 What's up? What's up? What's up? I'm brand man Sean and I'm Corey and we are back with episode number 27 of no labels necessary podcast you can catch us every Tuesday every Thursday on YouTube Spotify Apple music all those great places bus him down the music industry the content creator economy when it comes to cash marketing and overall business and as always y'all know we like to get into advice to pop off the show and today we got some really dope advice that any of y'all that want to get involved in music the industry in terms of your career take this advice and it's coming from our guy K Von front who works at genius but I'll let him speak a little bit on himself because he does that in this clip to industry is something I've learned in my career that might help you in yours I'm the director of A&R genius and I've been in the industry now for about seven years this is something that I've learned that I think is this helped me even now make sure you can identify and understand your value and skill set this is super important if you're applying for jobs if you're interviewing if you're looking for your first job in the industry this is important and if you do stuff that isn't necessarily a real job but you have experience this is even more important for you employers want to know this stuff about you they want to know your skill set lies and if you can back it up with the results that's even better so you can demonstrate exactly what your value is not kind of sell yourself beautiful beautiful shout out to K Von matter of fact y'all follow him he's always looking for a quality music you know I mean don't spam don't spam him you know that might have started that off the way I said that but no like he he drops and shares like really dope upcoming artists and obviously he works at genius so really really dope person follow him and he gives great tips K Von y'all see his info on the screen or for y'all listening K A Y V A M D now about the sauce that he just dropped though and getting involved in the music industry for jobs this is where I start and this is basically what he said right being able to know your skill set and communicate that skill set regardless of it was a formal job or not I think a lot of us who are inclined to be in a music industry are tend to be entrepreneurial or self-starter so we might do some shows or we might work with the artists or two just starting off and it might not feel like it's official but how do you communicate that and bring that down into a skill set and that's extremely valuable right extremely valuable to have done that because there's a lot of people that aren't doing that type of stuff yeah right and whenever I talk to music execs whether it's the OGs or the new folks that are actually like hiring building businesses to us ourselves that passion don't mean nothing bro that passion everybody is passionate about music damn near plenty of people who not aren't in music that are passionate about music that's not enough and a lot of times people try to sell themselves that yeah but there's a few things that you can do specifically to bring value and I'm a base it off of a convo that I had with the VP the former VP of sales at bad boy he really broke it down to me pretty clear before I get into that detail I want to get your thoughts to Corey on like the things that cave on said yeah I mean the other way I was kind of looking at looking at it on top of what you said is being able to communicate value outside of the music stuff that you might have you know I think a lot of people tend to forget about those things oh you know I'm just a manager at I don't know some clothing store I don't see how that ties in the music but it's on the other side like it might show like that you're good organization or you know how to run a team or something like that right so that's a that's a part of kind of stuck out the most of me is like you said all those things are how can you kind of build your value and build these skill sets that people kind of just want to see you get but then like what are these other things been teaching you that could be valuable over here because you know what's one of the things we always talk about with music is they're more than glad to pull people from other industries because a lot of times a lot of these music businesses don't have you know some of the most like serious infrastructure that some like other industries have right and so you might be looking at it like oh man they would never want me all I did was working like sales at this you know insurance company I'm like no no no you know we've never had a formal you know sales structure before we would love to have some life from that world come over and teach us how to set up you know saying so yeah man don't knock these these are none music skills that you're building you know saying like people are looking for them speaking of right sales jacquery mention sales y'all hit us up if y'all are already doing formal sales jobs we got some spaces and places that we might a hundred might be able to help you out with it's on work for y'all to do if y'all are interested in applying that sales to the music industry now again back to it has to be more than passion now what I the conversation I had Sean Prez with him he broke it down to me like this and it's very simple it makes the most sense in the world literally just showing progress in working with an artist for instance yeah is enough it doesn't mean oh you had to blow an artist up just say oh I worked with an artist and did some PR for them and I took them from 1000 streams to 1500 streams right and to be able to say I took them from a thousand followers to 1200 followers over three months and break down your process exactly what you did to be able to show that is actually more than most people who just come in saying hey I'm passionate about the industry right and I'm creative that's like a pre-work that we assume that you like music and that you have some inclination or you know attractiveness to creativity we get that yeah that's the core of it all but saying that I've taken an artist from here to here or saying I put on a show and got this many people out no matter how big the number is or how small the number is hey I'm this super creative guy and I do fashion well and I want to be a creative director well show us some pictures of some people that you've dressed up or at least your outfits and show your taste or show that you've done graphic design work right so now oh I can see oh he can do this graphic design work for me or man he's done these really dope videos using some some footage from his friend show or he's done these really dope videos just taking shit online and I like it editing skills and I can do these editing skills on your music video right yeah like if you have a hard example it puts you far above most within the music industry and we love to see like some example of skills because it's also industry where so many people can talk and talk and talk you know you don't want to get finesse where you got somebody that you have to train on everything yeah nobody wants to do that in any industry anywhere if they don't have to but in music where things move fast and a lot of people don't have like strong infrastructures they really can't afford to have somebody wasting their time and teach them from ground up and everybody likes to come with oh yeah I'm passionate I'm gonna give you all my time just teach me and you understand like college charges you money to teach you right like me giving you my time you think oh you're not charging me any money and I'm building you up I'm giving you massive value what value are you giving me yeah you know yeah yeah I mean I also look at two like uh it's like talent a and r you understand and you're looking at this person okay well you you put together this show yeah it only brought out 50 people but you you shown you have baseline competence and you know this type of organization and these skill sets all right cool yeah maybe I'll bring you in I could see you being much stronger in this position in a year or two right so I I do think a lot of it happens you understand like we tend to think about organization AR from like the creative aspect right the art side but I'm thinking of people think about like the back-end aspect ever like we're you're looking at employees almost the kind of the same way right so yeah like you're always gonna want to take the person that has proof of concept and has shown you I can put this thing together even if it doesn't like hit like crazy you know so especially man if you like listening you like a curator or something you know thanks I know like especially in Atlanta you see like a lot like local curators putting on shows and things and they'll be sick you know only got 50 people out but like you said bro how many people are even putting the work together to bring out that amount of people right you're gonna do work yeah we just we gotta know people are at least willing to do work half the time instead of just wait for me to tell you to do every little bit of the task you are way far ahead in comparison to what you might think you are yeah I'm sure one more thing that actually made me think about is you mentioned the curators right talent for Ann Arring right that you have a taste in music so you're showing that you have taste but at the end of the day look it's the same shit everywhere you go right you know today we talk about hey people don't want to sign artists unless they've shown that they got a fan base yeah unless they've built some momentum why because they don't want to have to go through all this expensive process of training or finding your fan base going and then putting money into it and helping you get some progress and possibly being a bad product quote-unquote right yeah like how are you or higher it's the same thing right got that with the artist I could train somebody for three months and they not be a good hire and no one wants to spend that time and there's too many people that come in just like the artists we talk about artists filling entitlement thinking the industry should give them things as people on the job and skill side that come in thinking about well well what are you gonna do for me as a company you owe me XYZ before you have an established skill set that has true market value right not the value that your mom has in you you know I mean not the value that you have in yourself I'm talking to yourself in the mirror we have this we have this culture and community today where we focus so much on people you know only having ownership stepping up and and not being afraid and knowing their self-value and self-worth that is going a little bit too far on the other side of the spectrum where people are out of whack on understanding like yeah you got it also show improved right starting now in the industry if you're going from one really applicable job and you're getting paid a certain market market rate and you're killing it you have systems you don't need training you're not raw then probably can demand a certain amount of things and you probably have multiple opportunities coming right at you if you're not in that position then look for the opportunity not the immediate payoff because I can be associated with this company associated with this artist and then I could flip the fact that I worked with this artist and done these two three things to build out my portfolio and I'm more competitive right so there's a lot of different ways to to look at the marketplace and I know a lot of artists y'all are interested in working in music cuz y'all might be like look if I don't win as an artist at least I could be around something I love as I can touch it at least I can touch it be