The Freelancer Mindset, Pt. 3
Of all the challenges that freelancers face, nothing matches in difficulty the everydayness of business ownership. It exists from the moment you wake up until the moment you collapse in exhaustion at the end of the day. It’s exhilarating, terrifying…..and constant. What keeps this relentless routine from taking undue toll on you is the management systems you put in place. Good planning...
Read MoreThe Freelancer Mindset, Pt. 2
If you’re going to be on your own, you won’t have a boss setting agendas and assigning projects. You will be the chart-setter. You will be the time organizer. You will be the gig-creator. This means planning, and planning means first setting goals. Some people absolutely love this part of freelancing. They’re planners at heart. They enjoy describing themselves as...
Read MoreThe Freelancer Mindset, Pt. 1
In a sense, we are all freelancers today. Whether you live week to week on short term projects, or work as a minion in a corporate department, the challenge is to manage your projects like an expert juggler and nurture your relationships like Dr. Phil. It is this continuous and creative orchestration of work and relationships which helps us thrive, and allows us to contribute our own special...
Read MoreFinding Your ‘Adjacent Possible’
Forging creative alliances is key to building a multi-dimensional music career. Teaming up can multiply your efforts and move your career in an upward trajectory. Traditionally, musicians joined with “professional” teammates like management companies, high-level booking agents and established record labels. This still goes on, but in the DIY era we’re increasingly seeing artists and...
Read MoreSmart Tip for Hooking Media Interest
Media coverage remains one of the best ways to get your signal through all the noise out there. As we daily battle with “data smog”, people are finding themselves gravitating to reliable media sources for news, for information, and for point of view. So media in all its forms remains a valuable channel for exposure and promotion. Today there are more media than ever before and they all need...
Read MoreInch Wide, Mile Deep
In study after study of successful individuals, one trait found to be common among them is this: they were all highly focused. At some point along the way, they had each realized that they had to make a commitment to one business idea. And, in fact, many of them had to make difficult choices and let go of some possibilities that seemed appealing. People don’t focus for a number of reasons:...
Read MoreHow to Add ‘Value’
We’ve all heard the phrases ‘adding value’ and ‘value-add’. But have you ever stopped to ask, what is ‘value’? Well, in this context, value is the full-spectrum impact your product or service has on your customer. Value should not be equated with price. Price is merely one aspect of the total value you deliver. Value is essentially what your company...
Read MoreTips for Using Third Party Music License Services
With the explosive rise of indie music and the Internet there has been an equal explosion of music licensing services to hit the scene. Zynch Music, Sorted Noise, CopyCat Music, Agoraphone, Primary Elements and VersusMedia are just six of the numerous services that have popped up. Recognizing the value of the content in its online store, CDBaby has also branched into this part of the biz,...
Read MoreContext and Career Opportunity
Every spare moment of our time is being filled with some form of commercial connection. Our e-mail, voice mail, and cell phones, our twenty-four hour trading markets, instant around the clock ATM and online banking services, all night e-commerce and research services, 24/7/365 television news and entertainment, twenty-four hour food services, pharmaceutical services, and maintenance services, all...
Read MoreMake Customers, Not Sales
During tough economic times it’s easy to default to things that will turn (or save) a quick buck. One less phone call, one less follow up, one less email because, hey, there isn’t enough time, and I need to eat! Short term thinking like this corrodes our long-range vision, and those compromises can slowly eat away at the foundations of business. For your customers to have a good opinion of...
Read MoreToo Many Music Services?
I don’t know about you, but I’m getting a little dizzy from the flood of music services hitting the market each week. Soundcloud, Mixcloud, Grooveshark, Audiovroom, Audiosocket, Ujam, Rdio, MOG, TuneStat and ScoreBig are roaring in next to “veteran” services Nimbit, CDBaby, Reverbnation, Sonicbids, Tunecore, Topspin and Bandcamp. Then, making less noise but still vying for position, are...
Read MoreThe Color of Focus
Concentration is the secret of strength in politics, in war, in trade, in short in all management of human affairs.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson Unless you were born under a rock, you probably are familiar with the name Crayola. It is the most popular and recognized crayon brand in the world. Every year, Binney & Smith, the company that makes Crayola products, manufactures nearly 3 billion...
