Starting with the End Goal in Mind
Before diving into the world of music creation as a business, it is essential to define your end goal. Determine how you want to monetize your music and identify the various avenues available for doing so. Whether it be through streaming royalties, selling beats, offering music production services, or any other means, having a clear vision of your end goal will guide your actions moving forward.
Developing a Strategic Plan
Once you have established your end goal, it is crucial to create a strategic plan to achieve it. This plan should outline the steps you need to take, the resources required, and the timeline for implementation. By mapping out a clear path towards your desired income of $7,000 per month, you can stay focused and motivated on your journey as a music creator.
Building Your Brand and Audience
Building a strong brand and growing your audience is key to success as a music creator. Utilize social media platforms, music streaming services, and other online channels to showcase your work and connect with potential fans. Engage with your audience, collaborate with other artists, and consistently release high-quality content to attract a loyal following that will support your music career.
Diversifying Your Revenue Streams
In order to reach $7,000 per month as a music creator, it is important to diversify your revenue streams. Explore different avenues such as live performances, merchandise sales, licensing opportunities, and music production services to generate multiple income streams. By tapping into various revenue sources, you can increase your overall earnings and achieve your financial goals.
Investing in Education and Skill Development
Continuous education and skill development are essential for growth and success in the music industry. Invest in courses, workshops, and resources that can help you improve your music production skills, enhance your creativity, and stay updated on industry trends. By constantly refining your craft and expanding your knowledge, you can position yourself as a valuable asset in the music business.
Networking and Collaborating with Industry Professionals
Networking and collaboration are powerful tools for advancing your music career. Connect with other music creators, industry professionals, and influencers to expand your reach and gain valuable insights. Seek opportunities to collaborate on projects, participate in music events, and showcase your talent to a wider audience. By building a strong network of connections, you can open doors to new opportunities and accelerate your path to success.
Implementing Effective Marketing Strategies
Effective marketing is essential for promoting your music and reaching a larger audience. Develop a marketing strategy that aligns with your brand and target audience, and utilize social media, email marketing, advertising, and other channels to promote your music and engage with fans. Consistent and strategic marketing efforts can help you increase visibility, attract new followers, and
Think Outside the Box
I would put a list of a few different ideas over here, but I would recommend to pick three to five to start with just pick the ones that you think would interest you that you think would be good for you, just the ones that you feel the Most attracted to now those are just going to be guidelines, but you need to think outside the box.
Utilize Your Strengths
For example, my friend producer poni. He is very good with plugins hes, very good at the technical aspect of it hes good at coding, and he saw that some plugins in uh Aon live was losing their UI when it was loaded on ablon. So he just went in and built some Max for Life rappers that now hes selling, so this, for example, would fall into the category of digital products, but it is perfect for music artists. So this is just an example of how you can think outside the box, and the only limitation that you have is your imagination. If you can find a problem and solve it for someone, then you’re going to be doing great.
Passion and Persistence
One more thing that I would recommend when picking the income sources that you want to set up for yourself as a music artist online. Just think about your strength and what you’re good at and what you love doing, because if you don’t like what you’re doing it’s going to be very hard for you in the hard times to push through.
Set Financial Goals
How much money do you need or want to make per month to be able to potentially quit your 9-5 job?
Calculate Your Monthly Expenses
To start making $7,000 per month as a music creator in 2024, the first step is to calculate all your monthly expenses. Add an additional 25% on top of it for safety. For example, if your expenses amount to $3,000, add $750 on top of that for a total of $3,750.
Account for Taxes
Remember that as a self-employed individual, you will need to pay taxes on your earnings. Account for this when setting your income goal. If you estimate that 30% of your income will go towards taxes, aim to make a little more than $7,000 to ensure you have enough to cover your expenses after tax deductions.
Divide Your Income Sources
Divide your income sources into different buckets to set specific goals for each. For example, if your goal is to make $7,000 by offering mixing and mastering services, online courses, and coaching lessons, break it down as follows:
$2,500 from online course sales (approximately 25 sales at $97 each)
$1,500 from mixing and mastering services (three clients at $500 each)
$1,000 from coaching sessions (10 students at $100 each)
Step 1: Have a Clear Monetization Plan
The reason why I like this exercise is because, when you put it like that going full time as a music artist, doesnt seems so unattainable and scary, it seems more reasonable and achievable because its broken down in simple steps, apps that feels actually very achievable so congrats. You should now have an exact plan as to how you want to monetize all right.
