Episode Transcript
[00:00:10] Speaker A: Everybody, and welcome back to the Music Industry 360 podcast. I'm your host, Vanessa, and today our topic is going to be artist development and management tips. And we have a special guest with us today. We have Camille Barbone, who is the president and owner of Camille Barbone Coaching and Consulting. And also we have Jeanette Barrios, our marketing director, with us. So welcome, ladies.
[00:00:29] Speaker B: Thank you. Nice to be here.
[00:00:30] Speaker C: Hey there.
[00:00:31] Speaker A: All right, so we will get right into it. So, Camille, could you actually just give us a little background information about yourself?
[00:00:36] Speaker B: Of course, be happy to. First, Jeanette, thank you so much for being here. I mean, Symphonic is an extraordinary organization and they do just such a fabulous job in terms of giving the creative community here in the area exactly what they need in terms of ancillary and support services. So it's a great honor to be involved.
My whole background has been nothing but the music industry since I was 23 years old. So it's about 30 years of experience. I've probably done everything you could possibly do in the music business, all legal, I might add. Worked for record labels, been an independent artist manager, owned two recording studios, worked with major artists, and worked on incredibly high profile projects as well as concerts. So I've done it all. I understand the music business, but I think my heart lies with artist development and helping the artists understand exactly what they need to do to cut through and break through.
[00:01:43] Speaker A: All right, thank you so much. All right, so we'll just get right into the discussion then, if that's cool with everybody. So, Camille, first topic we have is a record deal. Do you really need you know, there's.
[00:01:55] Speaker B: Not a yes or no answer to that. Record labels are evolving, okay? Technology, how they bring music to the listeners, how they find and sign new talent. Even the deal structure reflects new income streams for the labels and how labels can make the most money. I mean, it always comes down to the money. We have the 360 deal that has become a part of the landscape with regards to artists. When I started out in the music business, there was no such thing as a 360 deal. Labels got paid on, records sold. That was it. Okay? Now labels are involved in every aspect of an artist's career, so artist development becomes that much more important to them. Specialty deals do exist and we have the micro labels and we have distribution deals, which it's imperative. How the music is delivered is really the crux of an artist's career in the beginning. And access versus ownership is another aspect of the new music industry. It's not about people going out and downloading, it's about people getting involved with the streaming and accessing the music. The entire model with regards to record labels have changed. They own the content, and what they do is they allow the content to be placed on aggregate sites like Pandora or Spotify or SoundCloud or any of the other access points that listeners now go to to hear new music.
[00:03:30] Speaker C: So a question for you. So just for perhaps maybe some listeners that aren't fully aware of these deal structures. So what is a 360 deal?
[00:03:38] Speaker B: Basically a 360 deal tells the artist that the record company is going to earn on every aspect, every income stream of their career. So it's not just downloads or hard sales like CDs or now we're getting back into vinyl to a certain extent. It's also live performance, it's also endorsement, sometimes publishing, music publishing.
Every aspect of the artist's career that generates income now becomes part of the income stream of the record label. So it's very different. And it requires an artist to be far more multifaceted than they ever had to be. And it also requires that their career be a lot more evolved where there are other income streams so that a label finds the artist more attractive.
[00:04:34] Speaker C: At what point, let's say, I'm assuming that a lot of these deals are taking place by major record labels. Have you noticed that there are any, let's say, like independent record labels that are doing these sort of deals?
[00:04:48] Speaker B: Absolutely.
What I call the micro labels, they're far more prone to maybe specializing a little bit with the deal and maybe it's just distribution only. Or maybe they'll give a certain advance, which is kind of a lease deal on the Master, and they limit their participation. It's kind of like an ala carte menu. So with the micros, with the smaller labels, the indies, you have a little bit more latitude. The major labels, it's a straight 360 deal.
It all depends on what's important to the label and what's important to the artist. If an artist has a following, a really good presence on social media is gigging like crazy, has merch, has everything that an artist needs to be attractive to a major label, then go for the major label. If you're inclined to have a major label deal, they're very restrictive.
