Top 10 Mistakes People Make When Trying To Become Professional Artist!! Mistake No.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 and integrated in a congruent way. Mistake No.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 No.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 Twitter, YouTube, Facebook, Instangram or any other website that you do not own and control. Want to impress the industry with your bands promotion? Build your website traffic. Mistake No.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 No.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 No.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 dont 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 No.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, its 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 bands 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 No.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 cant 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 No.2 - Not enough depth in your music relationships. Theres an old expression, Its not what you know, its who you know. In music this is often modified to, Its not who you know, its who knows you. The truth is, its 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 dont 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 No.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 its 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:
Posted on: Wed, 02 Apr 2014 05:41:29 +0000
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