Music Business For Dummies
Overview
Start your music career off right with this fun guide to the music industry
Music Business For Dummies explains the ins and outs of the music industry for artists and business people just starting out. You'll learn how file-sharing, streaming, and iTunes have transformed the industry, and how to navigate your way through the new distribution models to capitalize on your work. It all begins with the right team, and this practical guide explains who you need to have on your side as you begin to grow and get more exposure. Coverage includes rehearsing, performing, recording, publishing, copyrights, royalties, and much more, giving you the information you need to start your career off smart.
Music industry success has never been easy to achieve, and recent transformations and disruptions
to the business side have made the whole idea even more daunting than before. This guide gives you a roadmap around the landmines, and provides expert advice for starting out on the right foot.
- Find the right players, agents, and business managers
- Make more money from your work with smart distribution
- Build your brand and get people talking about you
- Get gigs, go on tour, and keep on growing
If music is your calling, you need to plan your career in a way that sets you up for success from the very beginning. Put the right people in place, get the most out of your investments, and learn how to work the crowd both virtually and in person. Music Business For Dummies is your companion on your journey to the music career you want.
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About The Author
Loren Weisman is a music business consultant, speaker, and author who has been a part of over 700 albums. He also maintains TV production credits for three major networks and has served as a media consultant for many businesses in and out of the arts and entertainment fields. Loren is an executive producer and co-creator of Leveraging Smart, a new reality business TV show airing in 2016.
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music business for dummies
CHEAT SHEET
It seems like there are so many different aspects to the music business, and so little time to learn it all and hone your skills. From keeping yourself healthy and keeping your musical edge, to knowing how to confidently sell your act and when to post on social media sites, life in the music business offers a wide variety of daily tasks.
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There are certain traits that you see exhibited by successful people in the music business. There’s a saying that if you do something 30 times for 30 days straight, it becomes a habit. By practicing and having certain habits and traits become part of you and your approach to the music business, you have a much better chance at succeeding as well as sustaining that success for a long time to come.
General Music
As you prepare your music, your business, and your plan, the last step comes down to your presentation. Whereas people invest in a business, in the arts, they also invest in the people. All the more reason it’s important to have the ability to present and carry yourself well.
Posture
A confident walk that carries a confident body makes all the positive difference in the world.
Wouldn’t it be amazing if all you had to do was learn your instrument, practice your craft, write, record, and perform music? Many successful musicians tell of how they were “found” playing at this or that show, or how this or that record was played for this guy, or they signed this deal or that contract. Tens of millions more, however, had to take a different path, to find some level of success in music.
As you cut your deals, set your percentages, and secure both your rights and profits, the decisions you make in the music business early on in your career can have long-term effects. The biggest percentages of profits that you share are with your publisher, your label, your manager, investors, or whatever mix you have involved.
General Music
There is no such thing as just a single sponsorship or endorsement level in the music business. They all have a wide array of levels and options. Different companies offer different options. Having this understanding enables you to come to a conversation that much more educated and prepared to discuss options as well as how to negotiate deals and opportunities in the moment and for the long term.
General Music
The music business can be difficult to navigate, at tines. Art is opinion, and no one is right or wrong when it comes to what they think of a song, a piece of art, an exotic food, or anything else that’s subject to personal taste and opinion. However, the amount of people out there claiming to be experts on the music business is staggering and scary.
General Music
Reviews are a wonderful thing in the music business. A particularly well-trusted reviewer or source can immeasurably help get new fans to connect with you. At the same time, when you review other bands, venues, restaurants you’ve visited while on the road, products you use, and places where you’ve stopped (hotels to local attractions), you open up as a voice that people want to follow and then learn more about you and your music.
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The call to action is your signature in the music business. It is for blogs, videos, and other content that serves as a direction for where fans should go to find out more. It should get your audience to do something — usually in the form of clicking links, calling a number, or performing another activity to get more information.
General Music
Many think that revenues in the music business come only from CDs, downloads, and concert gigs. But revenues can come from nearly countless different sources. Take, for example, the following list of different revenue sources:
T-shirts and other wearables such as hats, sweatshirts, tank tops, and so on
Posters
Backstage pass product
Items with your logo such as key chains, coffee cups, tote bags, and more
Custom merchandise items, such as wine, clocks, jackets, and other special orders
TV licensing
Samples
Sponsored and nonprofit gigs
Publishing
Private/house gigs
Composing for and selling songs to other artists
Foreign translations
Corporate video licensing
When creating the best music business plan possible, it’s crucial that you build as many avenues to revenue as possible.
General Music
In the music business, cross-promotion is key. By mixing the right physical (offline; promotional items) marketing approaches, products, and promotions with the best posts, blogs, and online marketing angles, both aspects complement each other to allow you the farthest fan reach with the least effort and the most results.
