Friday, October 25, 2013

ARTIST: SHOULD I SELL TICKETS IN ORDER TO PERFORM?

By Eric L. Mims J.d.


If you are a rapper or a singer, by now I'm sure that you have ran across the opportunity to do a showcase at some big venue such in your area. The only catch was that you had to buy a certain amount of tickets up front (usually 200) for about a dollar each. The promoter's sales pitch is that if you purchase the tickets at 1.00 each, you can then turn around and sell them to your fans for any price you want and keep the difference as a profit for you or your band.

If you decide to go ahead with the purchasing the tickets, this is usually how it plays out for beginning artist;

The promoter usually will sell you around 200 tickets for 1.00 each, then tell you that you can resell the tickets for 3.00 to 5.00 dollars each to your fans and make your money back plus make a profit.

Show night comes around, and you and your people get there, and you figure out that there are about 30 artist performing and they all did the same thing that you did. So what that means is that whenever an artist performs that there is a little section of their friends and family that are exclusively there to see, cheer, and support that particular artist, and when that artist is done, they leave and so does their crowd.

On the night of the show, you're short on the 200.00 and have to come up with the difference out of your pocket. In addition, you're nervous and you're hoping that the people who have tickets actually come. On top of that, you look around and you slowly begin to realize that there are about 40 other artist who did the same thing that you did.

The only time that I would suggest buying tickets to do shows is when the showcase has a headliner. By that I mean that a major act is going to perform at the venue and you are buying and selling tickets so that you can open up for that act.

For example; Say Drake is coming to your town and he is performing at a local venue, and the promoter is basically selling opportunities to open up for Drake. In this case, it will cost a little more. You ma have to buy 1000.00 to 1500.00 worth of tickets and then sell them, but keep in mind that it is a little easier to sell your tickets now because you are not selling tickets to see just you, you are selling tickets to see Drake, and on top of that you're opening up for him!

The main drawback to these shows is that you hardly get new fans, since everyone there is really there for someone else, and that someone is their family member or a close friend and very loyal to the artist that they came to support. That's not good for you, because an important purpose for doing shows is to gain new fans and these types of shows rarely provide you with that.

On the other hand, if a major artist in your genre is coming to your town and going to do a show, and the same opportunity arises (you have to sell tickets in order to open up for them), jump on it...because this is a different situation.

On top of that people don't know that you pretty much bought the opportunity to open up for this major artist, so they will automatically think that you are a legitimate up and coming act that is possibly associated with the major artist that is performing.

The difference is that the price will be much higher (1500.00-2500.00), but it will be easier to sell those tickets because your friends, family, and strangers will want to see the major artist perform, and they will be much more willing to support you because they believe that you are moving up in the music world. The other difference is that when you perform, you get to perform in front of the major artist's fans, and since they have no emotional attachment, it is ore opportunity to gain them as fans.

Peace!




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