Today's Music Biz

I’m told by some that Drake is a “reverse rapper”.  Most successful rappers go to TV. Drake was a teenage TV star on Digrassi The Next Generation before his rap career took off.

Either way, there is no denying DrizzyDrake is everywhere with the fan base to follow.

So what are some of the secrets to Drake’s success in Today’s Music biz and what mistakes can you avoid?

1)  Build your brand.

If you Google Drake you’ll come up with DrizzyDrake (Drake’s AKA) and Octobers Very Own or OVO.  Drake’s brand. He built this brand before he signed to a label.

2) Listen to constructive criticism from your fans.

In a recent interview with Billboard magazine, Drake states that he’d “rather have great reviews than numbers”. Implementing feedback can take your music to the next level. I’ve seen it happen.

3) Positivity matters.

Drake’s song “Successful” and the lyrics to the majority of his songs are aspirational.  They talk about what he’s accomplished, or wants to accomplish (even if it’s marrying Nicki Minaj).  This is how he connects with many of his fans.  You have to have dreams and goals to be successful in Today’s Music Biz.  You have to believe in them, sing or write them to act on them.

4) Get your music cleared before announcing a release date.

Drake’s first album Thank Me Later release was pushed back due to licensing issues after the date had been announced.  It may work for someone with a large enough, established, fan base but you don’t want to build anticipation and then let your fans down by not being able to release your album on time.

5)  Leaks can be good.

He’s quoted in Billboard.com saying “the night that it leaks is the night by album release is…that’s when you start hearing feedback. That’s how we gauge things now”.  His latest release ended up dropping on the night of an awards show where he had the opportunity to let everyone know on national TV during his performance that it sold 700,000 units.

6)  Be loyal to those who give you a chance.

Drake’s first album with Lil Wayne’s Young Money hit #1 on Billboard top 200. His most recent deal for the release of Take Care was signed with Young Money/Cash Money/Universal to make sure Lil Wayne got paid off everything he did.  Just for believing in him!  This album just hit #1 on the Billboard top 200 as well. My guess is he’ll be winning more awards next year and thanking Lil Wayne.

 7)  Fame is fleeting.

Drake Says you get 30 days for an album, of media and radio air play. Drake connects with fans by singing about situations they are going through.  But everyone’s situation changes day by day.  Whats hot in music changes from day to day. That’s why we teach you to The ABC’s of Music Marketing.

There are  more lessons to be learned from this successful rapper.  One we’ve talked about many times at TMB is collaboration.  Drake’s success in working with others such as Trey Songz,  Jay-Z,  and Mary J. Blige and so many more has been phenomenal. Drake even wrote Un-thinkable (I’m Ready) with Alicia Keys.  Collaboration done right always leads to success and other opportunities.

We’re here to help you Succeed in Today’s Music Biz.

“Imagine yourself as the person you want to be. Then live up to that image”

~Legendary Songwriter / Actor
Kristoffer “Kris” Kristofferson.

Fonzworth Bentley completed “C.O.L.O.U.R.S. (Cool Outrageous Lovers Of Uniquely Raw Style)”The recording was to be released on Sony Urban. But it was never released. It was not promoted (“shelved”). Why? His record label was “dissolving” underneath him.

Mr. Fonzworth Bentely

Who is Fonzworth Bentely? You may remember him as Sean P.Diddy Combs side-kick. At least that is how I remember him. What most people don’t know, is that he has sold to a market of fan’s by focusing on four paths that are unseen by many. Today, I’ll show you those 4 paths.

1. Create Your Space:

Be different. Fonzworth Bentley created space himself by being different. In marketing it’s called having a U.S.P. “Unique Selling Proposition“. You also may have heard of it as “positioning” in the market.

Mr. Bentley was able to make space in the music business by relying on visual images to separate himself from the thousands other would-be M.Cs. in Hip-Hop. Fonzworth made himself different from other Rappers by wearing a bow-tie, argyle sweaters, expensive dress shoes and umbrella.

His message? He was the gold-standard for hip-hop. His style? One of a millionaire. Unlike every other Rapper from Atlanta, who wears the sagging pants and un-tucked shirts. Fonworth wears old money clothes. That is being different.

Have you created a unique image?

Every successful artists from Elvis Presley, to Freddie Mercury, to Nicki Minaj, to Lady GaGa, Elton John, Shaggy…all and more, have made room for themselves using visuals to create room to get into a crowded and competitive music market.

2. Generate Awareness

In what ways can you generate awareness of your Music Business?

C.O.L.O.U.R.S. (Cool Outrageous Lovers Of Uniquely Raw Style) got Mr. Bentley noticed. But he shelved the release because his record label was crumbling. He held off on releasing the project until he could generate enough awareness and have a fan base ready to buy.