Step 2: Choose a Discovery Platform
Now for us music artists. I recommend video platforms mostly so, for example, YouTube, Instagram and TikTok, but to show you an example, when I started, I decided to choose YouTube for long form videos in order to build trust and authority with my audience, and I also chose Instagram for short form video that would have a greater reach that I would then be able to redirect to YouTube.
Step 3: Utilize Social Media Platforms
Choose a discovery platform because to make it simple, if you want to sell something, you need to have people to sell it to, and the best and easiest way and freest way to do it in 2024 is to use social media. This is how you are going to put your potential products or services in front of thousands, if not millions of eyes every day. Its like free advertisement, but there is one mistake that I see most beginners fall into. You have to choose one platform or two maximum when just starting more than that will overwhelm you and it will lead you to give up or burn out before you even get started for real.
Step 4: Focus on YouTube
If I would have to start again right now today, I would only focus on YouTube. YouTube offers a platform where you can create long-form videos that showcase your music and build a loyal fanbase. With the right content and engagement strategies, you can attract a large audience and monetize your music effectively.
Focus on YouTube Over Instagram
I would not even bother with Instagram, I think, that, being on both platforms for so long since the beginning is what slowed my growth on YouTube. I think that if I would have focused my attention to YouTube, I would have grown way more and I think it would be easier to monetize through YouTube than Instagram.
Start Building Your Audience
Now that you have your Discovery platform, the next step is to start building an audience. If you feel like you aren’t quite ready to showcase your music skills online, consider building in public. Document your journey and show your growth over time. Your channel or profile should clearly convey what you do, why people should follow you, and why they should trust you.
Showcase Your Expertise
Whether it’s through Instagram or YouTube, make sure to showcase your expertise as a music producer and social media content creator. Let people know that you can help music artists monetize their skills online, and that you have successfully done it for yourself. Build credibility by demonstrating your knowledge and experience in the industry.
Monetize Your Skills
Once you have built a strong presence online and established yourself as an expert in your field, it’s time to monetize your skills. There are several ways to generate income as a music creator, including selling your music, offering online courses or tutorials, providing freelance services, and more. Find what works best for you and start earning money from your passion.
Stay Consistent and Keep Growing
Consistency is key when it comes to building a successful career as a music creator. Keep creating and sharing high-quality content, engage with your audience, and continue to expand your skills and knowledge in the music industry. By staying dedicated and persistent, you can reach your goal of earning $7,000/month as a music creator in 2024.
Attracting Your Target Audience
Start attracting your perfect target audience or customer by creating content that appeals to them. Identify who your ideal audience is and tailor your content towards them. For example, if you produce beats, focus on creating content that would attract rappers and singers who may not have knowledge of music production.
Building Your Online Audience
Building an online audience requires more than just creating music. You need to learn about video editing, graphic design, copywriting, content strategy, algorithms, and more. Stay humble and be willing to learn through reading books, watching videos, attending webinars, and connecting with other music content creators.
Monetizing Your Audience
The key to making $7,000/month as a music creator in 2024 is to monetize your audience effectively. Once you have built a loyal following, you can explore various revenue streams such as selling beats, merchandise, online courses, or offering services like mixing and mastering.
Investing in Your Education
If you want to fast-track your learning and success as a music creator, consider joining courses or programs that can help you expand your knowledge and skills. Look for opportunities to enhance your abilities in music production, marketing, and business management to maximize your earning potential.
Exclusive First Cohort
Music creators looking to make a living online can benefit from joining an exclusive first cohort that will be running on April 29th. This three-week live cohort will include six live lessons, replays, a student workbook, and lifetime access to future cohorts. With a price tag of $297 as an introductory offer, spots are limited and in high demand. It is advisable to join the waitlist to secure a spot at the discounted price.