around the energy being a better space work on something that I actually do care about or you're like shoot I'm still trying to work my dream but at least I can be in the space and not hate my job while I try to be an artist and be in a job that teaches me stuff from different perspectives that I'm applied to my own artistry it all works but you have to keep these same things in mind just as somebody who wants to be a you know regular professional in music does as well I was well said man well it was I don't even need to go deeper into the topic let me take a quick second to say if you're an artist trying to blow your music up or if you're a manager music professional in general trying to help an artist blow their music up I have something that's a game changer for you and it's completely free as you may know we've helped multiple artists go from zero to hundreds of thousands of streams we've helped multiple artists go from hundreds of thousands to millions of streams chart on billboard go viral all of that stuff and we've now made the way we've branded multiple artists and helped them go viral completely free step by step in brand man network all you have to do is check out brand man network dot com you apply it's completely free but the thing is we're not gonna let everybody in forever so the faster you apply the better your chance of getting accepted brand man network dot com check it out back to the video get into the second topic because artist man y'all are y'all are doing lives when y'all blow up and I know a lot of artists don't want to they don't want to do lives or they don't want to do social media posts before they blow up yeah but it's showing and once they get that power and that dominance and they on a level where they don't have to just give it all up give it all up give it up and that's when it has the most impact so let's read this post right here that yana a appreciate you yana I don't know who you are never you really deep in music or it's just a dispute fan insight and I feel like she's just a regular fan who just dropped a gym out here for us but she said when Ari Lennox first came in the industry she used to be on IG live all the time Megan the stallion was the same went live frequently she did doja cat went live frequently they all used to interact with us on there now they all go live rarely if not never and I think that's so sad all right now do you think I should read some more of her commentary on this or before you bring in your comments or or what you want to go now or yeah that first one is kind of where I'm at with it you know so let's it put your place into what I'm gonna say and she said in continuation of that tweet and why did they stop going live because the internet is a cruel place and they were all subjected to heavy criticism harassment bullying whatever if you want to call it random strangers that ain't worth the damn on the internet trying to make them feel bad about themselves I love worth the damn someone say that right I heard that someone say that a minute so okay bullying the way that the the public treats them once they have a platform yeah I've seen that run away some of the strongest soldiers man push push the biggest stars off the top you think it's all about that no I think there are probably elements of it too of you know feeling like the thing that you were doing to get you to that point isn't cool to your your fan base anymore right I think sometimes as artists get bigger they start to sometimes maybe struggle with figuring out how to like communicate like to knew them you know saying like we talked about hey this was funny and I was kind of this person when I was a little bit hungry or at this stage in my career but now don't relate to that version of me I'm here now you know saying I don't know how to communicate this to you you know saying who's still kind of liking me from here I could see a bunch of those different things playing into it cuz I'm hoping it's not just them going I'm probably going somewhere so let's kind of talk about each thing piece by piece yeah let's start with the one that I think people think about less often which is what you said I'm this person now I blow up and not only do I have a larger platform I'm evolving and I don't know how to communicate that knew me yeah all right I've seen artists or spoken with artists who funny is one thing actually that's the most common one where they're trying to transition behind and we're talking about people that are looked at as legitimate artists it's not like oh I'm trying to get people to not see me as funny or some kind of me comedian and now look at me as an artist we're talking about people who legitimately are already looked at and respected as artists but they were funnier lighthearted more personable and talked about subjects at one era of their career and now maybe they're just literally getting older cuz they were young when they first you know hit that way or for whatever life-changing reason they've changed kind of their perspective and they want to be involved in different things or be looked at and what they might call more seriously right that's kind of the elevation of it all one do you think that is mostly them being in their head or and if it's not then what's the real issue there I think most of it is is them being in there in their head because I think they forget that they can do a lot of those things that they were doing at the earlier stages like where they are now right so let's say for example let's take like someone like Doja Cat for example like a lot of her earlier lives were just her like laying in her bed like joking you know I'm saying joking around kind of like being like really crass on her live it's like I think one aspect of it that her early fans really liked was it felt really like homely I think might be the way I'm looking for right oh she she feels just like me she just laying in bed you know I'm saying kind of like cracking joke no relatable so we fast forward to today what would be different about Doja Cat doing that now versus back then probably just in a nicer bed you know saying probably just in a nicer room you know she has a even she has a clear difference on where she is status wise so the fact that she's doing the normal I'm in the bed we're even more like relatable or cool when she does it yeah and even the ones who might see it and go like oh you know does it have a course you have a nice bed or whatever like the older fans would just see as a part of the progress now right like I remember when used to be whatever bed and whatever room you were two three years ago like this is cool you still doing that so I think sometimes I they they overthink it and they're like I can't do that anymore they don't care they don't care to see me do those things I used to do and it's like yes they do a good portion of your fan base probably does and then are there things that you were doing back then that you could just repurpose and and make fit your lifestyle now or make right like what's the difference between a vlog of you five years ago and a vlog of you today right five years ago you was you know saying that you had less money you went to different place but it's still the same type of content right you know just you kind of you are the thing that changes it so yeah that's why I think it's them in a head a lot right like they're thinking like I can't I can't do this stuff because I'm so high up right like I think bigger artists especially tend to think that they hit like a cultural point where they can't do certain things that people are small them are doing right they get kind of locked into that box I can't do that because I'm so big and it's like but that's like you said that's what will make it have a crazier impact is because you're so big and you're doing this thing that we don't expect unless you're dealing with like oh I say crazy shit yeah yeah not be on live as much because it like you lose cannon you know lock it back up man go back in your room man get back off your phone but here's the other perspective on that too right what like being relatable and doing something like that I think that translates across the board no matter what level you are not something you need to stop doing is overthinking if you think oh now it makes me feel like I'm too close to them all that stuff is typically like overblown but what if I was truly in a space of my career where I was more jokie jokie and you know fart jokes and you know more quote-unquote elementary humor and now I want to be seen just more serious in terms of the audience in general all right like let's say that type of stuff a little pump used to do all right yeah I'm not as music not even talking about that part let's pretend as an artist with musically the music but matures with the audience or can have a longer time span but literally that image of being so playful and doing those type of things whether he was like all right but now I want to be looked at somebody who's like a straight-up musician or I want to be looked at somebody as someone who's in fashion or a serious business man right and doing all that type of stuff but kind of the tracks from those other brands yeah yeah I'm imagining a little pump with a real estate company yeah every crazy but not in the little pump set fashion right because little pump could flip right a crazy brand like you had before and then just be a crazy real estate brand kind of humor going on too but what if you wanted to be looked at it in more of an elevated way because he saw like oh man that brand didn't mature or wouldn't mature like I wanted to or maybe did but it just be like nah I just don't want to be associated with that anymore I'm a different guy now what does that look like to you I think it will be them changing their lifestyle to kind of fit and then document it you know I'm a big believer that rebrand is just this person has changed in terms of like you know who they are now and then they just want to show us that like out loud so now we see them in different places wearing different things we see them hanging out with different groups of people they talk about different types of things right like when they talk to that so I'm a big believer and that's all rebrand is you know so yeah it's like in this hypothetical what is you know little pump is open is this real estate company like I want to see some some intellectual content from a little pump you know I'm saying like I want to I want him to to get on his Instagram live and give me 10 tips you know I'm saying that's a 10 10 10 tips to kill my real estate deal you know if I'm gonna spy on real realtor or something like that giving me another regular person like homeowner advice or something and then seeing him move in spaces like that so I think is is it really is as simple as that over a long period of time because you got to introduce people to it and then you got to make them believe you and that's the part right there but believing is just us seeing you do it over and over again for an extended period of time yeah time is the biggest factor in that yeah it's like a little pump drop real estate content for a year in a year time he would have enough people come in so he's serious about it whether or not he really was right you know I'm glad you said that because the biggest push back that I get from artists who are on those level when we have those conversations is them not seeing the change in the fans perspective fast enough yeah it's like dog they don't know if you're kidding or not dog yeah or they don't know if you just felt this way for today it's a rollout rollout yeah is it a part of a rollout there's so many things are in question but if you're just doing it and you're doing it and you're doing