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In the middle of all the music, branding, and music business plan are the legal and organizational elements that make the business and any investments legitimate. This includes the internal contracts between each member in a band, the contracts with independent contractors you work with or have worked with, who wrote what, who is getting what, and the organization of the group into an actual business venture that has accounting and accountability.
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By taking a close look at the changes in the music industry, you can avoid making the mistakes of the past but also avoid making moves that once worked and were effective, but are no longer applicable.
Look at what has happened when you are building your plan and keep the past, present, and future in mind. Keep in mind not only the changes that have occurred but also the trends of where the music business is heading.
General Music
Advertising yourself in the music business can be tough. You may want to consider giving onliner ads a try. Give your ads time to reach your audience, and create shorter campaigns to make tracking that much better. Too many rush to start a Twitter campaign thinking they are reaching the world, but then they find out they barely reached anyone at all.
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Print ads can be a scary investment in the music business. They can cost a great deal of money to get the exposure you need and are read less and less each day. Although online advertising has a much better chance at conversions, some print can work to your favor; however, choose wisely and realize that those most affordable print options usually mean that your advertisement will appear small on the page and bunched up with other ads, too.
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Differentiate every show, whether it’s a release party or a gig. In the music business, every show should be more than just a gig and although you might put a little more promotional money into a release event, keep in mind that every gig should have something special about it. This helps it to stand out from all the other bands that have shows or events at that time.
General Music
Want to run a successful event in the music business? It comes down to thinking of a show as more than just a show when having an event that’s designed to make you money, help your promotion, and be as productive as possible. Too many artists and even managers have a linear mindset to shows and events.
Instead, think of every show and every event as an opportunity for that night and all the people who attend, but also for all the people who may have seen or heard about the event, those who were told about the event, as well as local media with whom you now have a greater connection.
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The biggest part of your business plan in the music business is the marketing. It’s one of the first lines on your expense sheet that investors look at to see if you budget enough to get the word out about . . . you. And if enough music fans learn about you and like your music, the quicker and easier those investors get paid back.
Just as it’s good to act as your own teacher in the music business, it’s also good at times to get a teacher or take lessons while you’re on the road with different instructors. While having one teacher who knows you and in a way can track for you, visiting different instructors and sharing some of your analysis and tracking of your playing can help them bring a different approach to and for you.
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A gig is more than a gig in the music business. A song is more than the final mix. The marketing is going to take up more time than the recording and performing put together. So how do you focus on the individual tasks while continue to see and work for the bigger picture?
It’s not as much about the idea of multitasking; it’s more about making every task have multiple results.
Whether you go the route of an established music publishing company or you start your own, you want to get as many licenses for your music to create profit. Licensing your music means just that — you or the music publisher allow someone to use a product that you own but you don’t transfer the ownership. The deals created from licensing your music, ironically enough, is called publishing.
It seems like there are so many different aspects to the music business, and so little time to learn it all and hone your skills. From keeping yourself healthy and keeping your musical edge, to knowing how to confidently sell your act and when to post on social media sites, life in the music business offers a wide variety of daily tasks.
General Music
Want to work in the music business, but stay out of the spotlight? These are the musician jobs that don’t have the brightest spotlights shining on them, but keep you playing, performing, recording, and writing the music that is out there shining.
Session musician, substitute musician, and backup musician: The highest caliber musician job for musicians; these musicians are the first call to the studio, the last-minute call to cover for another, or one of the backup singers or players for a tour, session date, or gig.
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There are many jobs in the music business that don’t involve writing music or playing music. Are you the architect type? Do you like the kind of work that builds from the ground up and the type that is all about creating the right foundations? Maybe the building-careers job options strike your fancy.
Music business consultant: A professional and experienced music business consultant has a wide array of experience and knowledge about the music business and helps artists, labels, managers, and others organize and outline plans for successful ventures.
General Music
In the music business, you have to worry about what happens before, during, and after the show. Before/during/after-the-show checklists ensure that everything you need to handle is either being handled or is on the list to be handled. With all the different activities going on before, during, and after a show, it can be overwhelming to remember and track it all.
General Music
Content is king in the music business. It draws people back to your website, stores, products, and you. Applying the most engaging content that draws a direct and indirect interest in you is a requirement to connect with new fans as you continue to maintain and keep interest brewing with your existing fan base.
General Music
In the music business, you need to have a plan for your website. Inside all the different types of content — like blogs, videos, photos, and audios — that you post and plan out, add different concepts and pieces to further more interest in you and your music. Adding these supplementary elements to your content not only helps keep the content and your postings more engaging, it also mixes things up a bit and can make the viewer look a little deeper.
