Forget Everything You Ever “Thought” You Knew About How To Build A Successful Music Career

Forget Everything You Ever “Thought” You Knew About How To Build A Successful Music Career

Every day musicians just like you tell me how frustrated and discouraged they are because they struggle to have the music career they've been dreaming about their whole lives. Most either don't know 'what' to do, or don't know 'how' to do things. Worse, they have a completely inaccurate vision about what it really takes to develop a stable, lasting and successful music career.

Whether you are just getting started to build your music career or you already are a professional musician on some level and think you need to:

- get your name out there, - get in front of the right people, - make connections, - just get your foot in the door, - get someone to give you your big break, - just keep trying harder, - be younger, - go broke to succeed, or - risk everything to become successful… ...then you are on the wrong path.

Why Most Musicians Fail To Grow, Expand & Sustain A Successful Career In Music Over The Long Term

Musicians & bands pursuing a successful career in music typically don’t make it because they simply chase the wrong things. Here are the most common reasons for their failure:

• They believe success can be found by trying to get their music & name to as many music fans and music industry people as possible. This approach is called, ‘Spray & Pray’. Failure Rate: 99%
   
• They don’t have a real strategy for building a successful music career… In fact, they typically don’t really know the difference between ‘doing stuff’, ‘tactics’ and ‘strategy’. The steps they do take are not part of a well thought-out & proven strategy. Instead, they are disconnected ‘tactics’ (actions) that lead to disappointing results. Failure Rate: 99%
   
• They don’t have a success mindset. The very first requirement for success is the one thing that all people who fail love to skip: a success mindset. Not having it is the biggest killer of success in the music business. With the wrong mindset, a truly successful long-term music career is impossible. Failure Rate: 100%
   
• They believe they can develop a successful long-lasting music career on their own. Fact is, nobody makes it in the music business ‘on their own’ today – nobody. At every level of the business (especially when trying to get in it), going alone is music career suicide. Failure Rate: 99%
   
• They focus their efforts on pushing their music & themselves onto music companies (record labels, management, promoters, publishers, etc.) without first finding out exactly what things these companies really want, then become, do or have those things and finally develop a specific strategy to deliver them. Failure Rate: 99%
   
• They never take real action into building their own career in music because they cling to the false beliefs that in order to become a successful professional musician they might go broke, starve, or risk everything to make it. Believing in such old myths prevents them from making smart choices to become a true success. Failure Rate: 99%
   
• They blame their own lack of success, opportunity and income on everyone & everything else. They whine about how nobody else has given them a chance or done the heavy lifting for them. This way of thinking is typically a cover-up for their own mistakes, laziness and procrastination that then causes them to make poor choices. Failure Rate: 100%
   
• They drown themselves in the failures of the trial and error approach, the guessing approach or the outdated crap that everyone else says to do (… you know, the people who aren’t actually successful in this industry, but love to give their unsolicited ‘opinions’ and ‘advice’…). These approaches to developing a music career don’t work, suck, and in some cases is outright dangerous to you, your music and your music career!

This is what happens when musicians think and act in the ways above:

Two paths await most of these musicians: 1. Years of struggle, frustration and disappointment as they spin their wheels, never really getting anywhere in the music business… or 2. Give up and return to the crappy unfulfilling day jobs they so desperately want to get out of once and for all, but can’t – they’re stuck there… forever. Either way the result is sad.

I’ve been where you are now – passionate about your music & wanting to take your music to the world… but at the same time struggling, frustrated and not getting anywhere – I’ve been there.
 

The 7 Things Every Musician Ought To Know About Music Career Growth, Creating Opportunities And Competitive Advantage!

There are 7 overlooked, underestimated & misunderstood core principles that are absolutely required to build, grow and sustain a successful career in music. Once you apply them, you will have a massive competitive advantage over 99% of all other musicians pursuing a music career and you will experience a fundamental paradigm shift from ‘looking for opportunities’ to ‘creating them’.