it and you're doing it now they know oh yeah that's something you do and that's something that you're serious about the same way that we talk about influencers who are trying to transition to artists so yeah you just dropped a random song but how do they know you're seriously an artist but you got to keep showing yourself as an artist keep showing up keep showing up be in the studio drop more music and more music oh he really he really trying that artist thing say at first they'll be trying you know people exactly then eventually well okay no he is an artist right or she is an artist so whatever that new space is the exact same exercise you keep showing showing showing showing showing showing showing showing over a long enough period of time and then the people won't even just believe it they'll just recognize you as that right that's what they know because that's literally what you've been doing now of course every part of the fan base won't see that immediately or the people who are outside your regular reach are also gonna be probably the last to know in most cases yeah right so you got that first party of fan base seeing and they see you're doing it and people outside your of your reach will still look at you in the same way same man as yesterday but eventually you'll have this moment that pops and they will be like oh man I know low pump was doing real estate that he actually sounds pretty smart and then you have all these people ah man he's been doing this for five years right the commenters in the community will begin to speak for you so you don't have to worry too much about that part as long as you keep showing yourself in those spaces and you're legitimately moving in those spaces the rebrand will happen but you know your brand is essentially your reputation built over time your rebrand is your new reputation built over time exactly man I don't know like the the time part the time parts are always the hardest part like you said to get across but I think it always goes back to the whole like building your world aspect to brown how much of it just comes down to getting people to believe you like do we believe that you really know your shit about this real estate stuff you know how can you convince me of that what can you do to convince these people that like hey I'm taking this thing seriously or right you know or at least attempting to take it seriously it makes me think of like one of like Jake Paul's I'm first start doing like the fighting you know I'm saying fighting thing perfect years ago bro like when I first started no way bro I was like there's no way they're not doing now man like man who who was out of doubt division he's still doing that shit hey doing that you know relatively high level so yeah that's that's all it is that's all it is now again there were some other angles that we could approach this artist stop going live when they get big and yes one is hey you don't want to do that and now you stopped cuz you did want to do it in the first place but you used it to flip it now that one I can't be mad at all the way you're not leveraging your your best abilities and all of your platforms and channels but at least you did it to get you there cuz there's a lot of artists who just won't do this shit at all and I realized that you can stop right some fans might miss it etc etc etc but this is you in terms of a moment in time and people don't they they take away all of their tools as an independent artist and you need all your tools as an independent artist to punch above your weight class and compete with the rest of this marketplace yeah so you know we talk about any means necessary like some old-school shit right when they used to talk that type of talk like bro we're not talking about this you know abstract evil of selling your soul to the industry and all that type of shit we're just talking about throwing up a TikTok dog if I get on off 15 minutes do it in your room like yeah get on live have some conversations you know blow yourself up and then look when you're done you're done and I saw somebody say this I can't remember who but it was a conversation about lives and maybe just videos in general but one artist that actually gives them performance practice oh yeah because they don't get to you know do shows and everything so it still gives them a sense of that performance practice so there's all types of benefits to doing this and look one day you're gonna be in brand deals and your sponsorships and commercials and all these other things man you get a skill set like this whole thing is about skill set you want to take advantage of all these places but I cannot still be mad all the way cuz still your life right if you did it to get there and you knew like you you stuck to the plan yeah you got what you needed and you're good I might see a higher potential for you or might want to work for you but if you if you're good where you are I am at it like damn never again you're gonna bring all this value to my life as an internet consumer and then just take it away hey that's why that's why I get mad at the cliche that bigger artists can get away without doing it cuz it's like yeah you're right they can you know saying at that point I have enough of the infrastructure to get away with it but then as the fan you're just like damn but why why not you know why once you come back you know they be teasing some of them do tease and they'll come out the woodwork for a little bit of fans think they're they're about to return yeah for the rollout bro that's why you that's why you be suspicious man is it some rollout or they they treating it like a video diary which I'm not I'm not the most mad at the video diary you know Sam I'm cool yeah all right so I like hopping on sharing random information about their life yeah like I just got a pool to that guy bro yes that's the normal relatable shit it's the it's the concept of having more impact though which I do understand yeah I when this coming it comes from that standpoint so oh well if I put out less whenever I speak people are gonna move I care more about it can you Lamar just whatever that is he lifted a finger J Cole he just did this shit that he did dropping you know over that producer yeah dropping a song from the producer on YouTube on his the youtubers page look that she ain't a big deal but it's J Cole which makes it a big deal and J Cole don't speak or do things like that often mm-hmm which makes it even bigger deal right that's the difference between J Cole and any random artists as unknown a lot of times right the barriers are just being who you are yeah like dang yeah yeah I know that he didn't do anything genius in terms of marketing but it's gonna get called genius yeah because of who he is and they move their weight around and this is saying about this I don't know it's like maybe when a giant lifts his finger or something like that but you know like the impact is just way more you know I mean if a giant taps you on a shoulder versus a little baby you get I'm saying and figuratively that might be where you are your career based on awareness and if you hear like those like market or market especially internet marketers as much as it might seem like fluff it is true when sometimes they're like you're like man you know what's my problem I'm trying to figure this marketing thing out I was like oh yeah your promise people don't know you yet and it is sometimes it really is just that simple and it sucks maybe I figure out how you get people to know you but once you got a lot of people who know you it gets easier it does get easier it does get easier so that should be don't use that as discouragement use that as inspiration that one day I too can do less and get more yeah yeah well hopefully you don't hey that's what makes the goats the goats and the riches the riches those are the guys who get more and still do more it gets easier and they still do more right like people say what they say about a Kim Kardashian in the world when it comes to money and like how her family moves things have probably got easier and easier because more people know them and they could be little meaningless things and they get all the attention in the world and they still work in their butts off I know it don't look like they don't work but like that's just the illusion like let's cut out though they don't do anything you know I mean they do some stuff you know I mean part of part of the lure is making it seem like they don't do anything you know that's that's part of the the entertainment smoke screen you know at the very least they're marketing yeah at the very least they're doing the same shit all the influence on the IG they like no posted pictures getting people interested and shit it just is what it is so you know I think the last thing in this particular topic then does go to more of the the bullying mental health side of things where people do consume them content those comments at scale you know people be hating on our page and shit like that have random comments out of nowhere or whatever we haven't gotten as many lately but like hater if you listen and you know late go ahead and just post something reminders that you exist you're like dang anybody hated on them in a minute but I understand how sometimes if you consume that shit heavy that it probably could affect your psyche yeah no I mean I think that's probably one of the the hardest things to get used to as your profile kind of rises right that's the thing that we see lots of different levels of client struggle with right from ones that just got their first like 50 fans of ones that go viral you understand like I think that's the hardest thing to get used to is one just people have an opinion on your life all the time right like you go from being someone that like not many people cared about you know saying a lot of people didn't something like it feels like a shit ton of people care about you right and I will always tell clients this around moments that we're going or they would ask about getting viral moments I'm like man you gotta think bro like yeah how many DMs do you get a day you understand just on some real shit like now maybe 20 30 from people that like you now imagine shit is you just wake up one day you got thousands of them thousand more come in right a thousand more come in you know like that's the hard thing to get used to you know and like almost every content creator and different mediums you understand to to artists and no youtubers and things like that they all talk about that being one of our things to get used to you know man it's not even just the negative not even the negative something we tend to kind of scapegoat like the bullying the harassment aspect ever like yeah of course that happens and of course that can push people away but sometimes just even the act of having to talk to all of these people yeah it's enough you know Sam but whether good or bad is enough for some people to get stressed out about it right and I was a lot of people have some of that people pleasing within them where they feel like man I have all these DMs unanswered and now these people even if they're showing me love are gonna be upset that I didn't give them back all right it's like the old-school version of that being can you give me an autograph and then a star might be afraid to say no yeah because it's gonna be that fan interaction well imagine that shit at scale and where that fans interaction today can easily be spread across the internet and everybody find out about the interaction yeah bad review essentially that you got on your career before hey that might be some random dude in the city that has no voice and would never hear about you again so it's a different climate today which I 100% get like just the the what's