A lot of the artists that gig regularly are dealing with micro labels where the label is giving them approximately 25 $35,000 advance. That advance covers any costs of actually creating the masters and if there's anything left over, it's promote yourself. The label is basically kind of folding its arms and waiting to see if the artist starts to break through. If the artist starts to break through, then they're more inclined to do a little bit more, give a little bit more money, invest a little bit more time and effort. There's a formula now, you don't just run into a label and a label says, all right, we think you're amazing, we love your music, we love your songwriting. Here's $100,000 advance. It's not done anymore. There's a formula. They're looking at algorithms, they're looking at everything that you need to have as an artist. Before they say, this is what we'll give you. They have formulas. They know exactly how much money they can give you and where your break even point is in order for them to proceed. For anyone that doesn't know what a break even point, it's actually zero income. It means all of the expenses have been recouped by the label. And now they're in the black, they're in the area where they're going to make some money.
[00:07:10] Speaker C: That's interesting. I've always thought that there is like a formula I've been so curious about because I've heard know a certain amount of perhaps whether it's YouTube subscribers or monthly listens on Spotify, a combination of things.
[00:07:24] Speaker B: The more sophisticated the label, the more elaborate the formula. But the formula, it's real basic business when you think about it. They know, can this artist sell X number of units? If this artist can sell X number of units, this is the dollar investment that coincides with that. And they'll know in six months, a year if they're going to recoup, if they're going to get back that money, they invest.
The interesting thing about it is it doesn't happen often where they do recoup. But the beautiful formula with the music business is you need one and one usually can recoup for all the losses that they've had to date. But make no mistake about it, this is a business deal, especially to the major labels or even an indie label that has major distribution. It's a business deal. It's not about we love the music and we want to sign. This artist used to be that way, but it's not anymore. And sadly, that means artists or what I call artist development teams, really need to dig in and do some crazy DIY development on their own.
[00:08:37] Speaker A: Yeah, it's not about just having a good track anymore. You have to do more than just have the great music. I mean, that's definitely important, but there's a lot more that goes into it.
[00:08:46] Speaker B: All the elements have to be there. The music has to be there, the songwriting has to be there, the live performance has to be there. But there's now more than ever an elaborate amount of marketing that has to go in in order for you to attract a record. So when I say, do you really need a record deal? Not yet. What you really need to do is you need to self market and self promote. And that's the first step. The first step is getting out there, having a social media presence, getting the followers out there gigging on a regular basis, working so that you get as much exposure as you possibly can. Because the label is looking at can this individual sell?
That's the bottom line. Can they sell? Can they grow as artists and reach that tipping point where they become stars and then superstars in very few instances, iconic superstars.
[00:09:47] Speaker A: So that makes me think if that seems that probably is a little overwhelming to artists to think about. They have to do that. So that goes to my next question. Management. Like, do they really need a manager?
[00:09:58] Speaker B: Well, management in and of itself is becoming somewhat obsolete, especially with the big artists. Why should they pay 15, 20% to an artist manager when their career is already developed? And basically that artist manager becomes nothing but a gatekeeper and an order taker. And by the gatekeeper I mean the phone rings, it's so and so. Wanting a tour, we'd like to do a collaboration with another artist. The manager supposedly has enough information and knowledge about the business to say yes or no. That's a great deal. But it's that push pull thing. The artist manager is not taking a dominant role in pushing the artist out there. He or she is just waiting to see what the deals are and discussing it with maybe the business manager, maybe the artist himself, maybe the lawyer to figure out whether it's a good deal early on is really when you do need an artist manager. If you can't manage yourself, and most artists either can't or won't, it's hard to self promote. So to have that spokesperson, to have somebody that's actually promoting you and speaking about you is great. And it also gives you a little bit of buffer when you're dealing with some of the pitfalls of being involved in the activities that artists are involved with, gigging and the likes. So I think early on you do need somebody unless you want to do it yourself. And not many artists do. So yes to that answer and who is that manager? Well, let's look at the difficulty there. A really established artist manager is going to kind of look through the same lens as a record label. They're going to say, well, does this artist have a following? All the things that the label would want, the manager would want. Because established managers are kind of lazy.
They really are.