1. The music industry does NOT look for great music to sell - or even great musicians.... Record companies, managers, promoters and big successful bands (who might hire you) look for great 'people' who can also create good music. What this means for you is, you need to prove yourself to be rock solid in three key areas (beyond your music) in order to put yourself at the top of the list.
   You need to show people and companies in the music industry that any relationship between you and them will be a great the best possible investment for them. You do this by adding lots of value and reducing risks to the other side. Most musicians aren’t aware of this and/or don’t even try. There are lots of ways you can do both of these things once you learn what they are, how they work and how to implement them... This is one of the things I mentor musicians like you to do. Fact is, you MUST do this, because if you don’t, the music industry will simply find someone else who will… no matter how great you (or they) think your music is. In addition, when it comes to your music career, you need to prove that you put your money where your mouth is. That means the music industry wants to see you investing in yourself before asking them to do the same – more on this later.
    
2. Contrary to what the vast majority of people falsely believe, opportunity is never ‘given’ to musicians. Opportunity is created by musicians who have the right mindset (more on this below), add value & reduce risks for the other side. If you want to build and sustain a successful music career, then it is suicidal to depend on & wait for others in the music industry to ‘give you’ opportunity… You must be proactive and create opportunity for yourself and others around you. It’s not as hard as it sounds when you do the things in point 1 above. This is what I have done and is what I successfully coach other musicians just like you to do.
    
3. The most underestimated and often misunderstood element required for building a successful career as a professional musician is having the right mindset. Many people believe they already have the right mindset to become a successful musician… The truth is, I can definitely tell you with certainty that most musicians simply do not possess the right mindset at all – and the few who do, often lose that correct mindset once things get harder, the stakes are higher or situations become stressful… However, the good news is, virtually anyone can learn, master and sustain the right mindset for all situations with the right training and efforts.
    
4. You really have zero competition. You probably think the world is filled with competitors and that in order for you to experience your own success in the music industry, you must ‘beat the competition’. The truth is, you don’t really have any competition. Most musicians will eliminate themselves from music career opportunities because they don’t know about or do the critical things I’m teaching you to do (and what not to do) on this page. Once you become truly valuable, low risk and can communicate those facts effectively, the music industry WILL want you, no matter how many other talented people are also trying to achieve the same things you are.
    
5. The reputable people and companies in the music industry are looking for musicians and bands to invest in for the long term – this is why they invest in ‘people’ and not in ‘music’. The music industry wants to be sure you are committed for the long term – they won’t be ‘asking’ you if you are committed to the long term, they’ll be looking for the proof based on what they can find out about you via their research teams... and yes they absolutely will search for all kinds of things about you, your mindset, your commitment, your track record, your strategy, your value and elements of risk.
    
6. Getting your ‘foot in the door’ is the primary focus of most musicians seeking a career in music. They think once they are in, they will stay in, or their career will be built on the music they’re creating. This myth is the surest way to get yourself thrown out the same door you just got your foot into. To become a successful professional musician, you must have a strategy that gets you ‘into the music business’, ‘keeps you in the music business’ and ‘makes both you AND everyone around you thrive in the music business’. Until and unless you have that, the chance of developing a successful music career is basically zero.
    
7. The biggest secret to success in developing your own career in music is integrating all the pieces together. This means that when you take an action of some kind (for example, promoting your album, getting people to your website, expanding your social media presence, promoting your live shows, seeking deals with labels, managers, promoters, etc.), all of the things that go into doing those things must be integrated with everything else you are doing. When the pieces are disconnected, they are simply single actions – that is not effective. When they are integrated as part of a real strategy, then your chances to achieve your objectives go through the roof.

Now that you know what you need to be, do & have, and most importantly, what NOT to do, what next?

The first thing you need to realize, understand & accept is that nobody makes it in the music business on their own. Every star in the music business today does have or has had a music career mentor of some kind – all of them, zero exceptions.

Learn It From THE REAL DEAL, NOT From Someone Who HAS NOT Done It And Does Not Live It

You see, most of the so-called ‘music business teachers’ at music schools & so-called ‘music career advisors’ are better at talking about the music business than they are at actually DOING MUSIC as a career. In fact, not only are they not doing it now, most of them have never done it… ever.
They don't know what it’s like to risk their own time and their own money…
... they only know how to report on how the wheels of the music business turn instead of telling you what YOU, the musician, need to do exactly to build your music career....

You Need A Clear Path for Success in Your Music Career. Making It Up As You Go Along Won't Get You There.