a good way to think of it customer support yeah that's exactly what it is that's all it is down it's like a customer support and not having the infrastructure to handle it all yeah cuz it's a lot man like I don't know like that's why I can empathize with artists getting bigger and getting social media management teams but then you like man but then social media lose a little bit of the personality right but it's something different angles to it that I understand but yeah so even you know going back to the conversation of why you should do it I think if you're an artist that where you know you're not the most talkative person you understand like you know that you are you're weird on camera you get awkward like you definitely need to be doing a lot you know Sam because I always tell people man like it's the exact same muscle at 10 people as it is a thousand people in your life right exact same skills that you practice and how to how do you know send get the conversation started how to how to get them back involved how to keep your energy like it's all the exact same skill set you know Sam and so you know I think we run into a lot of instances where you'll see these artists pop and they're practicing these very basic skill sets for the very first time in front like 10,000 people you understand 20,000 people and you see them say things and make these mistakes and do things that kind of are pudding and it's like man if you were just all those years ago a month ago just did alive with two people on you understand just to get comfortable with doing it then like think about how much of a much better of a situation you you being now and I don't know about you know everybody but I'd much rather practice and run two people in 20,000 you understand it's that it's the translated concept of performing for small rooms before you stadium exactly same same skills that yeah man sure I mean look for context the way I think of it logically I understand the emotions can still be the emotions in the moment that you see the comment you'd be very aware of this shit and go through 50 comments of love and then see that one and it will trigger you differently sucks we all know that that's a real thing but it became super clear to me when I had a video I dropped one day it's been years now and one person said this shit is trash they went down that entire path right it's trash it's basic and then another person said this is the best video you've ever posted this is the same comment section you know I can't listen to you can't exactly it was right there's like man you don't even know what to do with that like that extremity shows that it's always gonna be a reflection of them more than it is you yeah like because it's based on where their perspective is for instance one of the struggles with teaching online or like having videos and things like that where we offer perspective online which is why like the podcast format better is like people consume a video it could be five tips or something right but you might be an 11th grader the next person might be a second grader the third person that watches the video might be a PhD in this particular subject so the relevance to each person varies and if I intentionally made a video for a second grader the PhD might think oh it's so simple you're not giving any game like why you're not giving it out or you're not really saying something and then the PhD if I make a video for the PhD the that's the funniest stuff like when you make the highest level content yeah usually the second grader will be like you're not saying anything because it seems like it's not applicable but it's very applicable to the PhD who's already at that level yeah right because it's them in their day-to-day they immediately see where to apply it yet the second graders like you're not saying anything because they can't see the value based on where they are it's it's new one right and it's not as entertaining because typically the the earlier you are in the process I find a lot of those people aren't dedicated to the point or they don't have enough of the infrastructure in place with so they don't get the value as they do with someone who's like just getting straight to the point but the real point not the like marketing points that you see all these YouTube videos like oh how to build a fan base and these general tips and how to blow up on TikTok things that we will talk about have done but it's just in some ways consume more from an entertainment inspiration standpoint versus an application where it doesn't have to be sexy because I'm doing this and bro I just need to know one thing I don't need 10 minutes of like killing it I could listen to this 10 minute video or an hour video and be happy if I get one super strong thing because I'm gonna put that shit to work today and then probably flip that information into more money or more fans or like more business relationships wherever I am right I think what sometimes we have to remind ourselves is people are on different levels who are consuming your content in different spaces in their lives and their perception right and it doesn't have to be this education style content but it's just that makes a clear example it could be whatever you're doing right it's gonna be based on their own experience whatever that individual experience is right so you could be referencing something like I've you know somebody will think you're stealing from something that you never even seen before in your life is all he just took this from XYZ you like bro I never seen that but but his experience makes him feel like oh you must have taken it from there you know like that's just the content world and it's unavoidable at scale yeah like it comes with a job right like there's nothing that y'all take nothing else away from this if you are artists that has no fans like it's coming it comes with the territory that is a fact that is a fact now I would love to know how much would you like to be paid for a show okay would you be good if someone gave you a hundred K for a show yeah our long show what if somebody gave you three mil three man I walk off set right now I believe well look I think it's very clear for many y'all who probably heard this news that Beyonce have an upcoming Dubai show reportedly paying her 24 million dollars right but there's context to this that I don't think most people are gonna address right there's a conversation that I want to play from the Patrick Bed Davis podcast where they actually kind of talked about this from a different perspective but then also there's some stats and facts that people need to know Cory I know you said you'll walk off the set for three mil right I hear you and I believe you I believe you sir I appreciate it I do not blame you at all however Beyonce actually turned down a six million dollar performance fee back in the day I think 2015 okay from for uber it was a company I remember that right instead she said I'll take stock yeah right that's more than three mil and she was like I ain't gonna do this unless I get some stock now the thing is it was reportedly worth 300 mil back in the time but from a little research it's actually apparently only worth nine million I don't know if the stock dropped from 300 mil to nine mil cuz I haven't been tracking uber stuff or it was just misreported they made the number seem bigger than it was right but this is either the type of numbers that Beyonce is playing with you know I'm saying so we're already in a different space now on top of that remember Beyonce got paid maybe it might have been like six mil or four mil for her Netflix performance no not net but it was a note of Coachella before it was some performance yeah I know I remember I don't remember exactly which one Coachella performance 2019 she got paid between 8 to 12 mil and then there was a whole argument on how much it was worth it or not worth it yada yada but then what it would be on say dude she flipped that into a Netflix special that apparently she got paid like 60 mil for all right so again these are the numbers that Beyonce are is working with and the strategy changes how much you're willing to accept yeah yeah but Beyonce is fair to say she probably ain't doing it for three mil all right now with that being said let's play this clip and then we'll get into some additional commentary on the issue all right but here's the clip right here and the question he posed is do you think Beyonce is underpaid or overpaid for a 24 million dollar performance in Dubai everybody thought that she was overpaid but he came with a different perspective she's testing the sound that's the hotel is being done at her performance 24 million dollars for an hour okay so overpaid underpaid I'm gonna say it's underpaid underpaid 24 million for an hour yeah so first of all let's give us the math let's do the math so you're not paying 24 like the guy offered me to speak at an event international right now you pay 250 an hour to speak okay 250 thousand dollars oh my god 250 thousand dollars and we turned it down not because I'm worried about going to Iraq but we just turned it down okay we turned down 90% of speaking opportunities in the States $200,000 and they say how is your rate $200,000 an hour because it's not an hour yeah you want me to go to LA I'm losing a full day you want me to go there no it's $200,000 for a day and a half I'm not doing this for 12 so really $200,000 I'm in Wi-Fi which is Wi-Fi typically doesn't work when you're 30,000 you know feet in the air you can't you can't get the job done and so ends up being $200,000 for a day divided by 12 hours it's really only $16,000 an hour I can do a lot more than $16,000 an hour so Beyonce is getting paid 24 million dollars for an hour for one hour first of all the private jet to go to Dubai and come back you know how much that is that's a that's a million and a half holy shit you mean two million dollar feet to go from oh she has to pay it you mean for in gas and stuff yeah if you go with if you go with a G6 fill whatever you do you're spending a million dollars to go to the of course what are you talking about million dollars bro if you for Christmas we went from here to Aspen and back that's $150,000 wow if you're going from here to Dubai 20 hours Aspen is four hours so four yeah it's a $600,000 bill and patting is what you're spending it's a million dollar bill and imagine what jet they're sending her so then who's going with her no exactly I've been spending two million dollars all right so I think like the the point is clear and actually makes me think of multiple things that are relevant for artists on any level and I know it might seem like man there's some big numbers that are being thrown around but hitting costs it's like that phone bill AT&T used to be notorious about this like this is your phone bill but you got all these hidden fees the setup fee and the the continue to manage you feel like whatever whatever whatever all right it's never just that number we report these big numbers but in terms of value in your time your systems etc like what is your time actually worth you have to evaluate it more than just that number and for artists especially on any level one of the biggest things becomes production costs yeah and what does it look like to take your team with you if you do have a team it's like gorilla remember gorilla was talking about yeah I'm only paying you X amount of dollars maybe two or X a month but also I'm paying for all of your flights to fly with me around the country whatever whatever wherever like staying in a hotel room because you ain't gonna be staying in my hotel room all of these different things that continue to add up and these are the things that artists have to think about and can get really expensive