Hannibal Brumskine III Is Creating The Music Industry’s Middle Class
Talking monetization in the underground music world.
Most artists won’t reach superstardom, and I think the quicker you can accept that truth the quicker you’ll start to adapt your thinking into how to make a decent living off of music. -Hannibal Brumskine III
The Music industry has no middle class. You’re either a successfully signed artist or viewed as a dreamer, making music in your spare time. Which is not common in other creative industries. For example, writers, painters, and even comedians all have a fairly sustainable middle class. Where their creatives can earn a living independent of a manager or label contract and without the pressures that come with aspiring to be a household name.
When it comes to the music industry there’s what Hannibal calls an “artist and income inequality”. Where only .2% percent of artists are superstars and 90% are completely undiscovered.
Overall, the majority of the world’s artists are obscure and have never made a single dollar from their music. And it’s not due to a lack of talent, but a lack of information, resources, and basic business principles. More importantly, the average musician starting off is completely unaware that monetization is the difference between making music as a hobby and making music for a living.
Most people enter the industry with the mindset of “Go Big or Go Home”. They aren’t aware that being a middle-class artist is even an option. And that’s because the music industry doesn’t make it easy to tread comfortably in the middle.
However, local and statewide artists exist and are well-known within their communities.
One of the golden rules of business and art is that if at least one person likes your product it can work. And once you combine a business mindset with your artistic talent you can turn your creativity into not only a business but a new lifestyle for yourself.
This past week, I had a conversation with the Founder of TheMusicBusiness.com, Hannibal Brumskine III. They’re an artist development company that specifically helps music artists enter this middle class, by teaching them how to use the tools and strategies that record labels use to grow the careers of their artists — media buying, market research, etc..
Like many of you, I can name countless friends and acquaintances that are aspiring rappers, singers, and songwriters. And from the outside looking in, all I’d ever seen them do was post more and more content. Yet, typically stay in the same place, but with a slowly growing fanbase.
I only had one friend who was actually doing shows, selling products, and making an effort to make money from his music and his name. Not to mention actually investing in his brand.
Hannibal and I began the interview speaking about entering the industry and what artists can do to generate consistent growth.
If I wanted to start making a living from my music today, where do I start?
“The simple answer is to sign up for digital distribution services like DistroKid, TuneCore, and CDBaby. These are all companies that can place your music on streaming platforms like Apple Music, Spotify and Tidal. That’s the simple answer, but I think artists need to adopt the mindset of a business when they want to start selling at a deeper level.”
“They need to keep in mind that they’re SELLING something, so they need to have a good product and they need to have a clearly defined target audience. Before getting their music placed on streaming platforms, artists should ask themselves, “Who is my ideal fan?” “What do they look like?” “What keeps them up at night?” “What age range are they in?”, etc.”
However, I challenged that. I felt that music was an industry where a fanbase can become increasingly broad. Especially with several sub-genres and styles within each sub-genre. Your fan base may be split between teenage white kids from the suburb and young adult African Americans from the inner city — like many artists today are.
How do I capture such a broad market without making some of my fans feel left out? Both make different kinds of buying decisions.
His rebuttal was quick,
Focus on the image you’re portraying and the way it affects your largest fanbase. The indirect-consumers will follow.
Businesses never start selling products or services without clearly defining their target audience and then understanding the wants and needs of that target audience. Artists who can also adapt to this mentality will have an easier time selling music.
What is the best way for an artist with a small to medium-sized fanbase to monetize their music currently?
Patreon is one of my favorites and I think it’s the best option out currently. It allows artists to create their own subscription content services. Basically, an artists could set up a Patreon account and their fans could pay them $10 a month to access whatever type of content the artist decides to put on there — unreleased songs, videos of them creating while in the studio, anything.
This is huge because now an artist with only 400 fans can make a full time income off of his music. If he/she gets 400 people to pay 10 dollars a month then that artists is making just as much as your average American.
What would be your biggest piece of advice to, let’s say, an artist in his hometown trying to build a fanbase?
Think of your target audience and create something that would force them to pay attention. If you’re an artist from Omaha, Nebraska, make a song called “The Omaha National Anthem”. If you’re an artist trying to grow on campus, make a song for your campus. Don’t turn into a gimmick, but just think of your target audience before you think of yourself.
Once you have a song that you know your clearly defined, target audience will resonate with, create a free Google Advertising account and setup some cheap YouTube ads so that before someone in your area gets to watch a YouTube video, a snippet of your song automatically plays.