Here Is What I Am Going To Coach You To Do:

• How To Lay A Great Foundation For Your Music Career Success – so that you do only the things that will take you where you want to go and do not waste time doing things that won’t work for you & and only make you frustrated. I will help you write your very specific music career development goals, design a blueprint for success, take the action steps needed to implement your blueprint and manifest your goals into physical reality.
   
• How To Promote Your Music For Free Or Very Low Costs so that you are actually seen and stand out from the ocean of other musicians. Almost all independent musicians approach marketing themselves in the wrong ways, they simply do what they others doing… and it SIMPLY DOESN’T WORK! I’ll show you what does work, why it works and how to do it so that all the years of developing your talents in order to build a successful music career won’t be flushed down the toilet.
   
• Become The Right Person That Key People In The Music Business WANT To Work With (this is critical!) – Most people believe that opportunities and success come to people who are in the right place, at the right time. The truth is, if I put you in the right place, at the right time and in front of the right people, but you are not the right person – then it won’t matter. You MUST become the right person.
   
• Learn How To Release Your Music All Over The World - with or without a record label. Whether you want a record company to promote your music or not, the things you need to do to become successful are still exactly the same. Without a label, you need to get your music sold on your own. With a label they will do most of this for you, however this is not 1975 anymore. You cannot simply send them your music and think they are going to blindly invest huge amounts of money into your next album… it does not work this way anymore. Record labels are no longer willing to ‘gamble’ on musicians, bands or their music. They want a ‘sure thing’… You provide several layers of proof that people are buying your music. I'll show you how.
   
• Find Out Why You Do Not Have More Music Career Opportunities And What You Need To Do To Change That. Actually there is plenty of opportunity out there. Your problem so far has been that you have not yet been aligned with that opportunity, able to see it or able to receive it.
   
• Learn The Simple Secrets To Phase Out Your Day Job and phase in your music career without putting yourself (or your family) into financial jeopardy. I used this valuable idea while already married with children to move into my music career with no risk.
   
• Learn how to study losers, analyze their idiotic thinking and dumb mistakes of repeated failure so that you understand what NOT to do and avoid the common problems, errors & blunders that these musicians make!
   
• Discover How To Multiply A Short-Term Opportunity Into New, Bigger & Longer Lasting Opportunity, Success And Income. This is a key difference between musicians who build long-term, high-earning music careers and those who do something once or twice and are forgotten.
   
• Use Success Principles To Gain Strategic Advantage. You will understand exactly why successful people are successful and how that can be duplicated by anyone (including you!!!). Gain strategic advantage over 99% of other musicians who do not follow these success principles (most have no idea that ‘success principles’ even exist!). Once you know and apply these proven success principles, everything you do to build your music career will be easier, faster and better.
   
• Create More Time To Develop Your Music Career By Once And For All Solving Your Time Management Problems. The most successful people in the world have exactly the same 24 hours per day as you do… and many of them are far busier than you are, yet they get so much more accomplished each day. Why? Because they know something that you probably don’t. They are masters of time management. I will coach you to be one too so that you can and will get far more done without even having to work any more than you do right now.
   
• Develop Great Press Kits, Bios And Fact Sheets: how to make sure yours are professional, eye-catching and compelling. Learn why some packages are rejected and ensure that yours doesn't end up thrown in the garbage like most press kits are!
   
• Learn the simple things you can do to Make Yourself The ‘Only Option’ during auditions and interviews for any music-related opportunity or job! I used these techniques to get every single major gig I ever applied for, auditioned for, interviewed for or inquired about.
   
• How To Never Worry Again About Being ‘Ripped Off’ – Musicians are so skeptical of the music industry because they hear or experience horror stories about how musicians were ‘ripped off’ by their record label, manager, promoters, club owners, etc. That skepticism often leads musicians to miss other opportunities that they could have had. Fact is, if you have multiple sources of income and know how to make money on the ‘back end’, it won’t even matter if you are not paid for something because you are earning money in so many other ways… in many ways you become immune to this.
   
• Stop Wasting Your Time Trying To Make More Connections With People In the Music Industry, instead create genuine, deep and empowering 'relationships' with people that matter. Simply meeting or knowing someone is the easy part… and alone is completely worthless. The key is to develop a smaller amount of high quality relationships that matter – and that’s what I’m going to coach you to do.
   