especially as you find more success and you have to bring your team with you it's one thing to have a fixed cost office and everybody go in that office every day but shoot I have a mobile office and I have to pay like and the market prices might go up and an opportunity might come fast so I don't have a lot of lead time so I'm paying max airplanes you know ticket fees or whatever and hotel fees all these things are things that become a little bit more complicated and help explain away sometimes why some artists lose money really quickly outside of just like hey I'm wasting it on some chains and that whole stereotype sometimes it's just like the cost of doing business is a lot higher than artists expect yeah yeah that's true of the people booking them expect sometimes you know what I'm saying that's true I've been on that side from the booking side why is it this much he has a six piece band that he takes everywhere he goes yeah and he needed a sprinter van from the airport and all that type of shit yeah yeah I remember being hit with those oh they got to eat while they're here like do they really like bro you only gonna be here for you know 30 minutes or whatever come on you don't need to eat do you actually I remember they suck to get a have to buy like a public's platter for people like man that's an extra hundred twenty dollars man I don't got this shit all right well you gotta go along get the chick-fil-a platter bro hey you gotta go all right but no that's that that is a fact like all of these hidden fees in different places and spaces so you have to wait opportunity cost you have to wait the true cost in general and I think there's opportunity in long-term thinking and strategy that might come from that as well yeah yeah because I want to that's what I want to know about like you know what she about to flip it into because he know you know you talked about the Netflix special and all that it's like man like what's what's this about to be she might say okay I'm gonna do that especially if she truly looks at it like what he just said like hey it's underpaid for me knowing what I can do and make at any given time y'all are gonna have to allow me to do x y and z with this footage and own this footage and and might create a whole documentary so there's things you can do with that and say hey going on this experience and knowing that I'm a document it's gonna be a great look or part of the narrative for the experience and whatever I'm trying to paint or sometimes earlier on the value is hitting that threshold let's just say he talked about oh yeah I get paid 250k per speech or whatever 200k per speech and I turn many of them down but maybe the first couple of times even though financially where he is it didn't provide a massive benefit or life change but like just to set that tone like all right let me go ahead and take this one just so people can see and track hey this is what this is what he gets paid this isn't even just a number like this is what people are paying him to do this show but now I'm gonna be more selective because I gotta look beyond that if I do one knowing that 250k isn't going to change his life then maybe there's a reason because I'm trying to build a narrative I'm maybe I want to use a YouTube video I want to talk to that specific audience already got that audience so it's not like going to them is going to give me more than 250k for that awareness but going to this other audience that I'm getting paid 250k and they really don't know who I am yet maybe there's more benefit on the back end right you start having to think about things on these different levels so you know I think just thinking the game through right again the opportunity costs the true cost which is the most important cost to start with right and then how can you flip it how can you flip it how does that fit in your strategy or does it not always on whether something beneficial to you just like Cardi B how people are coming down on her they're trying to finesse it was so funny because I'm you know being in music bro like you don't even see the opportunity for roast sometimes because you just know the business too well yeah and then fans come out of left field with some bullshit yeah what was it like what was it Cardi B did that show and I forgot who it was it was like some really rich persons like backyard oh god let's talk about then they start roasting her like oh she's falling off she's doing backyard shows and she had to be like yo bro I got a million dollars yeah we're gonna show with this let's make a 30 minute performance or some shit like that let's make a backyard like yeah in this backyard I don't have to worry about production value at to the same level I'm gonna deal with all those different things I probably don't have to bust it down with ticket master you know come on it's a different type of meal like you know what I mean so like there's there's perspective and like doing so for her probably doing that opportunity one again that sets the tone hey this is what I when I'm bringing in yeah and shoot the value in her time for that on in that versus doing a show because it's not just the cost I might do two meal for doing a an hour show and whatever you know the stadium but everything I have to go through to do that is probably more and starting to take more time drain more times you as young kids right probably value that time and then you split in with more people and even whether it's the true financial outcome that makes it worth more or adding in some of the intangibles of your values and whatever you feel like you're missing like these are the things that people are making the decisions off of but not those private shows like we talk about the ladder the value ladder but high ticket experience weddings are great and everything but yeah once you get into I'm performing for like emperors and CEOs and company retreats all those bags are different brother rich kid birthday party though I've been unspoken heroes of the music industry it's like the college uh the college bag but um a little more naive you know what I'm saying hey well hold up explain the college bag everybody don't know the college bag oh like colleges a lot of times will pay a lot of money to book you as a artist you know what I'm saying and the reason I made that comparison which is funny or what you're saying that reason I made a comparison is that if you've ever um seen what like these college booking people throw artists sometimes the bag don't always make sense right like like you'll see a like I've seen small artists like ours with no fan base get like 10 bags you know what I'm saying 10 like 10 bands from my college just because like we got to spend the budget you know what I'm saying it's home coming week it's whatever we we got to spend it somewhere they do right and then sometimes you'll see what they'll pay for you know even bigger artists are probably like you know a lot of these major artists be knocking these colleges over the head you know what I'm saying because they don't know any better like they don't they don't have context and so that's why I said that the the rich kid is right out there with them right they're typically people who aren't like super deep in the industry they don't really know how to gauge like what this person should be charged or even care about it stuff you say like they're not even thinking about production but oh like oh I just read somewhere that Cardi B is a million dollars okay cool so I'm gonna pay her a million you know they're not thinking about it from like oh she was a million because she had production costs and blah blah blah right like there's so many uh just points that they don't they don't think about or have to think about right because they're not even like a set about it you know what I'm saying like like these that's the beauty of the colleges and you know what I'm saying the the rich kids bro like the you know what I'm saying like they they're not upset about it you know what I'm saying they don't get it but I don't care I just want you there because they feel like you'd be fun you know what I'm saying or they like you for whatever reason right it's beautiful it's literally everything art is ever asked for bro so no that last thing is true bro everything that they asked for like you you get your value seen in the truest form outside of the music industry that's like a pure fan with money to spend on you like this is what they look like 100% like that's but market without the competition yeah because that's not what they're looking at as much it's more about just you for you and look there's no business model attached to it so they're not weighing all these other costs there's no comparison of what your other book and fees are you versus other artists in the way shows they're going to look at you because you better believe we get shows we like all right this artist is 5k this artist is 10k but shoot this 5k artist is actually hotter right now and on the rise that 10k artist is on the way down so it's going to be cooler for us to get this artist because when this artist is 20k and we can't afford this 5k artist it's going to look like we brought him in first like this is all the shit that we think about like in the music industry they not think about none of that shit at all on outside of it so like you're never like your value is going to be squeezed and people aren't working with the same amount of money and budgets and the return is like tight these margins are tight so they can't even afford to so they have to think that's smart when they're looking at shows and things like that and promoters so it just is what it is but it's a little bit of an explanation for artists who might not get why the numbers might not be as prevalent in music to understand it's not all coming from like a standpoint of I just don't see value in you you know I mean they just they're playing a different game those people aren't playing the game they're playing fun yeah I like this I want you here that that's it that's it but hey yeah when you get in that space where those are your ops whoo this is a great space great space bro beautiful space all right now we gotta play one of the clips of of the last four days you know what I mean I know many of y'all have already seen this before by the time we talk about it but check this out because it's a video on st. John talking about the fact that he really get paid that much for his song with usher but I think there's some important points that I don't see people talking about enough check it out song came out at the time the song streamed 70 million that's a lot that's not 70 million dollars and here's the that's a song that he did with usher that's what he's referring to and it did 70 million streams in mathematics 70 million streams I own 25% of the songs and it's $3,000 per million stream is 3000 times 70 so $210,000 all right it's math and the numbers gotta make sense I'm waiting on the song for two years based on the royalty rate that Spotify pays the publishers there's two types of money in records there's publishing money that's writing and then it's performance money I was in my voice I'm just on the publishing side so that $210,000 that that song made had to be bust down my take on that 210 was $1,500 and I if I to put that song out myself and only had three million streams out of May 10,000 I said I'm done I washed my hands I was like this is done you know how hard it is to get these songs on these people who put it out on their own time the artists who have their own vision for it for your livelihood to be dependent on somebody else that you don't control or influence impact or have a relationship with and then it's not even your worth you're not even getting paid you're