There are a couple of kinds of managers, okay? And they're the order takers that I just described and then they're really artist developers. When I managed. I was an artist developer. The more I had to do for the artist in terms of development, the better I felt about it, because I knew what the labels wanted and I knew what the artist had and I could help expedite it and maybe be a little bit more guiding in making sure the artist developed what the labels wanted.
But if you can't have an established artist, then what you have to find is somebody that has as much enthusiasm about the business as you do. I love working with college students and I work with them all the time. And I find that those that are majoring in marketing and have a love of music are perfect for startup management. And that's where a young artist can go to find somebody that's not just a wannabe not somebody that just thinks that the sizzle is where it's at, man.
I'm going to be an artist manager. I'm going to walk around say I'm an artist manager and I'm going to pick up guys and girls because I'm cool, and all those kinds of things has to be somebody that really wants to work hard because it's really hard work.
[00:13:18] Speaker C: Yeah, I've actually have noticed that too. We have a particular client, and I'm going to give him a shout out. Excellencia. And he works really close with his good friend and his friend, he studied marketing, and he's all into branding and SEO, so they've collaborated really well. And all of his branding looks really on point. They're really savvy in terms of how they're marketing themselves and keeping track of where their traffic is coming from, and they come up with a really good strategy.
I do see the value of that. And we've even seen a lot of label like our clients like label managers as well, that have a background in marketing specifically. We've noticed that a lot. So yeah, I like that point.
[00:14:04] Speaker B: Yeah. That artist is incredibly lucky.
You need someone as dedicated as you are. You need somebody that wants it as badly as you do. And hopefully the artist stays true and loyal to that individual because very often the label tries to when you advance the business in and of itself, it tries to break up the people that really helped you in the beginning. And the idea is to actually stay loyal and look at what an individual like that is contributing to the process. And it's a lot. If you can find someone like that, you're ahead of the game by leaps and bounds. And that's what artists don't realize. You can't do it alone.
It takes a village. It takes an artist development team. If that manager knows about publicity or has enough ambition to call up labels and call up publicity people and call up publications and try and get interviews and try and get gigs, that's what you need, right? You need somebody that's going to connect you with people, going to intersect with your core audience. If the individual knows management, that's the best. If they don't, but they just have the energy, that's great too.
[00:15:23] Speaker C: Yeah. What are some things if we were going to give specific examples of what a manager would be looking for, let's say if it's an established manager on the artist development side, what would be some key things that they would notice? Because I'm kind of thinking about it from my perspective. It's like, okay, so I'd be fortunate if I do find somebody that's in marketing that wants to help me out. Maybe they saw me at a show and naturally gravitate and want to help out because I've seen that a lot happen. But then what things or best practices should you be doing? Specific examples of whether it's tactics or how your presence is going to be in order to catch that attention from managers?
[00:16:08] Speaker B: From an established manager? Is that what you're saying? Yes. Or any manager in general.
[00:16:14] Speaker C: I would like to hear even both perspectives.
[00:16:17] Speaker B: Okay. On the established manager, they really are a mirror image of the label. They're going to want to see a significant number of followers. I'm working with a young artist right now who's 17 years old.
I have a marketer that has worked with Sean Mendez, that worked with some of similar artists. And the objective is to get several hundred thousand followers on Instagram and YouTube views on videos and all that. That's what a manager is going to look at. An established manager, the same thing labels are going to look at. I'm showing that the artist is viable. Now, there aren't a lot of artist developers, so I take the role as an artist developer in this, and I'm creating a product forgive me, artists out there, but you are a product. A living, breathing commodity, but a product nonetheless. I'm taking a product and I'm developing it to a point where it will become attractive to what actually is, from a marketing point of view, your primary audience until you get the opportunity to make the music consumer your primary audience. So I'm trying to to get as many people interested in that artist as possible.
And an unknown manager that just has the ambition and the tenacity to go out there isn't looking at that. They're looking at the opportunity to apply what they know, maybe about marketing, maybe about sales, maybe they don't know anything except, I really believe in that artist and I want everybody to hear that artist. That's different. That's a blank slate.
They're going to help to do all the things that an artist developer establishes. So if they don't have a social media presence going to have to get one. If they don't have a really good example of their recordings, they're going to have to get them in the studio and get them to record and make sure that the songs are great. If they're not that great on stage, you got to look at that and you got to say, is this too much for me to deal with? Or can I help this artist develop even better and get on that stage and be electric every time he or she gets on? These are the things that a manager has to do.
