So I'm currently reading Ari Herstand's fantastic book, How To Make It In The New Music Business, a collection of smart and relevant pieces about the state of the modern industry. It is genuinely helpful and, as opposed to many of his peers is extremely practical. One thing he talks about is the concept of the "Music Marathon" an idea I really dug. Essentially he says that you need to be building out 1 year, 5 year, 10 and 26 year goals. Once you have those goals you should identify some steps that can help to actualize them. I think this is a good method because it keeps you on a realistic timeline and also forces you to really think about the steps to achieving your goal. Of course - the music industry is fickle and reliant on trends, but at least identifying the baby steps that you need to get to where you want to be is good. This morning I built out a small one to experiment with the concept. Feel free to use this as a template and see where you can go from here!
1 Year Goals 5 Year Goals- Sell 1000 copies of latest record
- Create relationships with fans who will want to buy
- Tour heavily
- Determine what producers are hip in your genre who can help you create a masterful record.
- Establish a webstore
- Create bargain deals to boost numbers
- Get 1,000,000 Spotify streams on one song
- Write a single that is a 'winner'
- Determine what producers you can use to create a winning single.
- Get radio support for said single
- Get label support for said single
- Determine what playlists to pitch too
- Determine a playlist boosting service to use.
Posted in Tagged Most Recent DIY, independent, independent artists, independent bands, independent music, indie bands, long term, long term planning, marathon, marketing, music, music business, music industry, music marketing, music promotion, musicians, planning