waiting salt I wrote a record for us who that thing was moving because he's talking and he hit so many points that people aren't addressing like people keep going back to the $1,500 for 70 million streams we know that we know that look the stream rate it ain't that much yeah right especially when you look at the percentage other percentage so one I do love that he's smartly was like look man I could get less strings and make more money that's the basic indie concept any artist been telling y'all that for forever man like I could not be signed but get a higher percentage and do quote unquote worse but make more money yeah right that's something that I I feel like people understand for the most part right now still I think the generalized thinking of I wrote a hit with usher even though 70 million isn't like a usher usher you know what I mean but saying I wrote a song that did well with usher and I only made $1,500 off of it that's mind blowing for I know like a lot of consumers and just people in general yeah right because we're not even talking about oh it was a work for hire he actually was participating in the back end right true credits etc and he still didn't get paid that much but when you look at two years I got $1,500 after two years golly yeah you know what I mean and now this is how you know you could always tell like the artists that are like older right it's just like I can't live off of that shit yeah bro what's 750 a year what what amount of 750 a year right exactly you just bust that down into the hourly raise that's probably like worse than being a waiter who didn't get tips you know yeah I mean he even made that point right like he's like almost rather just like take the bed on take the bed on myself um and make less there so I mean I don't know man that's why this is always such like a like a thin line for me because like the the split conversation and just how micro those breakdowns can get $20 a month that's what they came down to it's crazy oh you just did the math on it yeah you can find that shit on the ground but but this is because I I feel like it's safe to say he's probably locked in some like crazy club situation you know what I'm saying for it to come down like that this one's but that's why I go back to you know I don't know you know what I'm saying I don't know when I throw it out there hey but 10k isn't that much either right yeah I could do 10 mil or 3 mil and get 10k we know that's not all that much either which is something that artists are struggling with but to me the biggest thing out of all this is what the writers are dealing with remember I talk about me not necessarily wanting to manage artists early in my career because I'm like I can't depend my whole life success off this individual all right yeah him from a writer standpoint in this time he's not even talking about individual that he's personally dealing with it's one thing where I'm like bro yo Jacory you the artist and bro I gotta like wake you up you're not inspired enough and I have to deal with all this and it's like you're being lazy but at least I feel like I got direct line of communication and I feel like I might be able to influence you a bit right yeah but you're talking about as a songwriter just throwing your music out into the ether and sometimes sometimes and just hoping that it gets picked up you pitch it to somebody and then like he said the artist has their own vision so they might like the song but then it might not be in this project because it doesn't fit this project so I have to wait just like any artist does right with their own music oh it fits here better than there so he's talking about after two years getting 1500 I don't know if that's after it came out or whatever but let's just pretend which is happening many songs it took like five years for the song to come out all right or whether even worse you wrote the shit for Dr. Dre it never came out we know how shit go with him all right so it might be like five years before you start to see that money you add in like the amount of time to get them to accept it you don't know if they're going to accept it at all because you don't have much influence over the situation in many of these situations so it might take a certain amount of time to get accepted if it does get accepted which is you know a probability to work with there then you have the amount of time for it to come out then hopefully it performs well right because that's not guaranteed we know how hard that shit is even the biggest artists have songs that don't do well yeah and then we know how slow music payouts come and how sometimes music payouts don't come in the way they should and somebody might end up having to like audit and do all these other things for $1500 over an extended period of time he said too it could have been longer so a lot of this in terms of artistry speaks to why especially in today where the opportunity so much there is there bro control as much as you can yeah like just point blank control as much as you can because it's already hard enough to win this and to further away from the control that you get you're dealing with not only increase probability of failure but you're also dealing with lower percentages if you succeed so the risk factor is high as hell yeah yeah yeah yeah I do say it from from his side too where it's like you know it's much easier to get three million strings and 70 million you know what I'm saying like like three million is not a not a crazy goal to hit especially for like an artist of of his caliber but I would devil's advocate a little bit and say of course like and this goes back to I would love to know like what his situation was like then but I would imagine that that like having the credit so that song probably open hella doors for him right yeah some of that maybe wouldn't have happened if he put it out under his his own umbrella and I think just like because because what I don't want every artist to hear this and say is like oh this is why I never was song right I'm never giving my shit away because I know a lot of ours that feel exactly like this like one I don't want to give someone a hit that I feel like could have been for me you know I'm saying now I'm a little salty about it or two like you just say like no like this is my baby this is getting too far away from my hands of my throat you know those are the two main reasons I hear our say I don't want to do it but then I think about like all of the prolific artists who started out as like song writers you know saying and we're willing to give away that shit and probably go through similar situations like this because of the doors that open just from being able to say like hey man I got a usher song I got 70 million right I got a whoever a Beyonce some walk or whatever song um and then you know saying that but but now that I've kind of built that cloth these situations now I'm taking the rest of my shit and hoarding doing what he said I'm saying like so I do think like the other thing I do kind of wish um he would have bought a little clarity on like what part of his career what point of his career was this you understand because I don't know like do you know if you wrote that song for us before like he started popping as a solo artist if it was like in the in the midst of it or I think it was before he was starting popping and that was kind of why he made a point I could try to look up with song um it might have been that he's referring to specifically yeah but who else did he write for I remember remember we were we were working with some people and they were like St. John used to write for I fight hella people oh yeah so the song uh he worked Kaiser he worked with her which is like he had all these random credits that people didn't know him for yeah right and you would never expect the artist he might have had something on hideaway I know a lot of people might not even know that song or whatever but like he St. John had some credits like for real for real like he out here yeah with different types of artists I know it's not on hideaway but it is with that artist so I think the happiest medium that I can think of and of course everybody do their own thing like whatever makes sense to you but like me I would probably just strategically strategically if I was an artist compartmentalize it like am I writing a song for usher if I was in a position right and I had somebody connected where I could truly say hey I'm trying to write one and pitch it for usher Rihanna whoever whoever so I'm not writing this for me anyway you know what I'm saying because I know some writers who actually do that right they're writing in somebody else's voice but then their music is their own voice and is their own experience right yeah so like that probably might help some of the dissension between like oh man I could have just kept this for myself yada yada yada beyond that yeah I think it's a fact that yes there have been people who have been songwriters who have transitioned to artists however there is a grave like you're a songwriter who you know never made it to that artist side however there's also a graveyard of rich songwriters who never became artists so you know I mean it's not the it's not the worst fail if you are a successful songwriter who just doesn't happen to find your your wings as an artist man I'm chase out of man 20 said there was $20 a day man you get about 30 of them you know what I'm saying I don't think that's normally what I'm talking about yeah we talk about $20 a month by the way yeah I know what I'm saying like you get about you know what I'm saying maybe about 300 of them you know what I'm saying like 300 I'm out 30 yeah like 300 of them man you know okay you collect them over the years like like you know like a like a Quincy Jones seeking infinity stones you know what I'm saying like just be out here collecting songwriting credits production animal right there that's a different animal that's why you have some of those uh people be saying that kind of stuff like pop puffy old old school type of shit we're like man he didn't even do nothing all he did was you know push the button one button and or say turn it louder now he on the credits you know I don't have no stake in that horse I don't understand what officially qualifies as production or not and I weren't there but that but even if it was that I cannot understand right the incentive to do that let me get my hands on as many of these things as possible that shit might be perfect but now I'm gonna just throw in some feedback that's unneeded but I'm gonna put myself on the credits because I'm just trying to make all this add up one ain't enough I'm saying right yeah all them residual checks bro 2% of everything bro you know that 2% starts talking up hey that's a fact bro all I needed is 52% something about that honey our next is oh skip rates man so artists y'all might not understand that skip rates has a big impact on how your song and performs on Spotify but it does however there's a conversation around skip breaks that is worth adjusting now this came from an article titled what is an average skip rate on Spotify and they kind of get into this talk about skip rate it's being overrated that's not something we necessarily agree with but they have a couple of interesting assertions near the bottom of the article one being what is an average skip rate all right so again skip rate is your songs on Spotify and how often does it get skipped I can't remember if it matters well how much it matters if it gets skipped like within that first 30 seconds versus like two minutes yeah you know because it's still there it still counts as a play once it plays past a certain amount of time but a skip is still a skip it might just be a lower rated skip right