Are you a Bighead?

Hi there,

In last month's newsletter I talked about your route to success - whatever you consider that to be - and how you could reach that success. Most of my tips and examples centred around promotion and how you may find innovative ways of doing this for yourself and your music.

The feedback I have gathered from my clients is that promotion is something they really struggle with. Are you the same? Are you perhaps an artist manager trying to sell your services to bands and solo artists? Or are you an unsigned artist trying to promote your gigs - maybe through sending out press releases? Are you a signed artist promoting yourself and your latest album through interviews with the media? Are you trying to get that job with a record company and promoting yourself through your application form and interview?

Whatever methods you are using to promote yourself there appears to be an underlying fear of self-promotion or about being seen to be 'Bigheaded' about your achievements! For example, one client told me he wanted to say that he "was a fantastic guitarist" but couldn't bring himself to for fear that people would think he was bragging and sneer at his statement and start comparing him to a couple of legendary guitarists such as Jimi Hendrix or Yngwie Malmsteen. I have been making some observations around these fears and I have come up with the following - see if you can relate to them too:

Are you being too British? It seems to me that we British have a tendency to be rather self-deprecating. We play down our achievements, belittling them when we talk to others about them. As a nation we get annoyed with the Americans who seem to be 'in your face' and being 'the big I am' (I am generalising here). For some people this approach has been rubbing off on them - having watched The 'X' Factor over the last few weeks (purely for professional reasons, you understand!), I've seen quite a number of contestants telling Simon, Sharon and Louis, that they "have the 'X' factor", and getting extremely resentful and even abusive when the panel members tell them they most certainly do not!

Where does your self-belief come in here? Do some of you have a lack self-belief? It's interesting to hear where this lack of belief sometimes comes from. For example, a number of my clients have what I call a 'self-belief wobble' because they have concentrated on the comments of one person, who has said "Yeah, your voice is alright" rather than the hundreds who have said "Wow! You have a great voice"!

An abundance of self-belief also doesn't have to be showy and 'in your face' either. We British have a different way of showing it - 'quietly'. And funnily enough we British also kind of like people who show a little lack of confidence. For instance, going back to The 'X' Factor, we can easily pick out those singers who have a 'quiet' self-belief and those who are lacking confidence - and what a response we have to those people! We sit there in front of our TV's urging them on and exclaiming "what a great voice they have" and "what a really nice personality they have" (or is that just me?). It is this kind of person that the British public like to back and see them succeed.

So how does this relate to self-promotion and your fears of it that are mentioned above, I hear you ask? Well it's no wonder that you have those fears when you have possibly been conditioned to think in that way by the society you live in - via the media for one, or for that matter by the people and your peers close to you. You may know instinctively or by personal experience that you will be brandished a 'bighead' if you utter anything that you consider to be really good about yourself - however true it may be! But the music industry is a creative industry and one where to get attention you must really stand out to be heard - not an easy thing to do if you are a fabulous singer or guitar player, but essentially very shy, lacking self-belief or fearful about self-promotion!

Okay now for a couple of Tips on how to combat this:

Tip 1 - Planning is essential. For any kind of self-promotion you need to plan what you want to say about your self: maybe as a singer; or your music: maybe as a songwriter; your music industry service: maybe as an artist manager. The forms of your self-promotion can of course be in spoken or in written form.

When promotional materials are in written form you may find it easier to write about yourself and your music in the third person. For example: "Richard Evans - a star in the making - a glittering guitarist, let him entertain you in the style of Jimi Hendrix and Yngwie Malmsteen".

You may have written this yourself - but it sounds as though someone else has and therefore you don't sound 'Bigheaded'. You can use this kind of phrasing in many different forms of promotional material such as a flyer, a poster, a press-release or even a biography for MySpace or your website.

If however, you are planning to speak directly to people to promote yourself or your music, planning is even more essential. To plan what you want to say to your audience, first think about who that audience is, why are you going to talk to them? What are they expecting of you? If you are trying to attract them to your music industry service, what can you offer them that is of great benefit to them?

For example, if you were going to a radio interview to promote your music and yourself as an artist, you may wish to plan what you want to say about yourself, for instance, what are your songs about? What parts of your private life are you happy to share? What funny stories can you impart about your musical experiences? How did you get into music in the first place? Plan these all out and write them down and then go onto Tip 2.

Tip 2 - Practice makes perfect! Once you have written down what you may wish to speak about - practice speaking what you have written - does it sound okay? Does it roll off your tongue fluently? Do you stumble over the words? If so, change them if necessary. If you are able to practice your radio interview, job interview or whatever pitch you are making, with another trusted person, so much the better - but do try to find someone who can give you honest and constructive feedback!

Failing that, record yourself and listen to the way you come across - do you like it? If not, think about the artists that you have heard talking on one of the chat shows, or radio - Jo Wiley and Chris Moyles on Radio 1 are constantly interviewing musicians and singers - take some tips from those that you like and try to replicate the way in which they come across.

The most important part of self-promotion though is to be yourself - that may sound like a contradiction to the previous statement, but it is not intended to be. It is important to be who you really are and to show that. Unless you have a positive quantity of self-belief and are true to yourself and not trying to be someone you are not, you will always find self-promotion difficult. Therefore if you are a bit brash or funny or have a larger than life personality - show it - Robbie Williams hasn't done so badly from being a funny guy in his interviews. Alternatively, if you are a bit on the shy side, that's cool too - people will warm to you regardless.

The bottom line is that the more you plan and the more you practice self-promotion, the more confident you will become with it and the more you do it the less the fear will take over and render you speechless!

I hope you have enjoyed reading this month's newsletter. If you are still struggling to promote yourself and your music, then you know you can email me for a consultation call to discuss what is holding you back and to see how I can help you. In the meantime take a look at my package that helps you to 'handle the media' on the following link: http://www.bravura-group.com/package-handling-the-media.php

So are you a 'Bighead'?

With very best wishes,

Bravura Group
helping you brave the music industry

http://www.bravura-group.com

t: 01246 231 249 / 0845 456 460
e: lindsey@bravura-group.com

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I work with signed and unsigned artists and personnel working in the Music Industry who want to become more productive, creative and ultimately more successful in their music careers, whilst enjoying a more enriched, fulfilling and balanced personal life.

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