25 Music Business And Music Marketing Tips For Musicians

I often get nuggets of information I feel are important for anyone who makes music. Sometimes I share them in the form of blog posts on here, other times I share them as quick updates on my music marketing Facebook page. I call these the ‘Tip Of The Day'.

I know not everyone has joined me on Facebook however, and those that do don't always see this helpful advice due to Facebook's algorithm only showing updates to a small percentage of my audience. It's because of this that I've decided to share 25 days worth of short but really powerful tips that could change the way you run your music career!

If you haven't already joined me on Facebook, join me now and be sure to like / share / comment on a few things so my posts show up in your timeline.

So, here are the tips complete with links for extra reading. Be sure to bookmark this guide so you can refer back to it in future. 🙂

The First 5 Important Music Business Tips

I've added the first five important tips for those who actively want this information and appreciate the advice we give. Tip number three is especially important, so if you want access you can unlock them by clicking one of the social buttons below. Thank you in advance.

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As a reward here are the five additional tips:

Tip Of The Day: Sometimes, money just needs to be spent. We all want to save money and spend as little as we can on our music careers, but if it means also reducing the quality of the product we offer, is that really a good idea? Probably not… I mean, if your songs don't match the quality of those that people hear on radio every day, do you think they're going to listen to you? If they can regularly hear well recorded and music produced by the top people in your genre, why would they settle for a lesser experience? Saving money is all good, but be careful not to do so at the cost of making a poor quality product. This is a sure music career killer, and one you'll want to avoid! Save for a few weeks or months if you have to, just don't compromise on those important things.

Tip Of The Day: In order to get your ideal fan, you first need to know where they are. Where they hang out, what music channels they tune into, what radio stations they listen to etc. Those places are where you need to get your music. Give it a try.

Tip Of The Day: If you've spent weeks or (Most likely) months recording and putting together a album, mixtape or EP, make sure you make time to get a proper RELEASE PLAN in place. Simply mentioning it a lot on your website and social pages isn't enough, you need to combine that with a load of other things. Getting your songs to Djs, gigs, forms of viral marketing, the list goes on. This post isn't to give you ideas of things you can do, I've given a load of promo ideas in my guides. What I do want to make clear though is just putting material out there and hoping it will sell doesn't work. You won't make many sales. You need to spend around the same amount of time marketing as you have recording your release, so people actually know about your launch and can make the decision of whether or not they'll buy it. So if you're planning on releasing a single, album, mixtape or whatever, just don't forget the promotion side of things. Maybe even hire someone to do the PR for it. Not me, I don't deal with that side of things.

Want some tips for releasing a digital product? Check our guide for 8 huge tips on doing just that!

Tip Of The Day: As with most things in the music industry, you'll do better at getting gigs if you start building real relationships with the people involved. I don't mean emailing people the same template messages you emailed all the other event organizers, but more turning up at events and getting to know them face to face. If you want more information on this top way of landing yourself more gigs, check this post for a guide on how to do just that!

Tip Of The Day: Music videos don't have to be expensive to produce. Got a camcorder lying around? Got a iPhone 5? Both can produce videos of a quality that would be acceptable for Youtube promotional videos. What IS important though is a GOOD IDEA! Record and edit the video without much imagination, and your video will look cheap. This will be a bad reflection of you. Give the video a good concept and make it easy on the eye however, and you can make a captivating video that will make people stop and take notice of what you're doing!

If you want proof of this, check this inspiring post on making a video with a iPhone 5.

20 Tips For Musicians Covering All Different Areas

Tip Of The Day: If you want companies to push your music, you'll have to first benefit them. This could be in terms of good relevant music they'd want to play, promoting them in some way (and making them aware you've done that), telling them you'll come and help them with something they need help with, and the like. Use your imagination; see what the person you're approaching needs, and offer that. By doing so, you'll increase the chances they'll help you back in some way.