• Learn How To Prove ‘Those Who Doubt You’ Wrong - Anyone who tells you that you cannot become successful in the music business has no clue what they are talking about and you need to stop paying attention to them. I'm going to give you powerful secrets, strategies, tactics and ideas that will enable you to build a stable career and prove all these people wrong. Show them that you CAN do it!
   
• How To Put Yourself In Front Of Literally Hundreds Of Thousands Of Music Fans in an effective and integrated way (the ONLY way that works!)
   
• The Process Of How To Think Like A Real Music Business Entrepreneur So You Know How To Make A Lot More Money As A Musician And Avoid Getting Screwed! What you are going to learn is ‘how to THINK’ so that you see money-making opportunities for yourself that nobody else will ever see. This is by far the most valuable thing you will learn from me… and most importantly, once you learn it, nobody can ever take it away from you!!!
   
• How To Avoid Drowning Yourself In The Failures Of The ‘Trial And Error’ Approach – Stop wasting your time, money and energy by ‘blindly guessing’ what you should do when you will get dozens of real, effective and proven strategies instead.
   
• Discover How To Transform Win-Lose Or Lose-Win Situations Into Win-Win. So many potential opportunities are left unseen because most people are not trained in how to turn almost any situation, negotiation or circumstance from win-lose or lose-win to a win-win outcome where all sides benefit and there isn’t a loser.
   
• Avoid Going Broke While Pursuing A Career In Music – There are good ways and bad ways to pursue a career in music. I’ll coach you to do the right things so that you are not one of those ‘starving artists’ that do things the wrong way and go broke in the process.
   
• Reduce The Amount of Taxes That Are Taken From You Each Year. Did you know most governments (including the USA) will let you write off the full amount of money you invest into this program (and music related things in general) from your taxes? It's true! I'll show you how to save massive amounts of tax money you are currently paying to the government!
   
• Learn how loyalty and cooperation may save your career from ending in the toilet.
   
• The Crucial Things You Must Have In Place In Order To Go On Tour – Most musicians are never asked to join bands that go on tour because it’s immediately clear that these musicians don’t have certain basic things in place. I’ll show you what they are and how to implement them so that you don’t miss out on opportunities to tour.
   
• Start Attracting The Right Musicians To Your Current Or Future Band - and stop dealing with the steady stream of losers who waste your time, drag you down and don’t have their shit together in music and in their lives.
   
• Discover that there really IS a ‘short cut’ to developing a successful long-term music career – It’s called…. “Knowing what the hell you are doing” and adding MASSIVE value and reducing as much risk as possible IS the short cut. And that is exactly what you are going to learn how to do.
   
• How To Get Endorsements And Why You Should Definitely Have Them. Not only will this give you brand new gear for huge discounts, but in many cases you may get gear you want and need for free. However, it’s not just about the money, it’s also about the other things having endorsements can do for your career.
   
• Learn & Apply Powerfully Effective Techniques to transform problems into workable solutions and opportunities - stuff so powerful it should be illegal.
   
• How To Condition Yourself For Success: Develop, Nurture & Sustain A Success Mindset – This is the very first thing you must do, and I’m going to kick your ass to actually do it and do it every single day.
   
• Understand & Use The Power Of Leveraging Force Multiplier & Cross Pollination Strategies so that everything you do multiplies the benefits of everything else you are doing, will do or want to do.
   
• Develop Maximum Mental Focus so you can and will follow through with each step of your music career success plan instead of distracting yourself with things that don’t matter most to building your career and life in the exact way you want them to be.
   
• Stop Procrastinating! I’ll coach you to stop the number 1 killer of dreams – procrastination.
   
• Increase your value and reduce the risks to the other side. When people see you have done this, they’ll be pounding on your door! This is one of the core principles of music career success I will coach you to do at all times.
   
• Get Out Of Your Own Way by learning to recognize the very common pitfalls of Self Sabotage and Approach Avoidance. Ask anyone if they are ready, willing and able for success and most people will answer: ‘yes’. Truth is, few people are truly willing to take that final step forward to get started, to keep going or to complete something to the end. I’ll kick your ass to make sure you are not one of those people who won’t do this for themselves.
   
