Growing up, many of us saw and heard stars on TV and radio and dreamt of one day becoming the next big thing ourselves. What most of us failed to realise, though, is how tough breaking into the music industry really is. While listeners were exposed to more music than ever before with the emergence of the internet, this didn’t just give artists more opportunities to reach an audience. It also made competition much tougher and opened the door for streaming services to piggyback off of artist’s earnings, amongst other things. In this article, we’ll take you through some of the major ways in which the music industry has changed over the years – and how it’s affected the way artists and labels do business.
More Record Labels Equals More Competition
With more music reaching more people than ever before, record labels have also started emerging at a much more rapid pace than ever before. This, in turn, has resulted in much more competition in the music industry. As a record label, you must establish a certain amount of recognition and credibility to be able to sign some of the biggest upcoming names. For this reason, you as a record label must create a strong and unique identity to be able to effectively market your brand.
First off, you’ll want to make sure that you have a name that people will remember. If you can’t come up with anything, try using tools like this business name generator to get started or asking colleagues, friends and family for suggestions. A good, catchy name will make people remember your record label and put you on the radar of upcoming artists looking to sign with a label that gets their style.
Artists Are Fighting Harder to Get a Fair Pay
While the most popular artists are still very much able to profit handsomely off of their music, the same can no longer be said for less successful acts. Sure, streaming services such as Tidal and Spotify have made it easier and faster to listen to music without having to purchase the artist’s album – but their business model definitely doesn’t work in the artist’s favor. While users do pay a fee for using the services, not nearly as much of it as you’d think actually go to the musicians themselves. Streaming services have completely taken over the music industry, which is why more artists want a complete reset of music streaming to ensure fair pay for artists. However, it’s still too soon to tell if they’ll actually manage to get anywhere with these calls for action.
So, what can you do as a new act to boost your chances of making it big? Streaming platforms are of course still very important to be on, since this is where most people listen to music at this point – but concerts, tours and other types of live sets are where people discover you, and ticket sales are where many musicians make the bulk of their income. Make sure to network as much as you can and know who your audience is, where to reach them and which businesses to collaborate with to get your name out there. Music is far from an easy business to get involved with, but you have to hang in there and be patient. In order to make it, you have to give it all you’ve got, despite the many challenges you’ll be facing – so, if you can persevere through these and trust the process, you already have a big advantage over less determined competitors.