Tip Of The Day: Getting signed isn't essential to earning a full time living from music. That said, if you want to sign to a record label, you need to remember this: Record labels aren't generally signing unproven musicians! If you want record labels to take notice of you, you first need to prove you're a marketable product. How do you do this? By marketing yourself! Do your own promotion, build up a fanbase, and make sales. Play gigs, get your face out there. When you're creating enough buzz, record labels will approach you. More details in the guide ‘Why Signing A Record Deal Shouldn't Be Your Main Aim‘.

Tip Of The Day: Use the right studio. A free home studio with less then stellar equipment will give you a poor sounding product. Not good. That said, an expensive studio which throws extras at you such as pool tables and places to write your lyrics aren't where you should be investing your money. Go for somewhere which will give you nice sounding vocals, but also won't break the bank. Want more reading / advice on this? Then check our guide ‘When Making A Song, Does The Vocal Recording Quality Matter?‘

Tip Of The Day: There's no one universal way to make yourself stand out as a musician. If we were to all do the same thing thinking it'd make us stand out, we'd all blend in more then ever! Use the guides on Music Industry How To to get the core things you need for a successful music career down, but don't forget to think outside the box as well.

Tip Of The Day: While you don't want to come across big headed, using minor hype can help get people to notice you and your music. When people see excitement around them, they often get that excited feeling too. It's human nature. You can use this in your promotions to get people to pay closer attention and increase the chances they'll get involved in some way. Check my guide on ‘How To Make People Notice Your Music Using Hype‘ for full details and for other ways in which you can use hype to forward your music career.

Tip Of The Day: Just because you get more ‘fans', it doesn't mean you will make more money. If you give away your full album for free and end up with 500 new Facebook fans, you may still only end up making a couple of future sales from these freebie downloaders. If however you focused on getting people in who are willing to spend on the music they liked, chances are you'll earn a lot more over the long term! So what would you rather have, 20 Facebook fans who buy everything you put out, or 500 Facebook fans who hardly ever buy your material and would rather download it all for free?

Here are some more reasons you're not making money from your music.

Tip Of The Day: I know many musicians think of marketing as something they're not too keen on doing, but it doesn't have to be all hard work. Think of marketing your music more as sharing something beneficial to those who are looking for good music. You're just a friendly soul looking to talk to people and show them how your music can benefit their lives. That's all marketing is in it's simplest form. So go out and have conversations about how your music with others. 🙂

How much should you be marketing your music though? Find out here (Important guide).

Tip Of The Day: Rejection in the music industry happens. When it does, be better not bitter! Another opportunity will come along. Be better not bitter.

Tip Of The Day: If your last Youtube videos got 200 views or less, the answer to getting more views is NOT to release another Youtube video. It's to promote the current one you have! Pumping out song after song isn't going to help you get bigger if you don't know how to get people to listen to your current material. Aim to squeeze as much use out of your current song or video, and don't move on to the next one until that's done! If you haven't got a few thousand views, keep promoting it until you do. THEN you can move on.

Tip Of The Day: If you're going to make merchandise, be sure to do it right! There's no point pressing up a pen or t-shirt with just your name in a standard font, if it doesn't look good it won't sell! Make sure everything you make is of a good quality, and that you promote it like you would your music. Have your branding come across in your merch, but not so much that people are turned off from wearing it. Make it attractive to people whether they know who you are or not. THAT is when you'll start making more sales. If you want other tips on making more sales of your merch, be sure to check out ‘5 Steps To Selling More Merch For Beginner Musicians.' 🙂

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Tip Of The Day: The music business is a complex beast. What works for one person won't necessarily work for you. It's because of this that you always need to be trying new things out, and work with what works for you personally. Be sure to give a long enough test period though; doing something for one day before you give up isn't generally enough time to see if something works or not. A month or two should do the job, depending on what it is you're testing. Always trying new things will stop you from getting into bad habits, and show you if there's a better way to manage each task. This will lead to more fans and money in the long run.

Tip Of The Day: Musicians, protect your ears! While it's often the nature of the game, loud music can cause lasting and irreversible damage to your ears. Tinnitus for example, is something I've personally got due to performing loud gigs, radio shows and the like from a young age. It's not curable, and it's not fun. Have a look at my guide on the subject for one way you can protect your ears during loud gigs and the like. I wish someone would have given me this advice when I started out, so I hope you take it seriously.