The result: Bentley sold 90,000 singles in 6 months and over 120,000 videos for the single “Everybody” (featuring Kanye West and Andree 3000 of OutKast).

According to Mr. Bentley, selling leads to the kind of success that creates a “Situation of Awareness”. Major label are willing to deal with you…on more fair terms…once you have built awareness.

3. Watch Your Step

When Sony Urban was “dissolving”, Fonzwoth was offered an opportunity to release his first record anyway. He declined. Instead, Fonzworth waited until the Music Industry settled down.

The Music Industry changes every 6 months. It’s an unlucky fact that some of the greatest artists never have a chance. They are shelved…

Alicia Augello Cook, was shelved because her record label had no idea where to “position” her music in the market. She was signed to Jermaine Dupis’ So So Def Recordings, but the parent company Columbia Records didn’t know who would buy her music. So she signed to Arista Records which dissolved a short time later. 

Clive Davis, one of the greatest Record Executives – ever, started J. Records and signed Alica. She released “Songs In A Minor” and the world became fans of  Alicia Keys.

Keeping in mind the lessons learned from the mistakes of other recording artist, Fonzworth waited to release his record. This smart step saved Fonzworth the frustration of  having his record under-promoted while Sony Urban was dying a slow death.

Imagine if Fonzworth had of released his record?  It would have went un-promoted or “shelved” (as the say in the Music Business).

It’s a good thing that he decided to take a step backward to generate some awareness. This step allowed him to move forward with more control to chart the direction of his career.

4. Watch Your Thoughts

Mr. Bentley has removed three words from his vocabulary “Can’t”, “But” and “Trying”. Think about it? Those 3 words can prevent you from having the success you really desire. “I’m trying to get my music out there but I can’t because…” LOL

Below are some helpful insights:

• Watch your thoughts.
• Listen to what you say to yourself.
• Attitudes become beliefs.
• Beliefs guide conduct.
• Conduct leads to consequences.

Dr. Amen, in his groundbreaking book, “Change Your Brain – Change Your Life” discusses “A.N.Ts (Automatic Negative Thoughts). More specifically Dr. Amen suggests that you crush these ANTs as soon as you notice them.

In today’s Music Biz, each must chart their own path. Hopefully,you will take the right paths along the way.

What are the 4 Music Business Marketing Elements that every Musician promoting their music should know?

We’ll get around to that in a few. But first, imagine your music product done? Your music is ready. You’ve got your song ready. Heck, you may have even went to DiscMasters and got a few hundred CD’s pressed and ready for sale.

The problem is, you haven’t done any ‘Music Marketing Research’. So you stand there with your head spinning with ideas to “get your music out there”.

The not-so imaginary scenario above is common among musicians, songwriters, producers, managers…Everyone at some point has to figure out how they will “get their music out there”. With this in mind, below I’ll go over the 4 Elements of Music Marketing

1. Product: Why does Jay-Z, Willi.i.am, L.A. Reid and other Professionals in Music Promotion speak of their music, they say “Records”? Because they understand that a Record is a “product”. A product is anything that can be brought or sold.

2. Place: The great Rapper Rakim said, “It ain’t where you’re from it’s where you’re at”. I’ll bet if you’ve dabbled in any kind of Marketing, you’ve heard the word “placement” being thrown around. Picture placement as the location? You’ve most likely heard the phrase, “Location…location…location”. There is a sound reason for this.

3. Promotion: After you’ve got your Product, and figured out the places you want to be, it’s time to focus on how you want to promote your music. Did you know that a great majority of excellent records fail to sell because of a flawed Promotion Strategy? How you promote your music product is as important as where.

4. Price: iTunes, Ticket Master and many big players in the Music Industry have heard back-lash from Fans and Recording Artist (like Prince). That is because some people believe those companies charge too muc. Yes, you can charge too much money for music.  You can also charge too little money for your music. Charge too much and you’ll turn off too many. Charge too little and your fans may turn your offer down.

Speaking of Prince, I few day’s ago I heard him say, “People tend to de-value stuff they can get for free”. I’ve seen it myself in the products that I sell. Doing a favor for a friend, for free will likely be forgotten – or, keep them coming for more free stuff.  The same is true of Music Buyers. Today’s Music Fan asks, “Why pay if you can get it for free?”

The good news is that successful Music Marketing is now easier than ever before. That’s because I’ve shared the basic marketing structure. You didn’t get this valuable information from me for free. You had to pay some attention to what I was showing you.

What causes music lovers to wait in line to buy records?

This time around, I’ll tell you a secret…that secret is what’s called a Pre-sell. Successful Musicians (or their team) understand the process of pre-selling music.

Pre-selling music is a a marketing method used by promoters, artists and anyone who refuses to risk their time effort and talent to chance in today’s music biz.

Any musician trying to sell music will be doing themselves a favor by using pre-sell strategies. Pre-selling music will give you an edge.