General Music
The first words that define your brand to most people in the music business are your tagline. This is the information that gives the initial short definition or elevator pitch about exactly who you are. Everything you want to tell people isn’t covered in a tagline, of course, but it creates the connection from your logo to your name to your sound and what you are about.
General Music
You need to consider your keywords and phrases carefully to be recognized in the music business. Before you paint a picture, you first need colors on the palette to work with. It’s hard, frustrating, and ineffective to write a bio from start to finish without some type of “paints.” Create a couple different lists of words and phrases, and you create a palette of different colors to paint the best bio for you right onto the canvas.
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Touring is an essential financial obligation in the music business. Touring costs a great deal and in many cases more than people realize. Build up a conservative but considerate budget that takes into account all the requirements to sustain a tour and get an artist or band everywhere they need to be.
Look for ways to cut expenses, such as finding a coffee shop for Internet access or staying with friends, family members, or fans.
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Press releases are common practice in the music business. Keep your press release under 400 words and get right to the point, whether it’s an announcement, product, or event. Make the release quickly cover the who, what, when, where, why, and how of the information you’re putting out there.
Your release also should cover standout points about why your product or event draws people in and why media should be interested in either covering it or doing a story on it.
When you’re in the music business, you need to make the most of your rehearsal time. The following is a list of techniques for rehearsing your songs for arrangement, production, and performance to achieve the best sounds in the fastest ways. There’s no right or wrong way to rehearse; find the method that works best for you.
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Promoting your sponsor is a very important part of the music business. There’s nothing better in showcasing or promoting a product than watching it or trying it out for yourself, from test-driving a car to having a certain guitar in your hands to feel exactly how it plays for you.
At the same time, seeing something in person and watching how others experience it can help, too.
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Everyone has different abilities, needs, and requirements in the music business. Connecting and working with the right team, studio, and players can make or break a recording. When finding the right studio, producer, engineer, and musicians, it always comes back to your due diligence.
Always double-check and find the reviews, follow up with past clients, and put in the time to research the people who are about to become part of your recording.
Working in the music business is not easy; there’s lots of work that needs done before you can even set foot on a stage. With the array of tasks that need to be done (the lists, the action items, the marketing, content creation, shows, traveling, and so on) in the mix of everything that’s happening on any given day, the ability to streamline and simplify your workload is key to enabling you to accomplish important duties.
General Music
In the music business, the hardest and trickiest aspect of touring is time management. There are enough hours in the day to get everything done. It just comes down to how you use and delegate those hours while you’re on the road. There are four places where you spend the bulk of your time on any given day:
In your hotel or lodging situation (usually sleeping)
On the road driving to the next town
At the venue or a radio station, TV station, or marketing-related place
In a restaurant, coffee shop, or convenience store
By applying the best time management and best use of each location, you can get the most done and allow for that extra time for yourself.
General Music
You will need promotional graphics in the music business. Having a template of your core promotional graphics makes it easier to build online ads, layouts for physical products, promotional posters, CD covers, and everything in between. For quick access, keep graphics on your website or through a content hosting site like Dropbox or Cloud.
General Music
What your music sounds like on stage and what it sounds like in the audience are two very different things in the music business. Every room, every stage, every sound person, and sound system is different. You might know exactly what you want to hear, and you think you know what’s being heard out front; however, in most cases, you don’t have a clue.
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Online is a great place to promote your endorsements while continuing to market the music, yourself, and your information. When you take an approach of sharing information that people can relate to while highlighting a product, it comes off a lot less pitchy and more engaging.
Linking directly to the products and companies
Hey buddy!
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After you get the masters back, it’s time to just release it, right? Wrong! In the music business, the biggest mistake that happens after musicians get the final master back is that they rush to release the music and go to that mindset of “as soon as they hear it, it will sell.” Unfortunately with no preparation between the post-recording part and the pre-release, the bulk of these recordings fizzle and die out before they have a chance to shine.
General Music
Sponsorships and endorsements are a necessary part of the music business, so you will need to be prepared. Whether it’s a summary in your pitch letter or having links and basic information added or ready to send upon request, have your best and most professional promotional materials ready to go.
Whether they are direct website links to easy-to-understand pages or a short link with a description for that link, have all your materials easily accessible with simple links or descriptive links so that people know exactly where they’re going and what they should expect to see when they land there.
General Music
It is important to consider SEO when developing your marketing strategy for the music business. When you apply SEO (search engine optimization) tactics to each post, you help make each blog, video, and photo that much more findable in the search engines.
Even though a post goes up on that day you post it, if correctly formatted, that post can serve as an additional marketing push for a long time to come.