Tip Of The Day: If you're not getting at rejected at least a few times a week, you're not reaching for enough opportunities in the music industry! Rejection is just part of the ‘game', a lot of people will reject you, some will accept and help you out. The way you deal with rejection can support or ruin your music career. Take it bad, and it'll eat you up till you stop putting the effort in. Learn to accept it and possibly even take positives from it, and you'll keep striving forward, getting better as you do. If you want some tips helping you to correctly deal with rejection, check out this post.

Tip Of The Day: Don't let not having a budget be an excuse for not marketing your music! Of course you will be limited to what you can and can't do, but use this time to figure out what kind of marketing really works! Having a budget and not having any previous marketing experience can be harmful; It's too easy to spend a load of money on things that should work in theory but don't in reality. So if you can learn what does and doesn't work now, when you do get a budget to promote your music, most likely you'll end up spending it on the right things that'll actually help your music career! Want some ideas of free and cheap ways to market your music? Then have a look at this guide to see some methods worth trying!

Tip Of The Day: Make fans your marketing team! I know not all musicians have the finances to hire a marketing team when they're start out, so why not reach out to the people who already have a strong passion for your music; your fans? Interact with them right, and it's possible to get them on board promoting your music in a number of different ways. Want to know how to get the ball rolling with this? Then check ‘How To Get Fans To Help Promote Your Music Career‘. If you're not getting your fans to help you market, you're missing out on a big opportunity…

Tip Of The Day: Nothing in the music industry is guaranteed. The sad truth is, a lot of people won't get where they want to be. That said, it DOESN'T mean that it's not possible to make it as a musicians! Look at the charts. Do you see musicians? Exactly. Further more, regardless of whether or not you hit the charts, it's possible to make a full time income from the music business and making music. Don't let anyone ever tell you it's not achievable, because it is! It doesn't generally come to the lazy though, so be sure to work hard at achieving your goals. For those that haven't checked it yet, be sure to check our quiz ‘How Likely Are You To Succeed In The Music Industry?‘ to see if you've currently got the right mentality to potentially get far.

Tip Of The Day: Social media isn't a place for you to shout at fans, it's a place for you to have a two way conversation with them! Yes it can be great as a promotional tool and for letting people know when you've new songs out etc, but people want to connect with people! Show them who you are, reply back to them, and build up a lasting and loyal relationship. Don't, and your once fans will end up paying more attention to a musician who pays them attention back.

Tip Of The Day: Luck does play a role in how successful you are as a musician. That said, many people MAKE their own luck by putting themselves in the best position to take advantage of opportunities! Don't expect to be handed opportunities when you're not putting yourself out there; actively push your music career more, and you'll find you start getting a lot more lucky. So make it happen.

If you're not sure what kind of things you could be doing, check this guide on reasons musicians fail, and what you can do to greatly lower your chances of that happening to you.

Tip Of The Day: You need to learn what SPAM is. Without knowing it, a good percentage of musicians are spamming radio stations, record labels, TV channels, music bloggers, and even fans every day! By unknowingly spamming these places you're getting your emails ignored, and making people not want to work with you. If you have 99% of your communications ignored by these types of places, chances are you're doing something wrong.
If you're not sure if you're one of the people doing this, check out this guide about 7 spammy actions you could be doing without knowing. Check it out, take it on board, and change the way you approach people.

Tip Of The Day: Just because you've got a Facebook and Twitter account, that doesn't mean you're going to get a load of people listening to your music. Two very important things: 1) You have to WORK towards those social profiles getting your traffic, and 2) It's easy to do it wrong and drive people away. When in doubt, look at the successful profiles from musicians in your genre, and see what they're doing which works. And check this guide on ‘7 social media mistakes‘ to avoid driving your potential fans away.

More Tips Coming Soon

I've actually got more great nuggets of information which I'll be sharing on this site very soon. So keep an eye on the email newsletter and I'll let you know when they're up.

If you have any additional helpful tips you can add, please leave them in the comments below. Thanks for reading.