• Discover exactly what record labels are looking for in new artists, why they want what they want and what you need to be, do and have that makes you extremely attractive to record labels so that your chances of actually getting a record deal goes way, WAY up.
   
• Become specifically trained to create your OWN opportunities out of nothing! Opportunity is never ‘given’ to musicians. Opportunity is created. You must be proactive and create opportunity for yourself and others around you. This is what I have done and is what I will coach you to do.
   
• Red Hot Motivation. After graduating from this mentoring program, your motivation level should be nothing less than RED HOT because of the excitement you’ll feel knowing that you finally know (and are applying) the secrets that can propel you and your music career forward!

Of course you don’t have to join this program… instead you could look at the following options:

Option 1: You can go to a music school, college or university for 4 years, go $100,000 in debt to pay for it and STILL NOT learn and do what you need to do. We’ve had graduates from Berklee College Of Music, Musicians Institute and GIT in the program because they never learned this stuff at music school. It’s totally unacceptable to waste 4 years of your life and a huge pile of money/debt and then still not get the result you paid for!
Option 2: You can buy EVERY book on music business, spend years reading them all (as I have) and STILL NOT learn and do what you need to do. Like virtually all these books on the music business for musicians – they are written by people whose ‘actual’ music career experience as a musician is limited to butchering a few chords in their office.
No claim is made of even one day spent as a recording artist, successful studio musician or playing concerts on tour - let alone to actually earning any serious money as a musician.
This outdated, limited and often WRONG information infiltrates everything because many people falsely believe that if it’s written in a book by some washed up entertainment lawyer that it must be true. But YOU, the smart musician, won't fall for that.
So not only is it a waste to read them all but it’s an even bigger waste when you then follow bits and pieces stuff that isn’t a strategy, isn’t written by someone who has done what you want to do and just – simply – does – not – work…. And if it did work, nobody would be selling this for the price of a $19.95 book!
Option 3: You can try doing things on your own using the failed ‘guessing’ and ‘trial and error’ methods and STILL NOT learn and do what you need to do. Yes, you could save a little money by trying to do it on your own, but what that would cost you is years of your life aimlessly trying to figure it all out by yourself. Frankly, if you could do it all yourself, you would have done it by now and you would certainly not be reading this page. And besides, the only way it makes any sense to spend years of your life guessing is if your time is completely worthless to you. We both know that it’s not.
Also, why would you want to do that? What models would you use to know what you need to do? Looking only at what other people do doesn’t work. That’s what everyone else does and one of the reasons why they fail.
Option 4: You can do ‘nothing’ and stay right were you are… watching OTHER people living YOUR dream while you go back to your crappy day job and stay there for the rest of your life…
... or you can join the Music Careers Mentoring Program now and belong to the select group of special musicians like you who have made the decision to succeed and not let anything stop them.
 
Some Shocking Statistics About The Massive Difference In Results Musicians Are Getting As They Pursue A Long-Term Successful Career In Music
Musicians who have an experienced music career mentor are about 55 times more likely to succeed in the music industry than those without one. That statistic is impressive (5500%!), however I’m actually surprised it’s not even higher.
Musicians who have an effective, proven & integrated strategy for a successful career in music are 36 times more likely to build a long-term sustaining music career than those who don’t.

Here’s an unrelated but very compelling/interesting statistic – food for thought: According to The Pacific Institute, “A random sample of 1500 graduating college seniors were surveyed to find out what they would base their career choice on. 83 percent said that financial gain was the first thing they would base their career choice on and following their dream, or their passion, would come second. 7 percent said that following their dream would be first and financial gain second. In a follow-up study on actual net worth 20 years later, what do you think they found? Well, 101 of the 1,500 had become millionaires. But only one of those millionaires had come from the group that put financial gain first, while one hundred of them came from the group that followed their dreams.”

That means only 1 out of the 1245 people (0.08%) who put financial gain as their top priority actually became a millionaire… However, 100 out of 105 people (95.2%) who put following their dream as their top priority became millionaires (doing what they loved)… I’m not surprised at all by this... because I’m one of them.

Your path to music career success begins with the decision to follow your dream, but ultimately 'how' you follow it will determine your success or failure.

