- in Tips by Bobby Owsinski
There’s Still Time To Schedule Your Year
Being an artist is hard. There’s so much to do and it seems like there’s never enough time. One way to lessen the burden to make a schedule for the year, and while this better done in December, it’s still not too late. Yes, it may change as your year rolls along, and that’s okay. It’s way easier to rearrange things than it is to have them suddenly sneak up on you.
Although there can be many more factors to consider, I think it’s easiest to set up your yearly schedule into 3 areas – new music releases and the marketing surrounding them, list building through social media, and your ultimate goals. Let’s take a look at each
Goals
The first thing is to decide what your goals are going to be. Record new music? Then put a date to when you like to have it finished. Reach 5,000 on your mailing list? Put it date to when you’d like to see that happen. Start playing live again? Yes, it’s a moving target these days, put a date to it anyway. Reskin and update your website and social profiles? Get it on the calendar.
Just the fact that you’ve set a time to reach your goal will help you manifest it. If you miss a date, don’t fret – just move the date back, look at what you’ve accomplished so far, and figure out what you need to accomplish to move forward.
Try not to have too many goals unless many are easy and can be achieved in the short term (like a month or two). Too many goals will most likely lead to many being missed, which could make you feel like you haven’t accomplished anything at all. The idea is to have a lot of little steps that lead you to achieving a goal before you know it.
New Music Releases
If you’re working on new music that you’ll release in the new year, now is the time to think about how and when you’ll do that. It’s already too late if you wait until your music is finished. By the time you mount a marketing campaign it may already be dated, or at least feel dated to you, instead of fresh and exciting.
Decide on your release date and work backwards from that to plan the recording, mixing, mastering, production (if physical product is needed), artwork, and marketing. If you’re dripping out releases over time, like every month or so (which is a great strategy), decide the ideal times for that to happen so you can pre-plan how you’ll get the word out.
Make sure you take into account things like holidays, school breaks (if that’s your market), times you’re unable to post, and anything else that might be a factor that can throw you off later.
Social
The goal of being on a social platform should be to get people to hear your music, but more importantly, build your mailing list. The list is invaluable since people have willingly opted in hoping to hear from you, and it’s much easier to capture their attention with an email than the hit or miss of social.
Your schedule here would be promotional events like live gigs and new music and videos, as well as an editorial calendar for the times in between. It’s sometimes helpful to have different topics or themes lined up for certain times of the year so you’re never caught in a spot where you’re wondering what to post about.
Many artists and musicians are afraid to think more than a month ahead, worried about how things might change. Yes, that happens, but not as much as you think, and when you have a plan it’s pretty easy to move things around. Also, having these three parts of your schedule will better keep you on track so you don’t drift away to whatever shows up in front of you.
So get out your virtual calendar, paper calendar, or whiteboard and start planning now. You’ll be glad you did.
You can read more from The Social Media Promotion For Musicians Handbook and my other books on the excerpt section of bobbyowsinski.com.
