You are on the right track with your music career. You have a natural talent and your fanbase is growing. In this industry, you have paid your dues in the industry and it is paying off, but it doesn’t seem to be moving fast enough. You may be thinking now is the time to take your music career to the next level. You want to reach a larger audience and have greater career opportunities, and now you can with artist representation.

Deep down, you know you can offer just a little bit more.

To do this, there are steps you can take with artist representation to transition to the next level in the music industry.

Know Where You Want to Go

Before you start rising to new levels, it’s important you know exactly where you want to go. What dreams do you have? What path do you want to take to get there?

If you have no direction, it will be easy for you to get lost and lured by the wrong influencers. Artist representation can help with this by steering you in the right direction. Your talent representative can help you establish yourself even more, and their supply of connections can help you get there; but only if you know where you want to go. Being strong in knowing the path you want to take can keep you from veering away from your values just to reach the next level in your career.

Establish Short-term Goals

You need short-term, realistic goals to help you reach your ultimate desire. It’s impossible to start at one point and jump immediately to your end goal. There are many steps in between that are valuable to your journey. Artist representation helps you to reach these short-term goals, which then leads to reaching long-term goals as well.

Short-term goals help you stay focused. Artist representation helps you accomplish the important projects that can help build your reputation and make you necessary in the business. Their established list of contacts creates a network of people to help you. This in turn leads to you attending more events and gigs. Each small goal accomplished is one step toward the large end goal.

Work Smarter, Not Harder

Strategic planning in the types of gigs you take can skyrocket your career. While you may want to say yes to every job offer you get, you must start turning down some of the jobs. Luckily, your artist representation will help you with this. They fully understand what is best for you, and which events and gigs will help you to reach those goals. Artist representatives understand that not every gig is right for you, and some of them will not help you reach your goals. These are not the gigs you want to be taking. The jobs that will not open you to a wider audience are the ones you may need to put on hold.

Say yes to the career boosting opportunities involving the media. Say yes to being the opening act for larger names in the business. Agree to artist representation networking opportunities that allow you to meet influencers in the business. All of these things will help you to boost your music career.

Enhance Your Music

First, write great music. Your music will establish the foundation for everything that follows. Create the way that is best for you. Choose methods that make you comfortable but also encourage you to take risks.

Participate in activities that will improve your craft.

Make time to record in a professional studio where your music will be produced at its best. This is another aspect that your artist representation will be more than happy to help with. The days of recording in someone’s basement or garage are over. As a professional, your work needs to sound professional, and your artist representation can do this. This means it must be as crisp and flawless as possible to get the attention of producers and music companies.

Seek advice from other recording artists and studios. They know what you want, they know how you can get it. Take all opportunities available to learn from the best. Luckily, with artist representation, you are more likely to meet such influencers, which helps you to gather insight behind the necessary steps.

There is always room for improvement and putting in the effort to improve how your music is created and recorded will be noticed by everyone in the industry, from executives to fans.

Improve Your Social Game

Social media platforms are one of, if not the best way to take your music career to the next level, especially if you have artist representation. You could be the most naturally talented artist on the planet but without a fanbase, your success will be limited.

Social media outlets like Twitter, Instagram and Facebook are the most powerful tools to get you noticed. It is practically free and with just one viral video you can gain millions of fans. With artist representation, they can help with your social media management strategy. Representatives help with posting strategies, brand management, technology opportunities to strengthen your brand awareness, and build a loyal following.

Check out the biggest names in the industry and you will find they are social media all-stars. They know how to please their fans with small glimpses into their world of music. These musicians know how to gain fans by using smart social media marketing techniques.

Social media allows you to showcase your image and your music on a large scale.

There are multi-millions of people on various outlets of social media. They all want to be entertained. You can do just that with your music.

Taking your music career to the next level does not have to be complicated or time-consuming. You are already on a successful path. Taking the steps listed here with artist representation will strengthen your path while also boosting your impact.

You deserve to reach goals you have set for your music career. Your efforts will pay off in the end. Focusing now on positive ways to grow in the business will be rewarding and satisfying for and your team.

Jason Swartz

Jason Swartz is the President and Founder of Alliance Talent, a world-leader in the entertainment business. Growing up in Los Angeles with a passion for music, he took his local childhood concert business and made in an international concert booking company. Specializing in entertainment booking, social media branding and monetization, and music publishing, Jason was the first to scale social media monetization for the music industry across Facebook. Today, he runs Alliance Talent, a leading entertainment company and concert promoter; focusing on concert bookings, talent representation, brand management, and social media monetization.