There was a day, there was a time when I knew nothing about artist management excuse me, except that I wanted to be one.
I had seen what managers do. When I worked at record labels, I was fortunate enough to be around really big management because I worked at what is now Sony, but was called Columbia Records then.
So I knew what I wanted to do and I knew what I had to do to do it. Managers need to learn what elements must exist for an artist to attract a label.
[00:19:16] Speaker C: Now I want to be a manager.
[00:19:18] Speaker B: Okay, I can teach you.
I've taught so many people how to manage. I really have. I used to teach it at Baru College in Was. Like, there were so many people that wanted to sign up to the class. It was astounding.
[00:19:33] Speaker C: No, I actually truly am gravitated toward management, but on the artist development side, but on the branding aspect, and I kind of naturally even do it when we see clients that have potential or struggling with their branding.
I love enhancing everything. Okay, this is what you have to be so so at least like profiles and everything is optimized.
[00:19:58] Speaker A: Well, Jeanette, I'm glad that you actually mentioned branding because that was another question I want to ask. Like, what is branding?
[00:20:03] Speaker B: Branding is a reputation.
And in the truest sense of marketing, branding is that. Okay? Symphonics branding is its reputation to do what it says it's going to do in its mission statement. And that's what an artist's brand is all about. It's about reputation. This person's going to get on stage is going to entertain. The music is engaging, their live performance is exciting, the music is moving, the band is great. That's their reputation and that's their brand. And if anything has to be developed as far as an artist's brand is concerned, it's you better know that it's that artist in just a few bars of music. Think about now, you know, Rihanna and how many bars, how many notes does it take you to name who that artist is? That's branding. They have an identity that's completely enmeshed in their music.
[00:20:57] Speaker A: Could you compare that to Britney Spears saying it's, you know, like, oh, hey.
[00:21:01] Speaker B: That'S a bad you know, it's interesting that you bring her up. And there are a lot of artists that really fit in a category, and the category is the brand, as opposed to the artist being the brand in and of himself or herself. Now, can you say that? Did you ever hear Gaga say that or Ariana Grande say that? Or any of the artists that are up and coming right now. They have an identity that stands out and how they behave not only on stage, but off stage is what their brand is.
[00:21:38] Speaker C: Yeah. And it has to be authentic too, to themselves.
And that's why I feel like it's tricky for some artists because I feel like they do get mixed up in terms of something more corporate. And, yeah, if it's like a logo or a look, but it's everything that you do and from the sound to how you interact with people, oh, yeah.
[00:22:00] Speaker B: That'S where development goes off the rails. It's when people decide that they're going to really change the artist. When you can't it needs to be organic.
It's like grafting. There's going to be a certain amount of rejection. If you're trying to graph something onto an artist that really has no business being there. What you really have to do is you have to be objective as far as management is concerned of what the artist can and can't do. Now, an established manager is going to have an eye for that. A manager that's starting out with just the desire to be a manager may not. But I strongly urge people like that to put your music listening hat on at that point in time. Put your fan hat on. Does that artist come on stage and just blow everyone away?
Is that person exciting from the minute they step on stage to the minute they step off? Can they really perform?
It's kind of like bad marriages. It's like, I can change that person. Well, you really can't change them that much. They either have it or they don't. And managers make a lot of mistakes. Now, what you have to do is minimize your risk. You have to say, can that artist perform? Can that artist write? Can that artist sing?
We're in the world of auto tuning and artists are not feeling they have to sing as well as they sing. But when you see some of the artists that really can sing, always in an interview, you'll hear someone say, can you sing us a few things? Can you do a few things? Or those old videos show up where they're all alone and they just have a guitar. They better be able to pull it off. You know what I'm saying?
We have a lot of artificial talent. I'm a purist, okay? You better blow me away in my living room, sing me some songs. If you can do that, then I know I got that piece of the puzzle's in place.
[00:23:59] Speaker C: And what an amazing feeling when you stumble on somebody like that that you've listened to, like, let's say, whether it's Spotify or you bought their album and then you see them live and they actually sound exactly how they've been recorded.
