How to Get Signed to a Record Label
How Can I Get Signed to a Record Label?
Say you write songs with big, singalongable choruses. Bingo. That’s what everybody wants. Make recordings of your five strongest songs, showcasing your voice as well as your instrumental and writing chops. Please make these recordings sound like masters because that’s what the people on the other side of the desk demand. Never mind the video for now – you want everyone to listen first.
Getting Your Sound Out There
Get yourself a gig on a certain night, or nights, every week. Sing your songs throughout your shows. Make copies of your CDs for sale, along with business cards. Yours should say you are a singer/songwriter, with your current contact information.
Keep writing new material. Make sure it’s as strong as it needs to be in order to realistically compete in our very competitive business.
As long as you’re performing somewhere, people you don’t know can hear you, live. And these same people will bring in their friends to enjoy your material. And remember - you only need one person to say yes. Just one person can get you signed to a label deal.
Building Your Musical Brand
So, keep singing in small clubs, then bigger ones, and send invitations to everyone at the labels where you feel you belong, and have them come to your gigs as your guests. Maybe you could make your invitation funny to make it stand out. “You may think I’m just another left-handed singer/songwriter in mis-matched shoes, but..) And keep sending your invitations, even if nobody shows. Stay on it. And keep changing the funny part.
Go to every professional music gathering you can get to. Everybody you want to know will be there. Network among your colleagues, too. Maybe co-write with some of them. Maybe sing on one or two of their tracks. Get your name out there. You never know when one of your friends will get a nibble or two and they’re asked who sang the harmony.
Keep a mailing list. Don’t leave anybody out. Your neighbor may have a niece who shares a garage with an A & R intern at a major record or publishing company.
When a music publisher or label is interested in you, they will ask the size of your fan base. And they want big numbers.
Send out email invitations for every gig you play. When you create your email list, be careful to make it look like everyone is being invited individually, so your message doesn’t show the other names. It’s okay to invite people you don’t know at record labels and publishing companies. Y’never know..
Send your invitation a few weeks before the gig, a week before, and the day of.
The more “in their face” you are, the better.
Invite the media. Even if the only reporter who shows up is just an intern from a local throwaway paper, press is press. That intern can move on to the local paper, a national one, and who knows? Use the press to build a following. When your name and the name of your group starts sounding familiar, you’re catching fire.
That helps record labels and music publishers to feel confident about signing you. They want the new hot thing. Leikin’ s Law is give ‘em what they want.
Landing a Record Deal
In our business, having a buzz about ourselves is a very big marketing tool. It makes people on the other side of the desk feel safe in considering you for their label, and afraid you’ll sign somewhere else..
Develop your elevator pitch, too: I’m Molly Leikin. I’m a singer/songwriter. I write top forty pop songs with big, singalongable hooks. I admire your label and want to be one of your artists. Here’s my card. May I have one of yours? When would be a good time to call you?
In that pitch, you could change pop to country or indie or Christian. Perform as much as you can. Try to get your local station to play a cut or two. Sign up to sing at your church or charity. It couldn’t hurt to choose a charity for which some music business folks are supporters, and present every Sunday.
Keep Improving Your Songwriting Craft
Y’never know who’s listening. Stay on it. Write new songs. Try singing a duet with an artist who’s just a little further along in his career than you are. Keep writing good songs, ones we can remember after hearing them once.
Miracles happen. Some night when three, noisy drunks show up for your gig, an executive from Sony or Arista could quietly sit down, listen to your set, sing along, buy you a drink, and offer you a label deal.
It happens. Just make sure you have the great songs you need, first.
That’s how you can get signed to a label deal.
©2022 Molly Leikin