Friends and Family
Friends and family are not reliable advocates.
Their motivation is generally built on friendship and family ties, not on belief in your music. I can understand bands starting to build help based on friends and family, but at some point artists need to move beyond that completely. The sooner the better. This coun this counts for both finding fans and for finding help.
For example:
Your brother may be passionate about tractors. He looks at you and thinks "Joel needs help. He walways needs help with his music. I wish him well, but I don't have time to help him. I want to look at tracctors. Hell, when was the last time Joel helped me with my tractor obsession?"
Friends and family may not feel empowered to help either. They will happily stand on the sidelines until you ask them to do something specific. Even then, they will do it governed largely by the factor of convenience.
For example:
You ask Jimmy to come tp your local gig and bring some friends. There are so many factors that might make that not happen. How often do you ask? The last time you asked did you spend any time with jimmy? Did you show appreciation to Jimmy for doing you a favour? When was the last time you helped Jimmy to do anything he needed done? Has Jimmy ever asked you to do anything? Did you do it? Was he happy?
Family and friendship relationships can be messy.
Then of course is the fact that virtually none of your family and friends will actually be fans of your music. If anything, they are fans of you. More likely they are used to you, wish you well, have some flexible back and forth obligation with you, have history with you, would like to see you do well, are happy you are good at music, but your gran is not a natural hip hop fan. She would far rather listen to Elvis, or Frank Sinatra.
For example:
You play your song to your gran. You don't expect her to get down with the beat and sing along. You expect her to nod along, keep knitting and tell you she's proud of you. She will tell her friends she is proud of you. When she shares it with er friends, funnily enough they are not Hip hop fans either. They too may have known you for years. they wish you well. They don't get the music, but they are proud of you none the less.
Recruiting people to help you is largely the same as finding fans. there is an overlap in the people and the approach to them. You need to find people who like your music because they like your music. People want to help becaus ethey are passionate about your music and feel empowered through their own connection to your music... in the case of helpers they are also hopefully motivated and powered by their own interest in the area you want them to help with.
It doesn't mean friends and family they can't be helpers, just that from experience they are generally not the best helpers... unless they have a strong, ongoing reason to, usually a personal interest in the subject or that age old motivator, money. Paying anyone does help with motivation, but it changes your relationship with them. When they are family or friends, but also employees and that can get very complicated. Even if it is a once off help, as a favour, there can be an implied debt of grattiude, or even a favour owed.
Family and friend relationships can also get soured through entanglement. Relationship politics and history can play a large part in the possibility of help actually happening. Unrealistic expectations on both parts can cause issues with such relationships.
For so many reasons, friends and family are NOT the ideal platform to build your music career on.
The Insurance Salesman Problem
We've probably all known one. That friend or family member who gets a job with an insurance company. their first job is to sell to friends and family. they do the rounds and get together a reasonable commission.
The next time around they have to go to further afield friends and family. Their success is a bit more limited. To make a living they develop a harder exterior and a sharper edge. The connection to those they approach becomes more tenuous. They are less inckined to just sign up because you are you.
It is often pretty one way. The insurance salesman is so busy chasing making a living they have little time for other things. Commission checks and bonuses invite them onwards. While family and friends might need insurance, they don't want it pushed on them. WHile they might like the protection it gives them, they may be happy with less coverage, with the insurance company they know. As a favour, they may go with you. they open the door based on you, not the product.
Eventually people stop answering your calls. They hide when you come round. They peek around curtains and say "Oh here he come. What does he want to sell us now?". Their motivation to help has evaporated. You have been spamming them, using you relationship with them to open doors... and their induldgence and tolerance has disappeared.
At some point, that insurance salesman has to sell to strangers, and only to strangers... otherwise family relationships will sour and his income will evaporate
Musicians can be very like insurance salesman.At least, they can be perceived that way. Eventually people feel the relationship generally goes one way. They may feel used. They often feel spammed.
The wise musician relaises that the more they rely upon friends and family, the more they will be perceived as an insurance salesman. Freedom comes from engaging fans and helpers who are not friends or family... plus it leaves those valuable friend and family relationships intact.
