TOURING/WORKING Rhyming live or 9-5? Punch the gas pedal or punch the clock?

Okay my last post I covered the topic of spending money to tour etc. etc. This post I'm going to get into details of ways to stay on the road, keep touring, without going totally broke.

CAN YOU KEEP A JOB?
-Double edged sword. Hard to tour when you work, hard to tour when you don't have funds.
-Day labor. This is a place where you can go in every morning and they will set you up with work that day. You can come and go as you please. Now the pay is low and work is tough. I just keep my head down and work hard while I picture playing a sold out show and a green room full of girls. They pay at the end of each day. You can work 6 days a week in prep for tour. Leave, come back and go right back to work with them.
-Serving tables. This Is a good option because the pay is really good and most restaurant are pretty cool about letting you work short period of time. so I'll Tell them that I only need six months of work because I'm going on a music door and usually they are pretty cool about it. sometimes They let you come back to work when you get back, if not there's always plenty of restaurants, good thing about it is you only work 4 to 5 hours a day so you have plenty of time to prep for tool
-Check Craigslist for temp work.
-Look into big event centers. They usually always need people and you can pick which events you want months in advance. Easily working around tour.

CROWDFUNDING:
Crowd funding is a slippery slope for me. whereas I do believe it can be done right I am not really supportive of people that use Kickstarter just to get money to tour. That said this blog is not for telling you what to do or not to do, Its to provide info for you, so as to maneuver more affective lay. It can work very well and people can make a lot of money doing now if you're going to do it please offer some sort of actual reward

KICKSTARTER.
The big dog. The champ, however keep in mind you must raise your entire goal or it collects no money from anyone.

GO FUND ME.
Easy to set up. Collect even if goal is not reached. Social networking integration.

INDIEGOGO http://www.indiegogo.com/
Similar to the others however its allows you to collect worldwide.

Here is a website with a list of 50 crowd funding sites. So go google around til you find a suitor.
http://marketingmoxie.biz/the-big-list-of-crowdfunding-sites/


IM GOING TO SAVE "how to make money on tour" for my next post as I've recently put a lot of time into studying the topic and creating new dough opportunities.

HAPPY TOURING.
FAN TO FAM

Location Los Angeles

Useful resources

Click the link below for useful resources

http://fantofam.wordpress.com/2013/05/30/useful-resources/

Once you land a show, your work is not done

Once you land a show, your work is not done.

GET ASKED TO PLAY AGAIN

DONT OVER PLAY...

Try not to oversaturate the market. Do not play every show that is offered you, if there is no obvious reason to play. Eventually people quit paying attention if you play 15 small boring shows a week.

BOOK ONE OPENING ACT YOURSELF

Often the venue says they will book openers etc. however you never know what you are going to get. Do some research and find out who really draws in the market you are going to play. Ask everyone, and then invite a solid opener personally.

CREATE YOUR OWN BUZZZZZ!!!

This goes a long way. Before every show, make sure you send them a flyer, if they have not created an event page do so, and share it with the venues facebook page. Like the venues page. Post on their wall, Find everyone that is opening and playing with you, add them, and post the event on their wall.  Contact everyone that is playing, as well as fans in the area and ask them to push the event, then update it often. Post links to your sites on the event wall. ETC.. you would be surprised the buzz you can create...

PHONE CALLS

This is a very simple thing that i learned that is really easy to do, however most people out of ease or whatever reason ignore this. If you are trying to book a show, or really get anything done in the music business, PICK UP THE PHONE.. Alot of times nowadays we tend to contact people via facebook, twitter, and email. Which can work, and for some it may be the primary way of contact. However, i have always found a phonecall will get you so much further. So next time you want to contact that rapper about getting you a show in chicago. Just give him a call instead of using social networking.

EMAIL VS SOCIAL NETWORKING

OK GUYS believe it or not. email is still the biggest recourse in marketing. We tend to kind of forget because of Facebook, and twitter, HOWEVER email has 5 times the amount of active users as facebook and twitter combined. EVERY WEB search performed every day only makes up 1/100th of the traffic that email generates. Email is taken much more personally as well. you are just shouting in a crowd with social media. The numbers Dont lie.

EMAIL IS STILL THE KING. So that being said. Lets talk about getting email addys and how not to piss off all your fans by getting all spammy.  So there are many widgets, pages, and etc for collecting email from fans via web. they all work pretty well. just google around til you find one that works for you. Keep in mind though that people are hesitant to give out their email address for no reason, so i recommend offering some sort of incentive. Such as a free song download if they sign your email list etc. The old carrot on a stick works. And give away something good, not some bullshit song that you made with a wack rapper because he let you sleep on his couch on tour.  Appreciate the fans.  Now, i recommend that you immediately start an email list of bloggers, websites, news papers, etc. Be very careful when emailing people though.

YOU do not want to email 2 dope boys five times a month every time you wipe your ass. Keep the blogger emails out of your regular email blasts.  Also i dont know how some of you feel about buying fame, but many rappers, bloggers etc have pretty huge email lists that they will sell you for pretty cheap. I personally have an email list of over 100,000 bloggers, sites and papers, some of which i collected, some of which i purchased.