yeah exactly but that basically is something that informs the algorithm and whether you're being pushed out to the right people right you get pushed on a horrible playlist you on a Metallica playlist and you come in with some I don't know Papoo style rapping or whatever like skip what is this all right so what's an average skip rate first it's important to understand that skip rate is defined as what percentage of users are skipping your record before the 32nd mark skip rate is always expressed as a percentage that can range from 1 to 100 percent according to product according to product managers at record labels like Sony Warner and UMG they see an average skip rate of 32 percent across their front line releases now 32 skit rate that's a third of people who are listening to your shit skipping all right now but take this from experience skit rates can be impacted by geos whether used in listening on mobile or desktop mail okay I see what they're saying I don't know why they had to shorten this out of this long ass article instead of geos they should have said geography right it could be impacted by geography whether a user is listening on mobile or desktop mail versus female all of these things that basically make up demographic like you would of course expect right now what about music released by independent artists it's next question there's no public data available for it but this guy basically projected that it'd be an average of 50 to 55 percent skip rate across front line releases for independent artists which is interesting like I don't know what he's seeing to make this um prediction but obviously he's in a better position than most to have this speculation but to say I think independent artists is 50 to 55 percent skip rate even though signed artists are 30 to 32 percent skip rate one average like where does that extra basically 20 come from is it just like hey there's a lot of bad music out there so it's like a weighted wrong is oh yeah this this song got skipped 98 percent of the time this other one guy skip 20 percent but it evens out somewhere in the middle I wonder where that might come from yeah I'm not going to see the quality thing right like I know like quality is subjective or whatever but we could assume that the sign act has higher quality than a lot of unsigned acts right like it's probably safe or something yeah they made it that far so I would think either that has something to do with it or maybe just like trust and perception right so the sign acts have the the perception of the label behind them or you know something that allows them to be in a place where they have a little more of a trust value then then the average indie artist that's the only thing I can think that will play into it because I don't know how would they know you know what I'm saying like if the song just I guess if they went to the song intentionally they could kind of say something but if it's just coming up on like release radar like discover weekly or something like you're just hearing it that makes me think so just like you would break down the quality of the music you also have to think of the targeting and then some indie artists don't necessarily target correctly that's true they're going through that exploratory phase and maybe by the time you're at a label a lot of that stuff gets more figured out yeah you know but even at the 32 percent skit rate I think that's extremely informative number to work with but it does suck that any artist can't see that for themselves because labels do have this so this is a big point that we do want to land on there's no public data available for the skit rate for artists right however we know these major labels have that now why is that how come artists can't go to their Spotify for artists and see the skit rate too much power too much power too much power too much control man I mean I don't know I don't even want to say that man because I do give Spotify some credence for coming along with the analytics setup because they have started to present some metrics that that are I think are important but yeah for whatever reason it was like this is the one they won't let go like what because remember we were calculating our own ratios on some things yeah and they now are doing like some of those things yeah like save the listener save the listener ratio like shit like that we were just doing the math ourselves and now they're having to integrate into the platform so it's like how the crown breaking into their how are we just giving them a pat on the back for doing their job now but that that's why I think that's the one they won't let go because that's the one we're like well I won't say the one because I'm pretty sure there are others that stem from that that we can't see but that's like the one big one that's out there they're like you can't just calculate you know what I'm saying like nobody out there can just calculate it unless you you like deepen the back end like man you get any artists you know what I'm saying Spotify for artists password before they made that change you could calculate your say calculate your save the listener ratio or calculate your playlist percentage and things like that right so these are numbers that yeah now I'm saying this out loud they probably put it out there because they were like hey people like Sean Corey are calculating anyway let's just put a visual to it you know what I'm saying yeah and go ahead and take credit for that um so but yeah I don't know why man skip right is the one that will not let they will not let go that's such important information to me for an artist to have like because I think that actually fills the gap what do we experience so many times as marketers and artists who try marketing things and then tell us what it looked like when they tried it we hear people say oh snap I blew up I went viral or this song is taken off and we also hear I got on this playlist and nothing happened where I tried this and nothing happened right yep yep but my skip rate wouldn't be oh I just got on that playlist and that playlist was trash nothing happened where you saw that a hundred people listen and a hundred people said fuck this shit and skip it five seconds in 20 seconds in so now it's telling you something different all right yeah you know now it's like oh my song might not be good and there's no other metric that truly could clearly give you that that's the most important metric actually we think about the clarity that that brings it's like oh well they I got my skip rate on this playlist and that versus that playlist is completely different maybe that's a better way of targeting that's actually the most important metric when you think about it no it's true they even said that versus what labels already look at is one of the the major four which I wonder what the other three are I don't know if he says it in this but I mean like I go back to the power of the control you know what I'm saying like that's the only thing I could think of a why Spotify wouldn't want to let it go because maybe they want to be the only ones who can really control like that level of perception like do people really fuck with this you know what I'm saying or is this all just body numbers and you know saying shit been inflated you'll never know only we know that you know say only we have the real that truth to that to that uh to that question so I don't know man that's something I could think of because that should have been an analytic that we got years ago years ago man and they even said like the labels and the big distributors had to negotiate for that so they could have that API access and you know we've tried to build some things and some of the value stopped at Spotify the spot spotify up yeah bro exactly I don't let that go easy they don't let that day to go easy just like us be on the run ads and then once that shit spotify you know who knows what happens right you can kind of make assumptions that's what allows those intermediary links to live right and creates that purpose yeah for them they wouldn't have as much value if Spotify gave us more information apple music gave us more information about what was occurring once we send people over there and then you add that to TikTok with the deep links and stuff and then one day I wouldn't be surprised if Instagram decides to do something similar or whatever like a lot of those sub link type platforms you know and they don't lose a little bit of value at least within the music marketing space there still will be value because you can't um you're probably not gonna find everybody do that but like man the black box is something that's always unnerved me as someone who pays a lot of attention to data yeah values like understanding the story because you know we we we've hacked as much as we can but there's nothing like just seeing like the hardcore like yeah bro they just don't like it yeah that's what I'm saying bro and I mean that is why I do give Spotify a little bit of the bend for the dog because that's still in my opinion like the best um the best of the worst top of the exactly best of the word because apple yeah I mean like using apple analyst bro that's it gold of the garbage yeah man so they don't they really don't care maybe audio man audio man has pretty cool analytics but you know it's all your mac and apple is different though exactly bro apple is just like the little definition of like I'm just here because I gotta be that's exactly what I was thinking bro that's what I'm saying I'm just showing up to work bro doing a bare minimum that's exactly apple is only a good buy because of the shazam feature that's what that that's what and they know that bro like this is what you came for shazams and streams bro what more do you need but but yeah but so I do give a spot for that bend for the dog but yeah man that they've been doing good they're like slowly rolling out key features you know I'm saying key KPIs and new KPIs to give artists a bit of a deeper understanding of what they're seeing so I do commend them for that but I don't know man like I said hopefully we get that skip right because I would love to be at the back of a camera I mean I know I know I know you're saying what you're saying Klein but if we look at this here it says that it had a skip rate of about like you said 85% I said we need to move this this song choice in a different direction I would love that top ammo bro let's say ammo everybody waiting on for real for real that's gonna settle the playing field heavy but maybe we won't profit as much people find out the truth about themselves nah ain't nothing gonna ever stop people gonna fight it anyway yeah what nobody because I'm thinking I don't know maybe people be so demoralized to find out that people don't like my music nah but they gonna see the stats and like oh come be me could be me come be me man that's about something wrong my Spotify broke yeah I feel sorry for that guy who these stats match with that's not gonna be me but that's how they all gonna thank me that's funny because it's true all right well let's get into this last topic here um this is off of academics page he posted a tweet from Emily Baker White should have looked up to see who she is but our latest employees at tiktok and bite dance have access to a secret back end button that can make any video go viral immediately pushing it to more viewers the practice which tiktok has never disclosed is known internally as heating quote on quote now one you know I said it since it's been brought up I said this shit bro in a video on youtube documented two three years ago it was either 2020 2019 why have so many things that we said about tiktok went through because why we like really took it seriously we do this but I am kind of perplexed