[00:24:12] Speaker B: Yeah, it's so important. I mean, that's what makes a real fan, you know, that's authentic, you know, that that's pure entertainment. And every time you switch on that person, you're going to have a good time. And we forget what it's all about, what entertainment is all about. It needs to take me on a trip. I don't want to think about a bill I have to pay, a car that needs to be fixed. I don't want to think of anything when I'm hearing music that I really love. It's a journey and they better be able to take you on that journey.
[00:24:46] Speaker C: So I'm going to do a little plugin because based on that, we can add it to our little SoundCloud and some previews. But I've experienced that with one of our clients patterns music from Costa Rica. Really awesome. And also King complex. It's a really good feeling.
[00:25:04] Speaker B: I wish I'd heard them.
[00:25:05] Speaker C: No, I'm going to send them to you.
[00:25:06] Speaker B: Yeah.
Symphonic as a distributor. You're not in ring distribution. You're distributing anyone that wants to be distributed. But, you know, because you're professionals, you know the ones that really have a chance.
Now, a lot of people do an R. A lot of distributors do ANR I'm sure to a certain degree you do. You're not going to distribute music that was recorded in somebody's backyard with the kids screaming and dog barking. I mean, it's just not going to happen. So there's a certain level, there's a certain criteria of professionalism that you need in order for you to do your job and be successful at it.
And that's really across the board. The artist manager, everybody is looking at that. The music publisher is looking at that. The record label is looking at that. Everybody has to feel that this artist has a chance in order to move forward to the next step.
[00:26:04] Speaker A: All right, so let me switch things over. So, Camille, what promotion and publicity tips.
[00:26:08] Speaker B: Can you you know, those are two very important aspects of an artist's development.
To get the exposure you need is vital to you moving your career forward. And publicity is an amazing way for your audience or a potential audience to find out what you're all about and who you are. You have to understand how to promote yourself, and not many artists do. As a coach, a lot of people come to me and say, I need to market myself and I don't know how to do it. Well, it's about differentiation. It's about you saying, I'm different from everyone else. And that's what you have to look at. My differences again, you're going to find publicists are order takers as well. Okay? If it's easy to get you interviews, they're going to do it. If it's hard, they're going to look for an artist that has more juice. All right? So if it's hard, they're not going to want to take you on it's back to that DIY thing yourself.
Artists need to find a way to break through. So if they're doing let's say they're doing a charity event. A charity event is a perfect example of getting some press that you wouldn't normally get. So you're differentiating yourself. You're saying, okay, I'm going to do the charity event for Casa, which is a shelter for battered women.
So you could call them and say, hey, I'm doing that event. I'm going to be performing. A cousin of mine was abused. I'd love an opportunity to talk to somebody about it, and maybe you can come down and help casa promote the event because it's a fundraiser. So you've taken the initiative, you've brought yourself out to be something different. It's not look, I'm an artist, I have great music, and you really should do an interview with me because I'm going to be a superstar someday. That's not going to get you an interview. So it's looking for the hook, looking for the way to show that you're different from someone else. Publicity is a really different thing than promoting. Self promoting helps you get publicity. But I'd say promotion is the first step to getting publicity.
[00:28:32] Speaker A: Yeah, that's why I mentioned to you earlier, Camille, separately, but that I work with video distribution, as our listeners know. And I usually tell a lot of people that they need to be unique with their music videos because when we pitch it for features to help get them publicity. Basically, with our partners, they're looking for something different than what's out there in the mainstream music video world nowadays. I see a lot of hip hop videos where they're doing like the old school camcorder look to it. And so now I've been getting a sea of music videos that they're like, oh, I saw this mainstream artist did this, so I'm going to do this in my videos. Like, no, you want to do something different. It's nice to be able to be inspired by that, but you have to take it and do something else with it in order to get it seen.
[00:29:18] Speaker B: Absolutely.
Look, there's a lot of traffic out there, okay? There are a lot of people wanting a record deal, wanting to get the gigs, wanting to be featured in festivals. I mean, there's a lot of competition. It's a highly competitive business. So how do you cut through on that competition? You have to come up with something that's different. You have to be different.