General Music
In the protection of your music, your brand, and yourself, wellness and health also need to be taken into consideration when you address security. From checkups to getting to a doctor or clinic when you are sick, to the maintenance when you are sick or hurt, your wellbeing is what allows your music to keep keeping on.
General Music
A great way to figure out what you want to do as well as what you would never do in the music business is to ask some important questions of yourself in a self-assessment format. Looking in the mirror and really being honest with yourself is the best way to know what’s best for you.
Don’t lie to yourself or answer these questions any other way than with brutal honesty.
General Music
Social media is where you see the most conversions and the most bang for your advertising buckin the music business. It’s also the best way to get your message, marketing, and music out there online. There are hundreds of books and thousands of views on these methods, but it comes down to four simple types of promotions and advertisements.
You’ll need a tagline if you want to succeed in the music business. Before you lock in the tagline with your logo and font, plan to take it for a spin — a test drive of sorts — on a whole bunch of different roads. The better idea you have of how others perceive it, the better you can get a pulse on what works and what doesn’t.
General Music
One of the first places an investor, potential funder, or the owners of a label will look at in a music business plan is the expenses and costs section. Having the best-planned and most-detailed expense budget is where most music business plans fail.
Copyright fees
Publishing fees
Trademark fees
Attorney fees
Bookkeeping setup
Accounting costs
Music consultant
Music producer
Recording studio
Recording engineer
Mixing engineer
Mastering
Session players
Graphic designer
web designer
SEO expert
Photographer
Videographer
Distribution
Marketing/publicist
Apparel
Insurance (gear)
Healthcare
Grant writer
Web hosting
Miscellaneous Products
Press kits
Banners
Business cards
Postcards
Merchandise displays
Printing fees
Postage fees
Memberships
Instruments
Cases
Computer
Phone
Online backups
Website support
Music conferences
Gas/tolls
Vehicle maintenance
Radio promotion
Magazine ads
Postering
CDs/Vinyl
Download cards
Rent/mortgage
Hotels
Food
Salaries
Internet
Clothing
Flights
Hotels
T-Shirts
Cups and glasses
Merchant setup
Taxes
Towels
Stickers
Facebook ads
Twitter ads
YouTube ads
Promoted posts
Internet radio ads
Press releases
Website ads
Print ads
Laundry
Instrument repair
Local promoters
Personal insurance
Hair
Make Up
Although you might be able to save money on certain requirements, you always need to have a great deal budgeted for the cost of marketing.
General Music
When researching a record deal, investor, gig, manager, music publisher, booking agent, or anything/anyone else that can help your music career, it’s important to look at the other side of the coin. Looking at how you can help or allow the other party to profit as well shows you are looking at the complete and bigger picture.
General Music
That amazing song, that great look, that band that sounds like no other: These are only parts of the music business. To thrive, sustain, and succeed in the music business — the singer on the front of the stage, the drummer in the back of the stage, the manager on side stage, or the production company that built that stage — you need to know the 16 Ps that help you move further in all the aspects of the music business or any type of business today.
General Music
In the music business, when you roll out your promotional and merchandise items, you create a win-win scenario for your marketing and sales. The T-shirt that was purchased by that girl at a show who wears it to her college classes the next day wasn’t only a sale for you; she’s now part of your physical marketing team.
General Music
Think of your website as your home base, where everything out there in the music business links back to you. On the opposite side, this is where you can link everything to send people out to all your different social media sites like Facebook and Twitter, stores like iTunes and Amazon, audio sites, streaming sites, video sites, picture sites, blog sites, and everywhere else.
General Music
Social media is a great asset for promoting your music. Every social media page has its own best practices, and there are complete books on every one of the following sites, but here are some simplified tips and practices to apply to each site. Give each post a primary home base from where it’s shared.
Change the headline; keep the content
Make slight headline adjustments for each page as you share the main content from a single page.
General Music
In the music business, the distribution of your release is just as important as the release itself. Use a mixture of a distribution service as well as a personalized list of contacts that you can build up for each city as well as national contacts.
Using Send2press.com, a news and press release distribution service, is one of the best things you can do for your releases.
General Music
Diet and fitness are important factors in the music business. You may remember those public service announcements in elementary school, but there’s a bit of science behind the idea of ‘you are what you eat.’ Maybe there’s something to Lolly! Lolly! Lolly! Get your adverbs here too, but let’s not tangent too far.
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It’s only a name! Right? No, it’s all about your name! It’s the first step of connecting people to you in the music business. Your name is what people Google to find your website, band bios, and tour dates. Finding the right name makes this decision-making process more important than just scratching out names on a yellow legal pad and narrowing it down to the one that everyone settles for.
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