about the surprise but I think that's again being in a music industry so long you forget that people don't know stuff yeah like because essentially what I kind of broke down early was this but it did throw me early in in spot in tiktok and I'll tell you why I saw my boy malaki speaks make a comment I don't have to hit him up whatever he that every algorithm has this and there's a lot of people with that kind of feedback right tell you why this tiktok shit is different oh okay hold up hold up academics said this is a tiktok employee who also actually called this out so I think that's part of why they're making a big deal it's somebody from the inside yeah reporting the inside right but yes out every algorithm has the ability to boost it's a way it's bad terminology to say algorithm every platform has the ability to boost you in the algorithm and get you more views that you don't necessarily deserve like hey you're a celebrity get on our platform we're gonna get make sure to um that you get shown to a certain amount of people because how do you convince these celebrities to get on the platform when you're trying to blow up if I give them those numbers without giving them some sauce right like they are used to big numbers it's gonna be demoralizing for them to start from ground zero have to work their way up so you have to be able to have that type of control and why wouldn't give us it on platform right with that being said that tiktok just felt different when I first understood and saw that on tiktok it felt like they take more control over the super virality of things than any other platform I've seen before so you'll have things judged by the algorithm initially in the ai because that they're not going to do all of that right they have ai to see if there's certain things said that might need to have the post taken down right if you curse or I don't know you know let's insert potential thing that gets taken down for nudity drugs guns etc especially on tiktok right they're super strict about that in comparison now once you get past a certain level you got those bars but you also have performance it goes up it goes up it goes up gets to a certain point and then you have somebody in my mind this is what it felt like when I first learned it and start talking to people um and even people yeah I started talking to people it felt like in my mind visually it was like someone in a room to push the button all right whether it was going to go super viral or they just let that shit rock and it kind of slowly like patterns patterns away or literally hey yo like let's stop this thing it's gone too far this isn't what we want to see tiktok the reason that that became such an issue to a greater extent is not just to control with music because I think we obviously tend to read this shit from music standpoint but remember when they were like there's discrimination going on on tiktok yeah it's like people of a certain race or this person is like special ed and they're not letting their content go as far as these women are are like of a certain weight like all these different things they were saying people were discriminating um tiktok against and when you looked at tiktok early on I was always describing it as like disney channel it's like people were comparing this shit to instagram I think one leg is Spotify the other leg is disney channel where they're trying to project this overarching brand of what tiktok content looks like they're trying to control it more than youtube and instagram care about what instagram content looks like you know I mean yeah so when you you take that then you throw in a little bit of you know chinese chinese culture the censorship starts to look crazy and what you decide to go let go super viral and not starts to look really crazy beyond just the benefits of oh i'm a label you know I mean we got some of these types of partnerships now where we can help encourage certain things on certain platforms you know I mean I don't want to ruin no partnerships I'm not going to specify which platform you know what I mean but like beyond that when you start integrating this the suppression of certain demographics and starting to see one type of demographic go more viral than other and one type of content go more viral than other then it becomes really tricky like what are you trying to encourage and do I truly as my brand in person have an opportunity as for success as some of these other demographics that's kind of like how how I read it but the fact they've been doing this shit is you know I get of course it's new to to some but it is what it is man they just been doing it yeah that's the biggest and I kept forgetting that like other people didn't know because like you said like we've been on for so long yeah um and then I didn't realize that you remember that um that leak document from inside the tiktok that showed the different tiers of the algorithm and how it worked I can't forget that there was a leak document that wasn't like a public report type of thing you know what I'm talking about which one it was this was like 20 heavy late 2019 early 2020 there was a document that leaked from the inside that was showing like how tiktok's algorithm worked in like layers oh I do remember that yeah it was very technical there's I'm saying like a super technical right like very like if you know you know I keep forgetting that was it if you know you know moment like I felt like that was one of those things that kind of like everybody knew you know I'm saying so so that's just been like the most interesting part of it but yeah man like there are some platforms that I don't think benefit from doing it as much as tiktok does because like you said like tiktok has an image to maintain like a virality right like people still the allure of tiktok is still like oh this is the place where my 10 second video could get 150 million views on it you know what I'm saying um so it has more incentive to have a button like that than something like a youtube you two doesn't want everybody getting hella millions of views on that video as well because then it will it will it will bankrupt the economy you know what I'm saying you just touched on something like you said incentive to create virality and give people that that nugget to chase but remember early on when people will be talking about yo man I was posting doing well but all of a sudden I just started going super viral but then you'll have some people talk about like after the fact and I had never seen people speak not from a sense of oh shit I start going crazy viral and now I'm trying to figure out how to keep going viral and it's not happening as much people literally would say their experience that like tiktok it felt like tiktok just lifting them up like like a guardian angel like people were saying that without any knowledge of how shit works on the inside or anything early on is before we even fully knew it I was part of what led us down that path literally the influencers that people posting going viral early on would be like yeah bro like tiktok just like lifting me up out of nowhere and I was getting crazy numbers for like three weeks and now I'm trying to figure out how to like get back in their good graces almost it was it was such a weird like paradigm and language in a way people spoke about tiktok but but that's because tiktok is different bro yeah something about you two would never no you two would never instagram instagram they're trying to figure themselves out bro yeah yeah they're on a deep spiritual journey but now I'm more so interested to see if one of tiktok rebuttals it I feel like they're not they they never do but like what I do love appreciate about tiktok is that like you know they see this because I know they saw in a report got leaked and they didn't feel like they did a lot to stop it they just kind of like yeah we do yeah and everyone's like oh shit all right we go back about our day because like uh blacky was saying bro like you feel like every platform at least has the option to do it it's built in there somewhere but tiktok always gonna let you know or let it get out there and don't don't do anything to stop matter bro so that's my only problem and I want to be careful because shawty was young and it's not any negative uh it's not any negative thought I have towards her it's just the happening of it charlie demilio all right because of how I understood tiktok to work in that time it was very interesting to watch that happen because she was literally chosen at some point chosen now the interesting part is you have these people with conspiracies typically why oh this person is super connected this person it's not like she was like manipulating and they were in back rooms making this shit happen yeah tiktok just chose her like literally just like people talk about lifting me up and dropping me off she got lifted up as a part of process but somehow it might have been something she did that kind of kept her in the graces and then also I think she did fit a specific look that they wanted to see on their platform right but she just got chosen and any when you saw the french comedian that uh do who like I think he was like a threat to charlie demilio I don't know if he ever surpassed oh yeah I know you're talking about it yeah but at some point he got chosen all right when you start when you hit that certain level on tiktok you have to be chosen it doesn't mean that you are on inside working in those relationships tiktok has its own agenda of sorts right as we've seen and like yeah oh yeah here's this narrative well everybody wants to see somebody beat charlie demilio and everybody seems to be on this guy's side does it not go against anything that we don't want to project anyway like this is a great agenda because maybe some people might be feeling bad that they can't usurp charlie demilio at the time so people feel like oh man what's the whole point of this because you know she's big and she's the the rich getting richer hey well this other guy just beat her and he looks nothing like her and they're coming from a whole different space so that might just be to inject a little hope in people's prayer you know not get too too deep with it in that way but it makes me look at their platform a little bit differently in that way because of how that much control they have with that algorithm and how much liberty they impress versus other platforms yeah this will make me excited though you know i'm saying except bro they wouldn't be looking to get chose no i mean you know they knew they knew a little music market on the platform you know i would i'd take the calling they've called for you know what i'm saying but i just appreciate the fact like they just they don't care that we know because i wish the other the other platforms are also like bro imagine like the the end of working of the youtube algorithm yeah bro that should break the internet you appreciate the gang stuff at all yeah hundreds of yeah bruh hey bro we doing it out in the open you know saying just blowing up who we feel like it and there's nothing you can do about and you still don't come over here and make it make a tiktok and it's like damn tiktok you're right you're right i am about to do all that exactly my bad bro my bad oh man well that's that's today's episode uh we appreciate y'all as always for rocking with us if you've made it this far you are one of the most appreciated y'all are true listeners are our true community that's keeping us rocking and why we actually talk about more than just like one short topic um so if y'all continue to get value out of this make sure y'all subscribe and share or people who don't know about it put them on and other than that i'm bram and shy i'm kovir and we out peace