What Is Pre-Selling?

Pre-selling is the process of telling Fan’s (or potential fans)… about your music or event – before the sale officially begins.

For example, Justin Bieber’s pre-sold his movie Never Say Never at least six weeks before it was to play in theaters. Thousands of teens stood in-line waiting…often in the cold…to see the Musician they love and adored. It is very possible for every Musician in every genre can have fan’s lined up outside of their events (sales).

I’ve seen it locally many times. More importantly, I’ve been a part of many pre-sell events. Some pre-sell’s have been out of this world successful.

For example, the Janet Jackson 4 Jamz pre-sell Promotion. The Janet Jackson pre-sell promotion was an immediate success for the mid-west based concert promoter I helped.

Pre-selling Prevents Music Promotion Failure

More importantly…pre-selling prevents local musicians from loosing mass amounts of money promoting sales that are not going to give a return on investment.

I’ve seen many musicians waste time and money for concerts that didn’t peak any interest during pre-sell. I won’t name any names. But the smart ones ended the concert promotion. The not so smart musicians (or their promoters) didn’t stop the promotion and the result was failure.

It sucks to lose money… but it really sucks to lose hundreds or thousands of dollars on a promotion that loses money.

The good news is that you can use a pre-sell to help you prevent a poor promotion from ever happening. So here’s what you can do before you burn your hard-earned dollars on a promotion that may…or may not succeed.

• Offer special discounted price (for a limited time):

  
  I’m sure you’ve heard of someone calling themselves someones number-one Fan? People like getting an advantage. When they can, people will give themselves an advantage. A special price offering gives the Fan the opportunity to take or give that special advantage to themselves.

• Offer special access to Fan’s who take advantage of pre-sell offers:

  One of the greatest pre-sell methods is to offer additional access to the musician. Backstage, and VIP Access offers a compelling reason to buy that drives sales like very few other methods.

Even better news is…Musicians can use pre-sell events and specials for digital music downloads as well as off-line sales and concerts. There is no reason to suffer through another failed music promotion. Not when pre-selling provides promotions insights as well as if your sale will return your efforts a return on investment.

Rapper Lil Wayne gets a Qwiki
(pronounced “quickie”)

Lil Wayne Gets A Quickie

There is a new social experience being created on the Internet. Lil Wayne is on of the beneficiaries of this great experiment. The website is called “Qwiki”…Think of it as a quick wiki like wikipedia. You can check out Lil Wayne’s Qwiki here.

MIGUEL DE CERVANTES

The great writer Miguel De Cervantes once wrote, “It is one thing to praise discipline, and another to submit to it.”

The only thing that separates winners in the Music Business from the losers is self-discipline. Self-discipline is a Music Business Secret that you should fear ignoring.

Discipline can be thought of as a branch of knowledge. Self discipline can be thought of as “knowledge of yourself”. For example, It’s important to know how you will perform in various areas of the Music Business.

Right now, there is singer, musician, producer (“talent”) looking for work. No doubt this talent is gifted in their musical craft. You and I may not heard of them because they are painfully shy. The problem is this talent does not have the self-discipline to know they are painfully shy.

Travie McCoy sang, “I Wanna Be A Billionaire – So Freakin Bad.” If I had a dollar for every talent without self-discipline, but with a list of excuses for why they have not succeeded in the Music Biz, I might just be a billionaire.

I won’t pretend that self-discipline is easy. I won’t lead you to believe that self-discipline is all it takes to succeed. I will say that self-discipline has taken average talents to the realm of Music Business Legends. I’ll remind you that people with self-discipline are winners.

Finally, I’ll ask you to give yourself some time to learn your strengths and weaknesses? For instance; if you are a great musician, how good are you at contract negotiations, promotions, marketing, and areas not related to playing your instrument? Having expertise in all areas of the Music Business, or having someone on your team with the knowledge that you lack, is one of the best Music Business Secrets.
 

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Who Else Wants To Learn The Secrets Of Using The Power Of Radio To Sell More Music To Up To Millions Of Fan’s?

I’m a 20 Year Veteran of the Radio and Records Industries in the United States. If you’ve ever dreamed of hearing your songs played on the Radio, now there is a powerful resource to make your dream come true.

I’ve had the pleasure of working on Music Promotion campaigns for Destinys Child, Janet Jackson, Prince, R. Kelly, Jay-z, Big Pun, EMINEM, 112, T.L.C., James Brown, B.B. King, Mary Mary, Mike Jones, 3/6 Mafia, Ginuwine, Busta Ryhmes, Eminem and many more.

I’ve worked for some of the most successful stations, in diverse formats like; Adult Contemporary, Country, Hip-Hop & R&B and Rock just to name a few. Working for non-commercial and commercial radio formats, I’ve witnessed the awesome power of how getting one song played on the radio can send your record sales from 0 to 100,000 almost overnight.