Building Your Audience
Building an audience is essential for music creators to pave the way for monetization. It is crucial to focus on building an email list rather than relying solely on social media platforms. Social media audiences are considered “rented” as platforms can shut down or ban accounts at any time. Building an email list helps creators own their audience and maintain direct communication.
Creating a Lead Magnet
To collect email addresses, music creators can offer a free incentive in exchange for contact information. This incentive, known as a lead magnet, can be something valuable to the audience, such as a free guide or tutorial. For example, offering a lead magnet like “Seven Steps to Produce a Track from Scratch” can attract subscribers and grow the email list.
Creating a Lead Magnet
In order to start generating income as a music creator, it is crucial to attract potential customers and build your email list. One effective way to do this is by creating a lead magnet. This can be a free resource that is valuable to your audience and showcases your expertise. Consider offering a sample pack, a chapter of an online course, or any other content that provides value to your target audience.
Nurturing Your Email List
Once you start collecting email addresses, it is important to nurture your subscribers with regular communication. Sending out weekly emails filled with valuable content, tips, and resources can help build trust and credibility with your audience. The more you help and provide value to your subscribers, the more likely they are to become paying customers.
Creating Engaging Emails
When composing your newsletter or weekly emails, it is essential to find a format that works for you and is easy to maintain. Consider sharing personal stories, lessons learned, tips, tricks, or step-by-step guides related to music creation. Additionally, you can include new music discoveries, resources for music artists, and links to your latest content, such as YouTube videos, to keep your subscribers engaged.
Offer Your Services
This is where you can start monetizing and the easiest and fastest way to do that when you’re starting is to offer your services. It could be ghost production, mixing and mastering, vocals, drums, guitar recordings, one-on-one coaching sessions, playlist promotion, composing for TV/films, etc. Make it as easy as possible for people to book you.
Use Booking Platforms
You can use third-party platforms like Fiverr or Upwork to offer your services. Alternatively, you can use a simple Google form or a platform like Calendly to schedule coaching sessions. You could also just include your email address in your Instagram bio or YouTube description for booking inquiries. Remember to include a link for booking in all your newsletters for indirect promotion.
Provide Value and Answer Questions
As you start posting consistently and building your audience, you will start to receive questions through DMs and comments. Pay attention to recurring questions as they indicate what your audience is interested in. Providing valuable answers to these questions can help establish trust and credibility with your audience.
Identifying Audience Needs
They will start to come to you for discussions, advice, opinions, tips whatever. This is where you should take notes of everything that is recurring. This is what I call learning the lyrics heres. Why its going to be super important. For example, I noticed that the self taught music producers were struggling a lot to learn on their own at home with YouTube. They didnt know where to start there was too many video choices and they didnt know who to trust. So I started creating more content about it.
Developing a Product Solution
The actual reason that you need to pay attention to the lyrics of your audience is to be able to create your first paid offer, which is Step number nine develop a product as the solution. So, as I was saying, if you notice a common struggle, a common problem or theme inside your audience, take note of it. Do some research online to see if there are any solutions to their problems? If not, this is where you come in, create that solution for them and offer it as a paid problem product, which is exactly why I created the YouTube roadmap or the 12-month plan. It is to fix that problem for self-taught music producers.
Launching Your First Paid Offer
By now you should have been able to pinpoint your perfect first product or paid offer idea. So now all you have to do is to build it, launch it and promote it, which is our last step, launch your first paid offer.
Launch Your Signature Offer
This will probably become your signature offer, but don’t worry about making it perfect. Just launch something: get feedback from the first customers and iterate over and over again with time.
Multiple Income Sources
If you follow that 10 step strategy by the end of 2024, you should have two income sources from your music online – a paid service and a digital product. This will give you a great base to start building on it.
Focus and Patience
The next year, just remember to focus and go one by one – don’t rush. It’s a marathon, not a sprint. Believe me, it takes a lot of hard work in the dark, into the studio alone without any rewards or recognition in the beginning.
In the first few months, the first few years, but I swear to you it’s worth it, because if I can do it starting from not knowing what a D is, then there is no reason you can’t succeed as well.