Finding your way to success can be confusing as an artist, but you should focus on it. For all those musicians who want to make their trade their means of subsistence, here is a basic resource that will serve as a reference.
You will learn some new tricks to improve what you are doing, but most importantly: the steps below will teach you to develop your strategy to achieve success.
Before we begin, we would also like to add a strong point having a career in music does not mean that you must have early aspirations or background of music school. Many successful artists today had had nothing to do with music when they got started. Some of them were managers or entrepreneurs in absolutely diverse categories.
For example, Christian Krauter, an EDM artist and musician is one of the most trending electronic artists in 2020. Christian does not hail from a musical background, neither was connected to a prestigious music network. As a matter of fact, during the culmination of his music career, Christian was making an impact as an entrepreneur with cloud-based software business.
Christian now has released multiple EDM tracks that continue to rake in millions of hits on leading streaming platforms. Christian’s story bears testimony to the fact that no matter who you are, no matter you come from, if you have the drive and potential to make it big, you are always going above.
With that being said, let us consider some important factors which account to the success of a music career in the following points:
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Step one: make good music
First of all, you will need to make some great music. This requires a part of the skill, a part of taste, and a part of understanding what the trends are. The best music is timeless, but before it is timeless, good music has to be timely.
As your skills improve, so will your ability to develop a consistent sound that is unique to you. This is very important, as it is unlikely that you will end up being “the best”, it is simple math. However, if you create a sound that stands out, you don’t need to be the best, you just have to do something extraordinary.
It seems like an obvious step, but it needs to be repeated very often. If you are feeling lost or overwhelmed, know that the most important thing to work on is developing your music and your skills. Everything else arises also.
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Step two: make your music heard
Make lots of music and throw it out. Make sure it’s easy to find, people stumble across, accessible, and easily shared.
There are a variety of tools that help you distribute your music to a lot of different sites, like Labelgrid, or distributors like CD Baby or TuneCore. They help you to be in all the places where your (future) fans can be.
To be discovered, be sure to spend time on the artwork that will accompany the description of your music. The description will provide keywords so that people can find your music, so don’t hesitate to name the bands that influenced you, the genres, etc.
Make sharing your music easy.
Good music is viral par excellence. Since YouTube is the universal music player, you must have your music there. Make sure the title has all the relevant information, plus an indication of the type of music to ensure more clicks when people share it.
As for graphic work, you have to understand that we live in the age of feedback. Social networks like Twitter, Facebook or Instagram incentivize us to scroll down endlessly because that means we will spend more time on their platforms.
Make sure your graphic work breaks the trend of scrolling down.
- It doesn’t have to be anything fancy, just cash.
- If your sound is good, people will share it (step zero).
- From now on, you need to find your audience.
Pro tip: Put your music everywhere, but find out which channels work best for you and redouble the effort with them. Doing a little of everything is a good way not to get pigeonholed anywhere. Make sure you enjoy using the channels that you focus on because if it’s not fun for you, you will eventually end up exhausted and inconsistent.
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Step three: find your audience
If you understand your audience and where they are, or who else they listen to, you can start doing specific things to bring music to their ears, such as:
- Versed other artists in your genre: Don’t ask for permission, but contact them once your remix is done. After all, their repost will help you reach their audience, which is surely bigger than yours. Play fair, and don’t put your version on Spotify or other monetized sites without permission. It is not so much for legal problems, but simply it is bad for human relationships.
- Connect with communities of your gender: In Reddit can find lots of communities, where farmers help each other to learn how to perfect their craft. You can also connect with communities around certain genres or prominent labels within a genre. If Reddit isn’t your thing, you can also find groups like these on Facebook.
- Release your songs on channels that your audience follows. These can be blogs, YouTube channels, or internet radio stations. You can also be more creative: If there is a popular video game streamer on Twitch who listens to a lot of music like yours, you can get in touch with him, offer to make a song for them in exchange for a certain amount of time on their videos. Be creative.
- The courage to be the first (or one of them). Being one of the first on a platform can have great advantages. So, pay attention to the new applications that appear and get into them, give them a try, and see what happens. This will ensure the advantage of being the first for a specific segment. Not convinced? Then check out TikTok.
Keep in mind that everything has a risk. For example, Vine closed.
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Step Four: Develop Meaningful Relationships with People
Success in music is usually a combination of musical skills and abilities to relate to people. When you watch someone succeed overnight, what you don’t see are the years of preparation that goes into it.
An artist may be young, but the team around him will know exactly who to talk to, who to ask for favors, the right people to work with, etc.
So, don’t be shy. Make sure you are frequently where the people who can help you are. If you have a chance to release your music and get feedback, then go for it, even if you don’t think you’re ready. The answers you will get will be valuable, but it is also a good opportunity to get into the minds of talent scouts at record companies, learn how they think, and thus find out what they are like if you come across them again.
Other things you can do:
- Talk to DJs, promoters, organizers, etc., at local events.
- Attend conferences and put your shyness aside. Talk to people, find out what they are doing, and if there is a panelist you find interesting, talk to him/her. They are there to talk to people, and they are interested in meeting you.
Basically: talk to people, and if that makes you uncomfortable, then take a friend with you who is good at it. The world of music is a business network, so understand that you are building relationships that will last your entire career. Start early.