Read MoreEvery Business is a ‘Music Business’
Every business is becoming a music business; more accurately, an entertainment business. Toyota started a record label. So have Artois Brewery, Proctor & Gamble, and Levi’s Jeans. Apple Computer, Red Bull and Nike, three companies outside the orbit of the traditional music business, have spearheaded successful initiatives in the music space that record companies themselves seem...
Read MoreSharpening Your Distinction
Put on your marketing hat for a moment. As any serious business owner knows, a key element of their strategy will be the positioning statement. Popularized by Al Ries and Jack Trout’s seminal work, Positioning: The Battle for Your Mind, “positioning” refers to how your offering is differentiated among similar ones. As the Ries/Trout title suggests, positioning isn’t just...
Read MoreNeed Help Conducting Your Business?
Of all the challenges that entrepreneurs face, nothing matches in difficulty the everydayness of business ownership. It exists from the moment you wake up until the moment you collapse in exhaustion at the end of the day. It’s exhilarating, terrifying…..and constant. What keeps this relentless routine from taking undue toll on you is the management systems you put in place. Good...
Read MoreArt, Synergy & China
A pair of American ex-pats are changing the way multinational brands cultivate their images in China, reports Hannah Seligson in the New York Times (5/1/11). In 2008, Sean Leow and Adam Schokora co-founded NeochaEdge “to showcase the work of illustrators, graphic designers and musicians from across China.” Both a gallery and a searchable database, NeochaEdge currently features some...
Read MoreThe Next ‘Record Label’?
World music publicist extraordinaire, Dimitri Vietze, discusses how the ‘record label’ – or whatever might take its place – will be structured. He points out that the architecture is very fluid and label ‘models’ are proliferating. Label ‘architectures’ include: a studio-based label that records the album and then licenses the recording to another type of label; the type of label...
Read MoreWhat Marketing Lessons Can We Learn From the Dead?
Just finished reading Marketing Lessons From the Grateful Dead by David Meerman Scott and Brian Halligan.. We all know that the iconic band galvanized its fandom into a support culture unprecedented in size and scope. Seems the Dead also had sharp instincts when it came to marketing, instincts that modern marketers are only beginning to discover today. Once again art instructs business. As the...
Read MoreIn and Outside the Box
“Thus, the task is not so much to see what no one yet has seen, but to think what nobody yet has thought about that which everybody sees.” –Schopenhauer That Schopenhauer quote underlines a key aspect of creativity – the ability to see something new within the familiar – and sometimes the not-so-familiar. Remember: Light bulbs weren’t invented by exploring candles Iron ships...
Read MoreIntrepreneuring: The Path Within
“Find the biggest problem your employer faces for which you and your skills are the solution.” – Robert Horton, Executive Recruiter Anyone who has worked for a company for any length of time knows who the intrepreneurs are. They are the staff members who are always crackling with new ideas, finding solutions, taking on new initiatives and coming up with creative strategies for furthering...
Read MoreAn Interviewing Blind Spot
“The worst assumption you can make is that your interviewer already knows everything about your major. In fact, it’s possible that not only is your interviewer not familiar with your major, but he or she may even harbor some negative or inaccurate views of it. So you need to become a star salesperson for your major and college degree.” (You Majored in What? By Katharine Brooks) This is...
Read MoreEntrepreneurship “Defined”?
Some are describing our time as the “Entrepreneurial Age’. Pretty lofty descriptor, but considerable evidence suggests more people than ever are pursuing, or considering, this role today. While it’s easy to identify this flurry of entrepreneurial activity, it’s less easy to define it. At its roots, the word “entrepreneurship” derives from the French word meaning “to...
Read MoreInvesting in Creativity
Investment strategies vary. We can put cash under the mattress and see its value wither away; spend it; or by investing hope to increase it. Likewise, we can let creative capital lie dormant; spend it; or invest it. The biblical parable of the talents favors investment. God is not afraid of risk. The management of creativity puts a premium on entrepreneurial, just-in-time, temporary, ad hoc...
Read MoreThe Artist-Entrepreneur Reprise
An artist is not a special kind of person. Rather every person is a special kind of artist. -Meister Eckhart Lately, we’ve seen a number of people latching onto the phrase “artist-entrepreneur”, an idea expressing the emotional and creative sides of entrepreneurship. It suggests that all entrepreneurs should approach their business ideas with the same passion and creativity an artist...
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