The Top 6 Excuses Some People Have For Not Taking The Big Step They Know Their Music Career Needs

1. I don’t have the time right now - Wow, that's certainly a problem. I mean if you are already that busy and you are still not getting the results you want, that's a problem, right? Perhaps it would make sense to start by better prioritizing your activities and leverage your time more effectively. Start today, right now in this moment to re-prioritize your schedule, stop the excuses, and finally get your shit together. :) Part of the Music Careers Mentoring Program is dedicated to this exact issue because so many people struggle with it. In order for me to put you on the successful music career path you need to be on, I'm going to help you fix your time management problems.
    
2. It's not the right time for me – Yes it is. 'Now' is always the right time. 'Later' never is.
    
3. It’s too expensive for me – Not really. How does the money you are going to invest into the Music Careers Mentoring Program compare to what it's costing you to NOT learn and do all the things you know you need to be doing to finally fulfill your life-long dream of a successful career in music? Think about all the money you’ve already spent on your musical equipment, lessons, your music collection and everything else that is music related. Compare the price to going to some music school, paying 100 times more money, spending years of your life there and STILL NOT get these strategies when your done at music school!
    
4. I'm too old, at 40+ years of age, I think my chance of having a successful music career has passed me by – Fact: the ‘average’ age of all professional musicians in the music industry is 41 years old…. FOURTY-ONE!!! So even if you are 50 years old, you don't have a rational excuse here.
    
5. I have to think about it - All major steps in a music career (and life in general) start with a big decision. But unless you jump right in and ACT, nothing is going to change for you...What are the downsides of advancing your own music career? There are none.
    
6. I’m not ready for this – Holy crap, this is a big one. As a teacher, coach and mentor to hundreds of musicians, the biggest thing I see plaguing the people who were struggling was the inability to get started. This really interested me so I tried to discover the true root cause of this. People were stuck on trying to figure out if they were ‘good enough yet’, ‘smart enough’, or ‘financially stable enough yet’ to try, and so forth. And look – I’ve been there, and I was broke when I was there – so I can relate. But here’s the truth: Most of the time these kinds of thoughts are the secret code for “I’m Scared!"

   Scared it’s not gonna work. Scared you’re gonna look stupid. Scared you might lose some money. Scared you’ll be judged…

   So let me help you out here and tell you that successful people also had those same thoughts at first. They have fears just like you do. The only difference between successful people and unsuccessful people is ‘successful people’ don’t wear diapers anymore. (Yes, you read that correctly). Successful people take the diapers OFF, put on their ‘big boy (or big girl) pants' and take action even if they are scared. And you know what…? I know a lot of very successful people - most of my friends are very successful people (including many highly successful/famous musicians) and none of them wear their ‘fear diapers’ anymore.

The time for talking is done. Now it’s your time to take action so that you can be one of the few musicians to actually grow, expand & sustain a successful career in music. You might be thinking right now that a program this great must cost a fortune. Relax, the fee is less than you probably expect. What you really need to be thinking about is how much it is costing you and your music career (or lack of one) not to take advantage of this great opportunity. That's actually the much higher price.
Also, how can you expect record labels, managers or even your own fans to continuously invest money into your music career unless you invest something into yourself first? As a musician myself, I saw it as my personal obligation to learn from the best mentor I could find. I made the necessary financial and time investments needed to grow as a musician (even during times when I had little money starting out)... and you know what? ... The people I worked with always greatly appreciated this, because they knew that ultimately it is THEY (my record labels, managers, promoters, band mates, fans, etc.) who benefit most from all the knowledge, wisdom and innovation that I know and apply for their benefit as well as my own.
So I bet you're still wondering how much this investment is... in fact, if you are like most people, at some point during reading this page, you probably skipped to the end to see what the price actually is. Well, at this point the price doesn’t even matter because ever since I started mentoring & coaching musicians, I decided to only work with people who are serious about a music career and don’t only like to ‘pretend’ they are serious in order to set a higher standard. So that means you have to apply to become a member of my program and prove to me you are the right person for this. This weeds out those who are not serious.
Fact is, I could earn more money if I let ‘everyone’ join my program, but I’m far more interested in getting ‘results’ for the musicians I mentor than becoming more wealthy (…I’ve already reached all of my financial goals in life) – and I can’t get results with people who are not serious. Now we are going to find out how serious you are.