to become successful in the music industry, there many things you need to know and do. But even if you get all that right, you can prevent yourself from reaching big success by making critical mistakes along the way (and there are many potential mistakes one could make, when not being careful). After coaching and mentoring many musicians and bands seeking a career in music, the same patterns of false assumptions, problems and mistakes appear over and over again. Here are the top 10.

Mistake #10 - Not having a compelling image that is congruent with your music. Most musicians (and bands) severely underestimate the importance of their image. Yes, music is about 'music', but music business success is about a total package that includes music, image and visual stage show among other things that need to be fully developed in a congruent way.

Mistake #9 - Trying to 'get your name out there'. Although this seems to be a main goal of most musicians and bands, it is the wrong approach to start with. Before trying to be seen and heard as much as possible, it is often more important to focus on 'converting' the people who hear and see you into becoming actual fans. This 'conversion' is the first key to your promotional success, NOT getting seen or heard as much as possible.

Mistake #8 - Believing that social media websites are the keys to online music promotion for musicians and bands. Social media websites are a tool. They are ONE piece of the online music marketing puzzle. Music industry companies (record labels, artist managers, booking agents, etc.) are far more interested in the popularity of YOUR website, not how many friends you have at MySpace, YouTube, Facebook or any other website that you do not own and control. Want to impress the industry with your band's promotion? Build your website traffic.

Mistake #7 - Not investing enough time into building your music career. Most musicians spend most of their time on music, but put very little effort into the many other critical elements needed to make it in the music business. If you are already a talented musician, you should invest at least 50% of your time into starting or advancing your music career. If you are still developing your musical skills, you should still invest around 25% of your 'music' time into building a future music career.

Mistake #6 - Surrounding yourself with people who are negative, lazy and lack ambition. If you are very serious about becoming a professional musician and building a great career in music, then you absolutely must surround yourself with like-minded musicians.

Mistake #5 - Having merely mediocre live performing skills. Many musicians, who are not yet in a good band, put off developing their live performing and stage presence skills. This is a big reason why talented musicians don't get into really good bands that they audition for. Your music may be good, but a live 'show' requires more than great music. If people only wanted to hear the music, they would listen to you at home. Both fans and record labels want (and expect) to see a REAL show. Neglecting this area results in talented musicians and bands becoming quickly forgotten.

Mistake #4 - Focusing on increasing the 'quantity' of fans instead of the 'intensity' of your fans. The 'number' of fans you have should always be your secondary focus (not your primary one) if you want to become successful in the music industry. The fact is, it is not the number of 'fans' that matters most, it's the number of FANATICS which will contribute more directly to your success (or lack of it). This is particularly true in the beginning of a band's music career. Focus more effort on converting your existing fans into raving fanatics. Learn to do this and the number of your overall fans will increase through powerful word of mouth.

Mistake #3 - Not enough cash flow to support your music career. Like it or not, it takes money to build a music career. Even if other people/companies are paying for your record, tour support, merchandise, etc. you still need to have the freedom to pursue opportunities as they come. Sadly, many musicians miss opportunities because they can't afford to take advantage of them.In addition to a decent income, you also need the flexibility of being able to take time away from that income source to go into the studio, go on tour, etc. That is why learning how to teach guitar is such a great way to achieve both if you learn how to become a highly successful guitar teacher.

Mistake #2 - Not enough depth in your music relationships. There's an old expression, "It's not what you know, it's who you know." In music this is often modified to, "It's not who you know, it's who knows you." The truth is, it's not about either. The most important aspect of connections within the music industry is how deep are the current relationships you have now and will develop in the future. You don't want to simply know people or be known, you want people who know you to have a real deep connection with you so that you are always on the top of their mind when opportunities present themselves. Ask yourself, "What can I do right now to deepen my existing relationships further on an ongoing basis?"

Mistake #1 - Having a fundamental misunderstanding about what record companies look for - and expect from new bands. This is a huge topic, but in a nutshell it's very useful to think of record companies like a bank that lends money to people or small businesses. Record companies make most of their decisions about whom they will work with and what the terms will be in much the same way that a bank will determine who they will loan money to and what the terms of the loan will be. Both record companies and banks basically want to see 3 things:

1. How much value do you bring to the deal right now.
2. How much risk do you bring with you right now.
3. How much potential value and risk might you bring to them in the future after they invest in you.

If you want to buy a house, the bank wants to know a lot about the specific house you want to buy and EVEN MORE about YOU. Record companies are the exact same, they want to know about your music, your talent and your band, but they also care as much (or more) about YOU (and your band mates) as people. What about YOU makes a record deal a good or bad investment for them?

