This whole thing is probably not.
Your big idea. My big idea. Yours might be better than mine but they both probably won’t work.
So ‘probably not’ isn’t a good enough reason not to go for a big idea…because they all fall into the category.
The biggest differentiator from one big idea to another is the willingness of the parties involved to put everything they have into the next actionable step.
First Monday of the month, new Hum Love playlist on Spotify and Apple.
When you’re doing creative work, both your conscious and subconscious mind are spinning.
This is why slight distraction while being creative can be such a great thing…when you conscious mind takes a break, you’re subconscious is often still hard at work…except now it’s free to be creative and percolate without the conscious mind (or the other people in the room) getting in the way.
The phrase ‘it just came to me’ is often a result of this idea. After distracting the conscious mind for a bit, the subconscious serves up some of the best stuff.
We weren’t good at fighting bears. They always won.
And I’m sure there was a group of people that thought getting better at fighting bears would be the best way to survive. But when that training kept not working…
Instead of focusing on getting better at fighting bears we got good at anticipating bears and learning strategies to avoid bear fighting.
While there are many problems that get solved by meeting them head on…some problems are worth avoiding so you never have to deal with them at all.
For instance…
Don’t focus on getting good at firing people…but rather, make better hires.
Don’t make it a habit of making the most of terrible shows…get better at saying no to them in the first place.
Don’t spend time coming up with better excuses for being late…instead, be on time.
Gaining fans one at a time isn’t a good long term strategy for making a career in music.
If you have to sit in front of each potential fan and play some music, share your stories and put on the sales pitch…they’ll probably end up being a fan…but doing that two hundred or a thousand times in each city in order to sell out the venue isn’t the way to do it.
However…especially at the beginning…you’re going to have to convince some people. And it might be one at a time.
It’s worth winning over the right manager because the right manager is going to help you win other people over by the hundreds and thousands.
It’s worth winning over the right agent and marketer and PR rep and maybe even the person who runs the big playlist…they all make it so you don’t have to win fans over one at a time.
The way you are identified out in the world, in your market, to your audience or customers is a very narrow definition. It has to be. In order to cut through and have staying power in someone’s mind your means of being identified have to be clear, simple and consistent.
A certain look or sound or stance or product or character trait becomes how you are identified.
But keep in mind that the way you are identified is merely a sliver of your identity. It’s easy to confuse the two.
The way you are identified is not your identity.
And
Your full identity is too complex to trade on in the marketplace.