How To Really Sell Your Music

Hey, what's up gigging pros. It's Jared, welcome to another episode of The Gigging Musician Podcast. Today, I wanted to share with you a tool that's going to help you book more gigs. And not only is it going to help you book more gigs, it's also going to help you charge higher prices for your gigs. And aside from even just booking more gigs, this is going to help you sell more things. And I know as a musician, you probably don't think you're in the business of selling things. But maybe you are a music teacher, and you want more students, you are in the business of selling parents and children, on booking you for lessons that's selling private lessons, maybe you are a course credit, you've created a course for musicians to learn how to play piano, you are in the business of selling courses. So this is going to help you with all of that. And what it boils down to is selling. When you think about selling, you know, most people will think that you have to be a greasy used car salesman, and just trying to get as much money as possible. And that's just simply not true. That's a poor depiction of what selling actually is. And unfortunately, you know, movies have made that I don't know the Matilda, the the father from Matilda comes to mind, because he was a greasy used car salesman that literally like rolled back the odometer on the vehicles he was selling so that it looks like they were not as old as they actually are. But that's not a good way of selling things that's lying and deceitful. So the question then is, how do you sell things. And as a musician, when you're trying to sell your music, the easiest thing for you to tell people about are what are called the features of your music. These are all the cool things that your music does or is and things that you have, or experience that you have. These are all kind of the things that maybe you and me as a musician naturally geek out about. Like for example, if you have a SQC sound system and PA mixer, that is a feature like we've got an amazing PA system, it's a QSC model K 12.2, yada, yada yada. The problem though, is that that's not going to sell people on your music or on your sound system, like unless they are already que se or audio files, who care about that thing. Those words are almost meaningless to those people. And the same can be applied to other things. Like for example, if you're in booking a gig, and you have, I was working with one of my Fulltime Music Academy students earlier today, and he runs a mandolin upright bass duo. And so that is one of the features of his group is that it contains him on mandolin and a an upright bass player, which is cool, but those are features. So what we want to get to is the benefits of that feature. So the tool is called features versus benefits. Most musicians focus on the features. But what actually sells your music is the benefits. What actually sells people on hiring you for private lessons or what why they actually buy your course is the benefits, how does the feature of what you do benefit their life. And I do a lot of personal development training. I'm currently going through a course by Tony Robbins called Mastering Influence, and it's all about selling better. And one of the tools that Tony told me about was using the words what that means to you is blank. So let's get back to the QSC sound system example. If I were to tell somebody that my band brings QSC speakers, including a subwoofer, the way to sell it is to answer the question, what does that mean to the person hiring you. So I bring que que se speakers, what that means to you is that you're going to get crystal clear, concert hall quality sound, and I'm going to be able to entertain you and your guests and control volume. And what that also means is that your guests will still be able to have conversations going on even with our music play. So get real deep into their desires and talk about how does this benefit them. Getting back to the mandolin and upright bass example. You know, having a mandolin and an upright bass is awesome. And but I would pitch it as so we're going to bring a mandolin and an upright bass to your event. What that means to you is you're going to get an authentic southern experience that you can latch on to but it's also unique and provides you and your guests with a variety that will keep them engaged and create lasting memories. So that this is not just another wedding where there's a DJ playing. This is something you're truly going to Remember, and what that means to you is that you're not wasting hundreds or 1000s of dollars on something that people aren't even going to enjoy or remember. So those are the benefits versus the features. And what I would do is if I were you, and I've done this for my group, and all the things that I sell, is go through all of the things that you sell, and list out on a sheet of paper or on Google Docs, whatever you like to do, list out all the features of what you sell. And then after you go through all of those features, put bullet points underneath each feature, and write out what does that mean to the people who are buying this? And you're gonna get some answers right away. And you're gonna have to go through this a couple times. It's kind of like an onion, you know, like Shrek says, or a donkey says in Shrek. an auger is like an onion, it has layers. So you can answer something, the answer this, what that means to you question with an answer. But then ask that question again, about the benefit you just listed. So, you know, what I'm selling has feature x. And what that means is benefit one. But what benefit one will actually mean is benefit to and you'll keep, you can actually go a couple layers deep to get to the actual root of the desire that the people who are purchasing your performance or purchasing your private lessons from. So that is an overview of features versus benefits. And the thing that really sells people are the benefits, not the features. The features are the things that you and me geek out about as musicians. And other musicians also tend to geek out about this too. So if you ever like talking to a bunch of jazz musicians, they tend to focus on the features of jazz, and that's what they geek out about, like this person can solo really well. And that's an awesome feature. But the people who are paying money for music are sold more on the benefits. So if a jazz musicians feature is that they're excellent at solo. And what that means is your guests are going to be entertained. Every performance is different so you're getting a unique experience by hiring them. So hope that helps helps you hope you do the exercise and start to think through what are the benefits of the things that you're selling. And let me know send me a message if you got value out of this. You can message me on Instagram at Jared judge or on tick tock full time musician or shoot me an email to Jared@BookLive.com. I want to hear from you. Let's start the conversation and make gigging better for everyone in the world. Alright, thanks again for listening to another episode of The Gigging Musician Podcast. Remember, "You are just one gig away!".