Artificial Intelligence (AI) is the talk of the town. For some, it’s the end of artistry. For others, it’s just the beginning. Some argue it will ruin artists and impact their income generation negatively. Others argue the complete opposite.

Steps for the AI Revolution in the Music Business:

Here are a few steps to take to get ahead of the Music Industry AI revolution.

Add Brand Equity:

I always preach this, and you always hear me preach this, because it has never been more true than it is now.  First, what exactly is brand equity? Simply put, it means how much your brand is worth. Ideas, things, products, and services become valuable when they have a value added to them. This is just another way of saying that you should make your Brand more valuable. Investing in oneself and one’s brand is of the utmost importance. This is exactly what it means to have control over one’s data and to own both the value and the Equity of one’s brand. 

Now, what does all of this mean, exactly? Let’s look at an example: if you ran an eco-commerce website with 10,000 price points, you would generally have a better chance of making money than if you only had 100 price points. 

The same is true in the music industry. The more music you have, the more chances you have to make money off of it, which directly affects the value of your brand.  When making assets (defined as: songs, lyrics, merchandise, etc.), you need to think about how valuable that content is and give it a tangible value, so that other people will understand how valuable it is and be willing to pay you for it.

Take Inventory:

Taking an inventory of your company’s assets is very important because it shows what your company can do. To do this, you can make a list of all of your songs and products, as well as the different versions and prices of each. What it means to “take inventory” is to write down in a Google Excel sheet or a file all of the assets that are important to your brand, how much they are worth, and how much each asset is worth in total and how much your whole catalog is worth.

Own Your Data:

It is important to realize that the information you collect is very valuable. In fact, you can think of it as if it were gold in and of itself. If this is true, then nothing could be more important than owning gold. Furthermore, substantiating this ownership legally. 

Which brings me to this next question- do you own your social media pages? Do you own your Instagram account? Do you own your TikTok or your Facebook account? No. In fact, you don’t even own the content that you upload on these platforms. When signing up for an account, you would see this detailed in the fine print. So, the goal here is to use Social Media to move your viewers onto platforms that you actually own and control. This, as we said earlier, adds value to your brand. 

There are organic and free ways to do this, but if you want to speed things up, you should set a budget for advertising. When advertising, you should be sure to collect email addresses and phone numbers from the platforms where you are advertising. This will cut out the middle man (social media) and allow for you to have direct access and influence with your listeners.

Provide a Service:

This idea seems antiquated when we are speaking about an artificial intelligence revolution. However, think about the first step in computer learning- a human to teach them. (PS- this has already changed and will continue to change, but there is still time to take advantage of this!) The truth is, In the time of AI and computer thinking, the thought process of genius may be more valuable than the maturation of the thought.

In a digital future, as more and more people focus on making digital items and digital assets, naturally the value of digital assets will increase, and the value of most physical assets is likely to go down. Even art is digitizing thanks to the NFT markets. In these markets, some outsider art is being sold for the price of a Warhol.

In the music world, we have seen this transition from younger audiences leaning more towards streaming rather than purchasing physical CDs. CDs are still relevant, but their sales have gone down since their origination.

Again, the path of the future consumer will be much more digital than it is now. So, if you want to continue to be seen as a useful artist, providing services could be a very lucrative revenue stream. Why? Because of this, I strongly advise you to become an expert around a particular service within the music business that you are passionate about and skilled in. This will also hep you to promote your music a long the way. Who knows, an AI company may scoop you up for all of the knowledge you have attained. You may just take them up on the offer if the price is right.

Sell Your Vocals:

You Can’t Beat Them? Join em! Learn how you can get in on the action of selling your voice to be used for generating songs through AI platforms. Research some of these AI companies and potentially partnership with them in selling your vocals, and even your music.

conclusion

In conclusion, the battle and collaboration regarding human vs. robot is now more real than it has ever been. The AI is and has been upon us. You can make a choice to join in on the action or continue to do what you have been doing. It’s really up to you in terms of how you position your brand and prepare it for this huge transformation.