By Bernie Furshpan
It seems like everything around us is going through, what Cosmologists refer to as inflation. Everything is expanding at a rapid rate, so much so that sometimes I feel like I just woke up to a new world. The population has exploded to 7.5 Billion people, there’s 800 million vehicles on the roads that crisscross our planet, 27,831 TV Channels, over half a billion YouTube channels, 97 million songs, 62 million amateur musicians just in the U.S. alone, 2 billion monthly active Facebook users, 700 million on Instagram and 400 million on Twitter. These figures are in the breadth of colossal and can raise your level of anxiety knowing that there isn’t enough time in the day or financial resources to reach just a small fraction of a percent of these large numbers. Not only can this be terrifying but can handicap your work in building an audience.
The chances of becoming #1 in your genre was a little more realistic in days past and with fewer genres, a less crowded industry, fewer channels of distribution. So what’s a recording and performing artist to do? First, take in a deep breath and look at the bigger picture. Our society within the grand civilization we live in is evolving rapidly in knowledge and technology. There are some things that haven’t changed. People still need to cling to a group, a philosophy, an idea. As society expands, there are points of critical mass when groups split to the right and left. All groups of people go through this process. There’s a saying going around in the entertainment business, “It’s a bigger pie and you’ll get a smaller piece of it.” This in fact is not true, the pie has reached critical mass points and has broken down to smaller pies and you can get a bigger piece if you can isolate and go after a smaller pie. The ego wants to have it all, to be King of the World. When you see the bigger picture, you can still be King, but of a smaller world, but a world indeed.
Think about Christianity. It started with the Holy Catholic Apostolic Church and expanded around the world and grew so large with many more interpretations, it reached critical mass many times over, forcing breakdowns to specific niche sects, the likes of Greek, Coptic, Armenian, Eastern Orthodox, Russian, Roman Catholic, Anglican, Assembly of God, Presbyterian, Unitarian, Baptist, Quaker, Lutheran, Mennonite, Protestant, Episcopalian, and many more.
If you’re promoting a new CD or show, here’s my suggestion. Start with baby steps. Build a fan base who will buy into the very specific work you’re doing. Scratch your niche and continue to engage them. Promote to the very specific brands that your work represents and build your pie. As you build relationships, allow them to “own” you, to feel that they can claim that you’re “their” singer, comedian, and entertainer. This kind of loyalty is for a lifetime.