And finally DO NOT LEAVE YOUR HOUSE without a notebook. Every day, every where you go, on tour or not take a notebook with you and collect collect collect. Or just use your iphone if that is easier for you.  Before i leave on tour i usually make up a fancy smancy email list on photoshop with my name. the tour name and some cool graphics etc. and print out a few thousand copies. Or you can just set up your ipad and have people sign that directly. I usually give away a free sticker for those that sign up. And i always tell people my intentions. Why i want the email and what i plan on

using it for.  AND I DO NOT SPAM PEOPLE. keep it short, keep it rare. DO NOT SEND 10 emails a month.  There are many mass email programs out there that allow you to make nice newsletter looking emails and send it to thousands of people at once. I use mac mass mail. or direct mail. Both of which are downloadable software, but they also have websites such as mad mimi that work really well too. you will have to pay a little bit monthly, but its worth it. HAPPY TOURING..

Build a foundation

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QUALITY OVER QUANTITY. This one is a slippery slope, while it seems the more content you have      out there the better. However, if you really focus on quality in everything you do whether it be the music. Your web design. Your Blog. Your Merch.   The music biz is way over-saturated  So take the time to put out a good product, something that will stand out.

BUILD RELATIONSHIPS .  Building relationships is the most important part of this whole dang thing. But this is so much more important and serious than you know. I am not just talking about meeting some rappers, some fans ,and some promoters. I mean you need to talk to and build with every single person you come in contact with. Sound guys, Bartenders, Coat check girls. I really hope that you are still not in the mindset that you need to act like a superstar and not mingle with people. And do not get in the mindset of you being to good to associate with other musicans, Juggalos  Hippies, Ragers, Ravers, Cool Kids, Hipsters, Club Djs, Rockers, Backpack rappers, I have gotten help from someone in every one of those categories.

ASK QUESTIONS  This one is important mostly because it is very underutilized. As you play shows, and tour, you suddenly tend to find yourself in the company of “famous” or what i like to call Successful musicians, which is great.  The problem is that everyone tries to impress instead of learn. Its hard to learn from someone when your busy trying to convince them that you already know everything. I hate to be this guy but ” NOBODY CARES”. Nobody cares about  how famous you think you are, but more often than not they are glad to share the information that they have worked so hard to get. So next time you are opening for that band that you grew up listening to, when you are in the green room say “Hey man,  do you guys have any tips on how to connect with fans better after the show” or  ”Hey man, bar owners usually dont return my calls or emails, what has been successful for you when dealing with promoters, and bookers?”  INSTEAD OF ” Yeah Eric Clapton saw me play and said I am better than Johnny Lang”  or ” Oh yeah, Kendrick Lamar? he is like basically my best friend, were going to be doing a tour together blah blahh BLAHH BLAHHH”

How do I get started?

HOW DO I GET STARTED?

I feel like it all kind of happens in steps. But the first one sometimes stumps a lot of musicians. Not knowing how far you are, i will assume. You are brand new. You are just now finding out that you have talent. Now what to do with it? here are 5 easy first steps that can get you going right away.RECORD AN EP. you just need a few tracks to get things going. If you  cannot find a friend with a studio, then just look around for a cheap one. They usually start at about 20 an hour and it should only take a few hours.GO TO OPEN MICS. maybe you or your band are not in a position to start booking a ton of shows. Open mics are a great way to get your music out there, and start to meet all the other people in the music industry in the area.GO ONLINE. as well as local, get right on top of getting yourself out there in every way. Start a website, blog, facebook page, twitter, and PRESS KIT. Put a lot of time and effort into all of them. You want them to be accurate, complete, and uniform. But do not forget to add your own flavor to all of it. and by uniform I mean whatever your name is stick to it. Dont have a bunch of different site names that seem to have no relation to each other or you.MAKE SOME POSTCARDS OR FLYERS.  You have no music to give away or sell yet. However you can still really make a presence, If you are at Every show, every open mic, every where your fan base goes and your presenting them with material. They are going to get the idea that you guys are making a name. Make sure to add all of your web content to the flyer/business cards and then just give them to everyone you can.MAKE SOME YOUTUBE VIDEOS, even without that studio quality music, you still have the option to make videos to post to youtube, You can do Live blogs about upcoming shows or open mics. Little comedy bits. Show off your musical talent. there are all sorts of things you can do to catch the eye. And people love watching videos. If you cant access a really nice cameral use your iphone.If you do all of these things, and really commit. The shows will start booking themselves. You will find yourself in the middle of your local music scene very quickly. It does not take long for everyone in your city to start saying. HEY that  guy is really doing stuff. I know you see other people touring selling merch booking big shows etc. and  you want to jump in as fast as you can. But keep in mind, if you go too fast you will get burnt out. There will always be a fanbase waiting for you to come to them.BEFORE YOU KNOW IT YOULL BE  OUT OF THAT SMALL TOWN.