I know we're not all marketers, but there's something to be said for presenting something thats cohesive. I see the whole event/community here as an exploration of creative lifestyle. a mini creative lifestyle blogosphere if you will, only each month we host an event. On the presentation side, I'm less concerned about 'branding' and care more about 'culture'. I see it almost like a 'brand of me' kind of thing, except instead of it being 'me' its instead a group of like minded people, together, accomplishing something very cool.

Diving deeper

After you've got three niche areas, start thinking of some subcategories within that, these might mean individual post topics, pictures, or videos. 

1- Music Mindset & Methodology

• Productivity advice
• getting things done
• understanding the big picture
• encouragement
• overcoming fear
• etc.

2- Songwriting

• practice videos
• songwriting tips and tricks
• pictures
  • songbooks
  • instruments
  • writing desks
  • creative workspaces
  • selfies

​3-Recording + production

• Audio gear
• mix videos
• tutorials
• Mix sessions

Capturing ideas on the fly... hope you have a pen and paper

Remember that great idea you had while you were out on the town? Neither did I until I started carrying around a notebook for scratching down ideas. 
Start collecting and stockpiling these ideas and before you know it, you'll have a deep pool of resources to draw from next time you sit down to focus on creating some new content, and the beauty part is, you'll never have to worry about running out of ideas again...

Practice vlog. I tend to not talk much. That's part of this whole experiment. Get over any nervousness around playing music on camera. At the end of the day, it's not so bad. In fact, It's a lot like those first couple times you go out to play your songs in public. It's a little nerve-wracking at first but eventually, you start to warm up to the feeling of putting yourself out there... Have courage to take the action and learn from your mistakes. Here's my Intentional vocal practice. Question. What did you notice about what and how I'm improvising? if you were practicing music in this way, what would you do differently? Comments here (or on youtube)

Thanks for being awesome.

Short answer yes, but why? As a musician who aims to become more professional, it's important to make yourself visible. Now, we all have our own launch strategies, y'know, those things we feel comfortable doing to get our music in front of our new potential fans. If you're using the internet to reach these ends, how easy is it for your audience to discover you and your work? 

This comes down to the workload you can handle, again if social media is your game, How many sites are you using? do you need to be on every single one? I have the best results using facebook and Instagram. Maybe I'm wierd that way, but even though I sometimes splash things out to Twitter, tik-tok, or youtube. I simply don't get the same results. 

I'd like to take a second to explain the purpose behind the content. Content is used for discovery, but theres more to it than just that. It's also used to create a personal connection, whether you've got an avante-garde orchestral thing with a band, or you're an indie-solo-singer/songwriter. The end goal is the same. Your online presence is akin your exposure, IE, It's the same as playing that open mic and burning gas to get there. The difference is that It costs next to nothing. It's another way you can get discovered by the people who are going to care about your craft and appreciate the music. So how can you connect with your new potential fans? If you are connecting with them and they want to learn more, then how can you make it easy for them to learn all about you and the thing you're doing. 

This is where having a consolidated online presence comes in...

Case Study: Joey has an instagram account. He posts great content, and is starting to grow a little bit of a following by posting great content every day. The link in his bio sends people to a single landing page with the links to his Youtube channel, His Bandcamp page, and each service where his single is available for streaming. His new social-media friends look at his link, and they can easily learn more about him by clicking through to their favorite place to consume the music. sounds simple right?

Compare that to Billy: Billy has an instagram account with a similar size following, but it points to his soundcloud page. He's got a youtube channel with no link to where people can learn more. His new fans want to learn more so they click the link to the soundcloud profile. There's nothing other than his song. Are people really going to take the time to listen to the song? Maybe they will listen to about 20 seconds, then move on, but most people will visit this link one time, and probably won't even listen to the song. He didn't tell his people what they're getting, and he didn't make it easy to learn all about him and his music.

​Have you ever googled your band/artist name to see what pops up? this is called a Google audit. If you're making art, and you have your own website, and you want to use it to reach new fans, It can be helpful to dial things in so that you show up in the right places (ie. the front page of the search engines.)

​Let's go back to the example of Billy (above) Billy also has a website. His potential new fans like the music on soundcloud  (guess he's doing something right) but they can't find a link to where they can get more..., so they punch his name into google. Nothing to be found, so they try again on facebook, a personal profile that's private. Did Billy earn a new fan from this? Nope!

​leave a lasting impression - get return viewers - add value to your audience - bring them back for more - Gain a Die-hard Cult Following.

The easier it is for your audience to discover you, the lower the friction of building that connection, the more audience retention you'll have, and the easier your journey becomes.

Here are some resources for ways you can consolidate your online presence. Simply gather all the links to where you can be found online, and put them somewhere together, so that you can be found. So that you can make it easier for your new audience to discover everything about you. Remember, If this process is difficult then nobody's going to bother. If it's easy, It causes less friction and more attention retention, so you can connect with more people who will LOVE YOUR MUSIC, and you can keep them coming back for more.