TEM Coaching Chat: The power of routine

This week’s TEM Coaching Chat is all about the power of routine. I touched on the following:

• A passage from my upcoming book about the power of routine

• An awesome quote by author W. Somerset Maugham about inspiration

• The uber-productive year I had writing blog posts and the specific parameters I laid out that led to that success

• Why goals need to be attainable but we need to be sure not to undersell what we are capable of

I also kick this off with a very quick musical holiday tribute to my late mentor, Sam Pilafian.

Enjoy!

TEM Coaching Chat: Why you're not charging enough for lessons

This week’s TEM Coaching Chat is all about pricing lessons. I touched on the following:

• A story of a store that accidentally doubled the price of jewelry they couldn’t sell for months and then it sold out in a week

• Why not charging much for lessons or any service is a form of hiding

• Why being the cheapest option isn’t the best way to break into a new market

• If no one thinks you’re charging too much then you’re not charging enough

Enjoy!

It’s easier to make yourself an authority than you think

Entrepreneur Brian Clark likes to say that it’s easier to make yourself an authority on something than you might think. He argues that anyone who reads two books on any subject will know more than 98% of the world about that topic.

Reading two books about marketing is obviously not going to make you an expert. But any entrepreneurial musician who reads Purple Cow by Seth Godin and Influence by Dr. Robert Cialdini is going to know significantly more than 98% of their peers about marketing and sales.

The great news is you don’t need to be a true expert on marketing to have your messaging stand out among your competition. You just have to be a little more curious, a little more intentional and a little more remarkable with your marketing to have it be something which sets you apart from the crowd.

Remember, obscurity as the result of blending in is the biggest threat to any artist today. If you apply the proven and effective ways of getting your message out that Godin and Cialdini lay out in those famous books, your marketing and messaging will be remarkable and as a result your music will cut through the noise.

Of course this doesn’t only apply to marketing. This principle applies to any aspect of a portfolio career.

In my experience, a lot of musicians spend almost all of their time on their music and close to none on learning how to make their website easier to navigate, their networking more meaningful or their social media presence more useful and relevant to the people they are trying to reach.

All of this provides a great opportunity for any musician willing to put in the work. And that work can be as simple as reading two books.

TEM Coaching Chat: The difference between motivation and inspiration

I am going to start streaming each week on Tuesdays on the TEM YouTube channel and TEM Facebook page with some thoughts on navigating a portfolio career.

This first one features my thoughts on the difference between motivation and inspiration (and why motivation is NOT the first step but the end result.)

And it also features about 30 seconds of me laying down some tuba at the very beginning of the stream.

Enjoy!

Lean into the tension and away from the certainty

The problem with choosing unhappiness over uncertainty is that uncertainty is where all growth comes from.

Seth Godin calls it tension which he defines as not knowing whether something is going to succeed or not.

The happiest people I know in the music business intentionally put themselves in situations where they don't know whether it's going to go well or not. And they do it regularly.

This goes for teachers attempting to teach new material or teaching old material in a brand new way. This goes for performers playing in new genres or completely reimagining some aspect of performance. This goes for musicians trying new approaches in the practice room.

It can be applied to literally any aspect of the music business.

The bottom line is you must lean into the tension and away from the certainty. You'll be happy you did.

How to write a powerful first sentence

“Your first sentence is an audition” says Josh Spector.

Even though Josh is not a musician he was speaking my language with that opening line!

Writing is a vital skill for any entrepreneurial musician to develop. Everyone writes, even if it’s not one of their main outputs. And being able to write in a clear and concise manner is worth the time it takes to master that important skill.

(This reminds me of a wonderful quote by French philosopher Blaise Pascal: “I have made this longer than usual because I have not had time to make it shorter.”)

I highly recommend this article from Josh Spector on how to open any piece of writing. In it Josh covers:

• How the job of your first sentence is to get readers to read your next sentence

• Why it should open a loop in your reader’s mind

• Why it’s important to mention exactly what your audience wants right off the bat

• A suggested technique for writing (Spoiler: You don’t have to start at the beginning!)

Josh packs a lot of actionable advice into a short article and it is very worth three of your minutes.

Article: How to Write a Powerful First Sentence

Godin: The specific yes and the meandering no

Sometimes Seth Godin nails something on the head so concisely that I think about it for the rest of the day. Today is one of those days.

“While some people reject a new idea simply because it doesn’t work for them, often the people who are saying no are afraid. They’re afraid of what change may bring, and they’re not sure they trust the innovation and the system enough to go forward. But we’ve been conditioned to avoid saying, ‘I’m afraid,’ so if we’re uninformed and afraid, we make up objections instead. And even add angry bravado to our objections, simply as a way of hiding what’s really going on.”

Read the whole thing here: The specific yes and the meandering no