The one possible exception is the very rare occurance that someone in your friends and family circle is a genuine fan of your music. Then you may find their pastimes and interests align more with yours and they may be more willing to help on a deeper, more extended basis. I can't emphasise how rare that actually is.
In general I would say, move away from friends and favours. Start loooking for fans in new places. Make sure you have a means to retain fans and keep them engaged (your own site, music profiles, newsletter, a blog... all of those.).
Approaching People
It should come as no surprise that it is important to approach and deal with people in the correct way. It should come as no surprise that you may not be looking for the right people in the right places. You look for different kinds of people in different places.
Although some like minded artists might well become street team members for you, generally street team members come from somewhere other than immediate friends and family. You need to have a method of recruiting them, including places to recruit them from.
Often they:
grow from a cultivated and nurtured relationship. come from fans, especially fans who want to learn a bit about the biz (for example marketing students, music students etc.)
I will dive into those subjects in another post.
Artists are better as collaborators. Find other artists interested in cooperatingto grow together. It's a good idea to find ones whose music is not the same, but perhaps in a related genre, or they write crossover music. Consider artists whose music reminds you of artists you are influenced by.
Sales don't come from "Here's my music, please buy it". They come from a whole bunch of reasons that help cultivate sales. They find and cultivate fans. Building a team is no different.
You look in the appropriate place, you recruit and cultivate people. With your team that can come from incentivising them. For example Setting a sales target and giving them a percentage... hell even giving them a prize can be enough if you encourage a friendly feeling of competition.
Motivate and Inspire
A huge topic and one that is so vital. Yet again success in this will impact how you recruit and retain fans, and how you recruit and retain helpers, collaborators, employees....
If what you currently do is not working, don't blame others. Learn it as a lesson, and change what you do!
Anger and negativity is rarely inspiring. Rarely attractive.
Money is a big motivator for many. Others need money just as you do, and musicians are not the only ones to consider their time precious. They are not the only ones who feel a need to be appreciated.
If you don't have any? Well that is what percentages are made for.
Concerned about sharing out a shrinking pot? Set targets. Make it conditional... ie 20% of the work they bring in.
Be positive. Have a vision and lay it out.
Let people know they are an important part of the team. Show them appreciation. Give them gifts for achieving things. I plan a blog post all about this, about recruiting and managing a street team, about incentivising and rewarding them while keeping the cost low. Ideally they will have a positive impact on your sales, attendance, downloads. It is hard to factor exact impact, but it the impact of the team overall should be noticeable.
Team members like managers, booking agents etc require not only people who believe in you, believe in the sales potential and the percentage they get... but also they have a burning interest in the topic. They can be a little harder to find, but still very possible. For an indie, it is often someone with at least some interest but don't compromise on them being driven. They need to have an awesome drive!
Preparation
So much is preparation. Put things in place in such a way that once done they are still working. For example... if you have your own site you can have different member areas. An area for fans. An area for street team members. Post a recruitment form for your street team. When you encounter the right people you can set the ground by pointing them to the info and recruitment form. When they get on the other side there are resources, others to work with, incentives blah blah. Hell, you can even contruct something around Google Drive and YouTube to get started for free. There are ways to get free web sites. If you are at all technical you can use the free tier with Amazon AWS to host your site. If you are not technical, look to wordpress or bandcamp.
Quick Notes
Going beyond your friends and family is essential. The sooner the better.
"Help me because I want help" rarely touches anyone outside the music world past those early gigs. For almost anyone the "what's in it for me" is a principle of appreciation, respect, and a key motivator.
Understanding different ways to motivate and inspire is key to success.
Find people with good drive and enthusiasm. It makes a huge difference.
Building a team around you, getting help can be done. Artists do it all the time. Suggested by people other than me!
You may have tried to build a team, and failed, but your lack of success may be more to do with the "how", "where" and"when", rather than a flaw in the concept.
There are no instant solutions. Even if you pay people, it takes time and effort to make an appreciable difference. Some patience is needed for the changes to work.
I get the problem, and I will try to fill some of the solutions out in subsequent posts.
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