Before Nora Jones sold over 20 Million Copies of her Debut CD, she was an unknown Indie Artist. Nora Jones was so unheard of that her Record Label only printed 10,000 copies of her music. But her Record Label also had a secret; the knowledge of how to get Nora’s Music on the Radio.

Although her second song, “don’t know why” only reached number 30 on the Billboard Hot 100 song charts, this song would establish the, Indie-Jazz singer as a respected new artist. Nora Jones would go on to sell over 40 million units after releasing two albums.

Radio is the Secret to Nora Jones Selling 40 Million CD’s

There are special Music Promotion resources that Nora Jones used to get her music heard on radio. Her team used these resources to promote her music at Radio Stations. The downside is that many people can not afford to pay thousands of dollars for access to these resources. In Radio Promotion Secrets, I tell you these resources, for under $100.00.

Here’s the ugly truth: without radio airplay your music may never live up to it’s true potential. Without radio airplay it’s almost like your music doesn’t matter to anyone else but you. The ugly truth is, the majority of people will not take you seriously until they’ve heard your music on the radio.

Without radio airplay you are missing your only realistic shot at Music Super-stardom in the Music Biz.

Why is it that so many below-average artists get played on the radio?

Remember back to a horrible song you heard on the radio? You may have said to yourself, “my songs are WAY better than that song”. The fact is, those who follow the “system” get airplay. Those artist who don’t follow the system don’t get airplay.

That’s why I’ve published “Radio Airplay Promotion Secrets”. This easy to download eBook reveals the exact secrets on how to successfully promote your music to get your music heard on radio. Radio Promotion Secrets tells you how to get your music on the air and possibly sell millions of songs.

Would you love to hear the sound of your music on the radio?

Radio Airplay is The Best Way to Become A Music Star”

• Once your music is played on the air, you’ve turned your ”Star Machine” on. Once your music is heard on radio people who doubted that you would “make it” start believing in your success.

• Many artists have become rich and famous with only one song on the radio.
• Radio Airplay gets you noticed by the Record Labels
• Radio airplay brings tons of more people to your shows
• Radio makes it possible to sell millions of your CD’s

You may be wondering, “what will I get”?

When you order Radio Airplay Secrets, first, I show you exactly how to Get your music ready for radio airplay. You wouldn’t believe all the people that don’t get radio airplay because they make simple mistakes like sending their material to radio stations before it’s ready for airplay.

In this report, I’ll show you how to package your material to send to radio stations. I’ll show you how to label your CD’s and how to easily mix your music down to Radio Specifications (“Spec’s).

I’ll show you why 98% of Artists and Band make simple mistakes that prevent them from getting airplay and exactly what to do step-by-step to get your music on the Radio.

Second, you’ll quickly understand how on-air radio works. This report will tell you how to connect with key people at radio stations, and how to influence them to play your music.

Third, you’ll learn how to find the stations that will play your music. Too many Artist send music to the wrong Radio Stations hoping that the station will play an unrecognized talent. This is a dream. The reality is you have to choose your stations wisely.

You’ll learn how to avoid the mistake of sending your music to the wrong stations.

Bonus in section three, you’ll get access to websites that make it easy to find any radio Station in any format in America and Canada in a few simple clicks. Most importantly you’ll be shown where to submit your music to get airplay. I’ll give you proven techniques to get your music heard and on the air that Major Record Labels use, but don’t want you to know.

Fourth, You’ll learn the proven system of getting radio airplay.

Fifth, You’ll learn how to make your pitch to radio stations. There are so many mistakes that prevent so many artist from persuading radio station staff to play their music. Radio Airplay Secrets will show you word-for-word exactly what to say to get radio airplay.

Sixth, You’ll learn what to do after you get radio airplay – to keep you getting radio airplay. There are so many secrets to keeping the momentum going that one-hit wonders never have taken advantage of. These secrets are free to use and can generate more publicity and sales than 98% of artists and bands. Best thing is these secrets are free to use, once you learn them.

Seventh, get Bonus FREE access to Top Secret Radio Websites and FREE Top Secret Radio Resources. “In this report, you’ll get 5 additional bonus pages of FREE radio websites and services that are 100% guaranteed to get your music heard by major players in the Radio Industry”.

Do you have the passion to get your Music heard by millions?

Do you want to get noticed and get a Record Deal? Would you like to be a Star in your City, Country or around the world? If you do, You can, and it all starts with radio airplay.

WARNING: This system is not ‘Payola”. Payola is illegal and can land you in jail or ruin your future. The system I show you is an honest one used by successful Independent and Major Record Labels as well as Radio Promoters – to get their projects on the radio.

Order Thousands of Dollars Worth of Radio Promotion Secrets now for Only $47

Radio Airplay Secrets is delivered to your email as soon as PAYPAL confirms your order payment