💡✍️ ADN #008: The #1 Mistake Artists Make

Hey Friends -

Welcome to the Artist Development Newsletter.

Every Sunday, I send an email providing actionable tips for artists and industry on one area of the music business.

Last week we talked about accountability partners.

You can re-read last week’s newsletter here if you want to refresh.

Today we will discuss saying YES to a fan club from day 1, and then we’ll go through the 4-step journey you want to focus on with your audience.

Let’s jump in.

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Every artist needs a fan club.

And by “fan club,” all I mean is a free email list.

In its simplest form, a fan club is just an email list with a better name.

By calling your email list your fan club, you’ve hurdled a massive step in direct audience engagement.

Rather than asking someone to “join the email list.”

(Somewhat engaging, but still a passive “yes” at best psychologically.)

Why not jump straight to saying, “join my fan club!”

(It’s direct, and most importantly, you don’t need to ask that same person to “join the fan club” in the future.)

I get it; you’re probably thinking, “Isn’t an email list and an email list that you call a fan club the same thing?”

The answer is yes.

That is why you should skip having an email list and get right to the thing you’ll ultimately decide you want, a fan club.

When starting, most artists don’t have any die-hard fans (other than maybe Mom and Dad or a boyfriend/girlfriend, etc.), so psychologically, it feels uncomfortable to say you have a fan club.

Here’s the thing:

A fan club creates a tribe, with an ideology, and a narrative, with a set of principles that you control.

A fan club lets you be very specific about what you’re for and against.

It helps to identify your audience by breaking the people you reach into two very distinct camps:

1. I agree with this artist and want to continue to engage and follow along with their journey.

2. I disagree with this artist and no longer want to follow their journey.

A fan club allows you to curate the audience you truly want.

Once someone has joined your fan club, you have a massive opportunity.

You now have a direct line of communication to share anything you want with people you know who want to hear from you.

You should actively engage with your fan club and treat them as the most essential element in your career, because they are.

Any chance you have to give them something special, do it.

If you wrote a song today, send them 15 seconds.

If you had a bad day, tell them why.

If something exciting happened in your career, tell them first.

They will be your biggest supporters on your best and worst days.

Here is a simple 4 step process for how to think about building a fan club level fan for life.

It Starts With Discovery

Whenever you play a show, post on social media, or release a song, your main goal is for that moment to be compelling enough to make people want to know more.

With that initial interest, you may get a “like” on a post, a “follow,” or a “heart” on your song, and that’s great, but that person still isn’t a fan club level fan.

Next, you’ve got to begin to reel them in.

How?

Build Trust

Make sure everything you’re sharing on social media and how you’re talking about your music and your fans are an extension of what is happening in your fan club.

Give more of yourself on social media and in person than the rest of the artists you are a fan club level fan of, and then give even more to your fan club.

Take snippets of the exclusive access you are giving to your fan club and show your followers on social media.

Encourage them to sign up, “it’s free!”

Next?

Deepen The Relationship

Once you’ve got a solid group of fans engaged in your fan club, you can offer exclusive opportunities to them.

As a general rule, I’d encourage you to give 90% of the time and only ask for anything 10% of the time.

Save your calls to action for big moments.

If you’ve consistently given to your audience 90% of the time, they’ll be more than happy to show up when you say you need them.

Finally…

Make $$

The final part of the journey for a fan is to get them to spend their hard-earned money.

The easiest way to make this happen is to have a direct line of communication with your audience via your fan club.

How do you do it?

• Discovery
• Build Trust
• Deepen The Relationship
• Make $$

The goal is to funnel fans from discovery to your fan club as quickly as possible.

Get them off platforms you don’t control, like Instagram, TikTok, Twitter, and Facebook, and into your fan club.

From there, your job is to give consistently and relentlessly.

Make your fan club special.

You want them to be out talking about how great it is to be your fan.

Make your fan club THE place to be, and you’ll also make one hell of a career for yourself in the process.

Remember to give at least nine times for every one ask.

That’s it for this week.

Do you have any thoughts to add?

Who are your favorite artists, and what unique things have they done to win you over?

Email me; I’d love to hear.

See you next Sunday!

Neil Mason

Artist Development