CULVER CITY, Calif. – Dr. Dre and Timbaland went back to school Wednesday night.

The rapper-producers shocked students when they appeared at a Culver City High School graduation party. Dr. Dre introduced Timbaland, who performed the tunes “The Way I Are,” “Promiscuous Girl,” “Carry Out” and “Say Something” on a stage inside the school’s gymnasium. Students invited had no idea the hip-hop masterminds were the guests of honor.

“When we walked in, we were like, ‘Whoa. Is this a second prom?’” said 17-year-old junior Saul Salmeron.

The surprise performance was sponsored by Hewlett-Packard and Interscope Records, who have partnered with the aim of improving digital sound quality. The promotional event, which was recorded for an online documentary, also featured free food, photos and a raffle of HP gear. The company said it was donating $10,000 worth of computer equipment to the school.

“Y’all got a curfew?” Timbaland asked the audience at one point.

Students held up their camera phones and gathered around the stage to get a glimpse of Timbaland and Dr. Dre, who sneaked a peek of the crowd before he took the stage. Dr. Dre, who is currently working on his next album, did not perform with labelmate Timbaland, whom he’s never worked with before.

Is a possible first-time collaboration is in the works?

“We should be so lucky,” said Jimmy Iovine, chairman of Interscope, Geffen and A&M Records, who attended Wednesday’s event. “I can only get them so close. The rest is up to them.”

How do you measure the success of a blog? By the number of visitors it receives. Traffic is essential to the survival of a site. So, what are easy and efficient ways to get it?

from wagtiradio.com



1) Provide quality content
Quality over quantity is a motto that should be in every blogger's mind. As such, editing and proofreading are two prerequisites. Before you publish anything, make sure that your content is as typo-free as possible.

2) Provide useful content
A blog is like a product. If you want to sell, your articles must be unique and visitors must relate to them. At times, it may be difficult to come up with new ideas. To overcome this problem, you could:
- set up Google alerts to receive news in your inbox. When you find an interesting article, share an extract in your blog or write something on the topic.

- visit websites like AllTop or Mashable and subscribe to valuable blogs in your niche.

And if you are an entrepreneur, why not check out the questions asked by members of LinkedIn? Some will fuel your creativity.

3) Write great titles
Titles are the main attention grabbers. When written well, they will make visitors read the articles attached to them. For example, if you want to offer tips on book promotion, something like X [number] Great Tips to Promote Your Book would work. Remember that people love numbers and lists, so organize the post as such. Be clear and concise.

4) Blog often
A blog regularly updated will bring traffic. So, try to contribute to its growth at least twice a week.

5) Ask questions
Asking questions is the best way to engage readers and show them that you care. There are three proven ways to do it:

• Ask a question in the first paragraph of your post. This will draw their attention to the problem that you are trying to solve.


• Ask a question in your conclusion in order to open the discussion. Visitors will leave comments more easily.


• Invite people to suggest future topics. Why not conduct a survey?

6) Tag, Tag, Tag
Tags or keywords are specific words that describe an item. When blog articles are published, they will be indexed by search engines (Google, Bing, Yahoo, etc.) according to those specific words. Without them, search engines may overlook the posts and they will end up at the bottom of the pile. So, tag all your articles and pictures.

7) Share your posts
Share your posts on sites like Twitter, Facebook, Digg, Delicious, and Stumble Upon. Search engines love them. Use Hootsuite and Ping.fm to update all your networks at once.

8) Allow visitors to subscribe to your blog
By using a tool like Feedburner, you give visitors the opportunity to stay connected with your blog by subscribing to it. Every time you publish a new article, subscribers receive a notice. It is a great way to build up a loyal audience.

9) Submit articles to directories
This is a very efficient way to get your name out there. EzineArticles and eHow are the best article submission directories right now and rank really high in search engines. Let me give you an example.

A while ago, I submitted one of my previous posts to EzineArticles. The article got accepted. Type 'rejection reviewers' in Google search and you will see 'Authors & Six Tips to Avoid Rejection from Reviewers' appear third on the first page of the search engine.

10) Answer comments & visit other blogs
Too often, bloggers do not follow up with readers comments or emails. They do not even take the time to visit others blogs or sites. Imagine a company that would not care about its customers. It would lose business very quickly. A blog works like a company. If you do not set aside some time to provide good customer service, you will get no traffic.