[00:29:42] Speaker C: Yeah. I'm a really big advocate too, of collaboration. So I always recommend artists of whatever city they're in, looking for those creative communities, whether it's visual artists or even photographers, videographers, just people that can have a different take on your music. Because I'm always surprised by some particular music videos. That how a videographer or producer will take a whole new spin on a song and have a story around it. And I've become fans of particular tracks just because of a music video.
[00:30:17] Speaker B: Yeah, collaboration is a great way to.
[00:30:22] Speaker C: Differentiate yourself, especially starting off, because sometimes there might know, we've seen this a lot in Latin America that a lot of people sometimes might barter a service. So they'll help you out doing a video and then perhaps later on the road, obviously you give them credit for it and so on. So there's always opportunities for probably doing some trade offs, at least starting off, but always reaching out to creative communities and just seeing what potential collaborations can come about.
[00:30:53] Speaker B: And you're also getting some of the power of that creative community as well. You're not alone in there. If the creative community has had some breakthroughs, you might be able to capitalize on those breakthroughs. Publicity is a really tough aspect of the music business to break.
But I would go after the fanzines, I would go after electronic newsletters, I would try every aspect of publicity in order to position myself to publications or exposures that have a much. Larger following. So I'd start a blog. I'd try and guess blog. I try and do all the things that I could do to get my name and my music out there.
[00:31:38] Speaker C: Yeah, some of the tips too that I try to offer too, is that first of all, start local. Start local, then regional, then national. So establishing those relationships locally with your local newspaper, or maybe it's like a town newspaper. There's always going to be somebody that focuses on the arts. Maybe they focus on music, maybe they focus on visual arts. But there's always going to be somebody in that handling that editorial coverage. So always finding that individual.
A lot of times now, writers are somewhat accessible, especially on Twitter for the most part. Sometimes you can reach out to them through there.
Even I've noticed a lot of posts themselves have the writer's Twitter account. So reaching out through there.
One other tactic that I've seen as well is through.
Basically, you know, once your music is streamed, you're going to have some algorithms that are going to be picked up. And Spotify identifies artists that have similar music as yours. So looking researching those particular artists that are similar as you and seeing where they have gotten coverage, media coverage, because whomever's writing about them will probably write about you as well or enjoy that type of music. So those are like at least two smaller tactics that I even use it sometimes for the company.
[00:33:07] Speaker B: You don't have to reinvent the wheel. You're absolutely right, Jeanette. You can see how other people have broken through and try and replicate what they've done. You have to be tenacious. You have to continually try. And if that doesn't work, try something else. You can't give up. If you give up, you have a problem. You have to continue to move in this business if you want it. It's not this is too hard.
It's hard.
It's very difficult work, and you're swimming upstream for a very, very long period of time. But a couple of breakthroughs will make it a little bit easier. People give up way too easily in this business. People with a lot of talent do, and that's painful to see.
[00:33:51] Speaker A: So we've talked about record deals, management, branding and promotion. So keeping all this in mind, do you have any time management tips for artists to get all this done? Basically?
[00:34:03] Speaker B: Actually, yeah. You have to continually keep moving.
You need to do at least five things for your career every day of your life in order to start to gain some momentum. When I coach artists, some have procrastination issues, some actually have a fear of success, which is pretty counterproductive when you think about it. You have to be fearless and be absolutely certain that this is what you want to do. But every day you have to add five things to a list that needs to be done for your career, whatever that may be. It may be going into a studio and cutting a new vocal. It may be finding a member of the band. It may be calling two or three clubs to see if you could get a gig or researching festivals in your part of the country. But you have to continually work your career.
A lot of people think, I go to my rehearsal space and I rehearse all day long, and they actually think they're in the music business, and they're really not. They're actually hiding from the music business. The idea is to get out there. The idea is to ask questions, learn. I mean, there's so much on the Internet now that can teach you about the music business.
Go online, look at a record deal, look at a publishing deal.
[00:35:28] Speaker A: Yeah, I mean, we even have, like I was discussing, we have our podcast, we have our Music Biz 101 series. We have our blog, Simblog.com. So we have the knowledge out there that people can get for free.