Should you really have no time to connect with those who contact you privately, just let them know that you will respond to their messages later. And make sure that you do!

11) Add a link to your blog in your signature
In this day and age, we all use emails. It takes a couple of seconds to add a link to your blog in your signature block. And it may bring a LOT of traffic.

12) Be patient
Solid and constant traffic does not happen overnight. So, continue working hard and do not lose heart. Good things happen to those who wait!

Now, are there other tips that I may have forgotten?

Now that the Jesus of the genre has been so kind as to drop his instant classic, Thank Me Later (the obvious, hands-down winner for album of the year) it is time for the rest of the industry to step it up or face some of those harsh realities that 50 Cent once warned us about. Hip-hop, as we knew it, may be in need of a funeral service. Nas, being the prophet that he is, called it in early in 2006, but the doctors are now giving up hope and sending for the coroner. Let me tell you how I know: There was a time (specifically 2006) when things were getting so bad that Nastradamus proclaimed that it was all over. The difference was that there was someone left to dissent. And that is what we have lost.

After a while, the voices of the people who wanted to see hip-hop survive got drowned out by those who didn’t really care about the music, the culture, the people, or really anything besides the damned money. What happened to us? We used to stand for something. But the entire rap genre has somehow transformed into a corporate liaison where albums are audio commercials for brand name clothing, jewelry, alcohol, and vehicles. Concerts have become the catwalk for these airheaded clowns to parade themselves and their crews around in the items that are available for sale. Have we really gotten to the point where the stuff you hear on the radio is actually what we’re all about? Do people really pay money to see Drake perform? Is it really possible that labels are bankrolling blogs? Something is rotten, word to Hamlet.

But this morning, it hit me. That isn’t death in the true sense. In reality, the inception of hip-hop was the beginning of a movement that represented a culture of lack. This thing that we love is the auditory representation of the people that it caters to. It was the music of the “have-nots” but we have seen it bent, stretched, morphed, and disfigured to encompass the many people who wanted the style without the struggle. And that isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Hip-hop doesn’t have to always be grimy. It doesn’t always have to be about life in the street. But what it must be, by necessity, is representative. It must embody the state of its people.

When cruising the troubled blocks of Los Angeles’ city streets listening to 2pac, one can see and feel the culture. If you happen to be on the right block, the same is true of the New Boyz as youngsters in the Fairfax district “Jerk” to their heart’s content in acid-washed skinny denim . A few years ago, looking out onto Lake Michigan and rubbing shoulders with Chicagoans, I could genuinely feel that College Dropout was truly the music of people. Sadly, I can’t say the same about much of the music by many of the artists that attempt to live under the hip-hop banner today. I would argue that the inordinate number of drug kingpins who are allegedly trafficking kilograms of cocaine daily at wholesale rates according to self-aggrandizing mixtape lore (See: Trap or Die) represent a farce that relates to hip-hop but is so far from true that the hyperbole is laughable and embarrassing (Bawse). The same is true of the non-criminal braggadocio of the highest success stories of the urban music scene. Maybe one day, rapping about international flights that garner millions of dollars in purely legitimate profits will be generalizable to this culture of ours. But that day is not today; not in the America where an oil spill was the biggest thing to hit the trap since Katrina.

In truth, the music that most call Rap or Hip-hop today is actually Pop, Top 40, or Club/Dance music. And sadly, even within that genre, it is still less representative of its people than that of Lady Gaga, The Ting-Tings, Miley Cyrus, and David Guetta; all of whom actually sing about situations that could legitimately happen to a person (if they were a sophomore in High School) and don’t aspire to do anything more than make people dance.

But don’t stop reading just yet. There is a silver lining.

The fortunate side effect of rebranding fake rappers as pop artists is the same as blowing away chaff to reveal the wheat. Hip-hop, the remainder after we divide the fake from the authentic, is alive and well. If you believe KRS-One, we will be here forever (and ever) but if you need a little more assurance than that, I have a plan. Much like the blowback against Wal-Mart when people became informed of their business practices, I think that we will find that the way to combat being force-fed the empty falsehoods of the corporate, urban music landscape is to buy local. Imagine the impact on your favorite local artist if your region had decided to spend its 13 dollars on their project rather than squandering it on a pretty package of lies from across the country. I bet his next LP would be easier to find at Best Buy.

When importing a tick-based audio file to the Region List, Track List, or empty space in the Edit window from the Workspace, your prompted to either import the tempo from the file or use the default session tempo. This tutorial explains how to import samples to automatically match the master tempo of your Pro Tools 8 session.