[00:35:38] Speaker B: They should tap into it. It's there for them. That's what it's all about. This is a great service for artists. They don't have to make it up as they go along. It's there for them to use. So it's educating yourself. I mean, time management is important if you have things to do, if you don't have anything to do, if you think, Well, I got to rehearse no, you should have a schedule. You actually should use one of the apps, the productivity apps, one I use, because there isn't a big learning curve on it. It's pretty intuitive and works is this thing called Maestro Task, and you can actually have categories of what you're working on. So say gigs. All right, in your gig folder, you would say, call X, number of clubs, call this club, call NACA and see if they're having a showcase, which would enable me to get college gigs. All that kind of stuff is really important. And if you're having trouble doing that, get somebody to teach you how to do it. I coach a lot about time management and procrastination and the patterns that we have in our lives.
If you get up every morning and you have a cup of coffee and you sit there and think about, what is it I'm going to do today? You're already behind the curve. You have to know the night before what needs to be done the next day. So it's really setting priorities and understanding what your career needs. And that goes back to self awareness. That goes back to, does that artist understand the process? And if they don't understand the process, they need to find out what it is.
[00:37:20] Speaker C: Yeah, it's really good to set yourself just small. Even if you have a larger goal, break it down into smaller pieces, and that kind of helps out. So let's say you have a goal. I want to play at a festival, so it's like, okay, and this is something that I actually got from Jorge, at least when I first started working here.
Just do like, okay, I'm going to research. I need to research maybe I need to research five festivals today and find out who do I need to reach, what is their content information or their submission process like. And something too, that, at least for me, has helped as well. Is that because this industry is so relationship driven? We meet a lot of people along the way. We get business cards.
I always keep all my contacts in a spreadsheet. And what is the title of this person? What's the company? What do they do? What city are they in?
And periodically I'll go in there and look up, let's say if you're traveling to another city, I'll just filter it and be like, okay, who's in New York that maybe I want to talk to or revisit that relationship? Or maybe they're interested in a particular project you can send them. Hey, I just started doing this new track. What do you think about it? Depending on the relationship, but just having one dedicated place with all your contacts because you meet so many different people, at least for me, it's helped out a lot.
[00:38:46] Speaker B: What you're actually saying is, this is how you do business. And what I think we're all saying to artists is, it's a business and you have to treat it as such.
We all have this feeling like it's a party, or at least some people that are looking at the business from the outside think it is. It's probably one of the most labor intensive industries to be in because of the competitive edge that exists, because of the fact that only a small percentage of artists cut through.
So you have to deal with internal competition all the time. And what makes you win is by doing more than the next person.
[00:39:27] Speaker A: All right, well, I think that covers all the topics I wanted to discuss. Do you guys have anything else you wanted to add?
[00:39:33] Speaker B: Actually, I just want to say that the key to this whole thing for artist success is making sure your music is getting to the listeners. So distribution is incredibly, incredibly important to your success. And an organization like Symphonic is doing a great service to its artists, for the creative community in general.
And it's important because of the integrity, and it's important because they know what they're doing and they associate with people that know what they're doing. If you don't know what you're doing, find someone who does and completely just have them empty their brain and give you as much information as they can.
[00:40:20] Speaker A: Well, thank you, Camille, for being on where can people contact you or read more information about you?
[00:40:26] Speaker B: Thanks for asking. I have a website, it's Camillebarbone.com, and I have a Facebook page, a business Facebook page, and it'll talk about what I do from a coaching and consulting point of view, I don't manage any longer. I just coach and consult, and I really enjoy this aspect of it, but it'll give you a pretty good idea of what a coach does. And coaching is a great way to forge a relationship that isn't long term, that isn't costly. You don't have to give a percentage of your income away. It's a service. People pay for it and they can run with the information. So my website, Camillebarbone.com, is the best place to find me.
[00:41:08] Speaker A: All right, so that does wrap up everything. So thank you again for being here, Camille, and thank you, Jeanette, for being on as well. And we'll see you guys next time.
[00:41:15] Speaker C: Thanks for having us, and thank you for joining us, Camille.
[00:41:18] Speaker B: It was my pleasure, really. An.
