I spoke at a Spotify event last week

Hey friends!

Last week I had the pleasure of speaking at and attending the first ever Spotify Fresh Finds Summit. Today I want to talk about it because 1, I did learn some things that I think are useful and worth sharing and 2, this was a pretty exclusive event with only around 200 people so I think you’ll find this interesting!

If you have no idea what i’m talking about, Spotify has a new program called Spotify Fresh Finds Forward and any artist that is added to a Fresh Finds playlist will now be given access to this program where they get:

• Free studio time

• Free / discounted access to creative tools like LANDR and Splice

• Early access to some Spotify features

• Mental health resources

• Access to exclusive events (like this one)

The program itself is for around 10,000 artists, but this particular event only had around 200 artists (so I was told, I didn’t count myself lol). Spotify Fresh Finds Summit was a 2-day event thrown at their LA office. It sounds like there will be more events in the future, and that there will also be virtual events.

This event featured some pretty amazing speakers:

• John Legend

• Ryan Tedder

• María Zardoya

• JP Saxe

• Quinn XCII

• Plus of a whole bunch of music industry people, and Spotify people

Here’s the schedule of the two days:

One thing you have may have noticed is they even fed everyone both days, and that ‘fresh finds social’ on day 1 had an open bar. Additionally there was an open espresso bar throughout the entirety of both days, so I was heavily caffeinated throughout the event.

My panel

The panel I spoke on was called ‘Financial literacy for artists’, which might seem like a weird place for me, but it actually made a lot of sense.

My panel featured Kevin Boucher and Eric Clay from Operation Hope, an organization that teaches people about financial literacy, Mauricio Ruiz from The Manager’s Playbook and myself.

Kevin moderated and Eric covered the raw financial side, Mauricio and I covered the industry specific aspect.

The main questions I answered were:

1. How do streams turn into money, and where do artists tend to lose track of their money?

2. How much should a developing artist spend on marketing, and how do they know if its working or wasted?

3. What should an artist look for in a brand deal contract, and what should they never agree to?

I think i’ll make either a newsletter or YouTube video in the future answering these, let me know if you want to see that! You may have seen me post content around these topics on Instagram / TikTok lately, that was me preparing haha.

This was actually my first in-person music industry speaking event as well. Not gonna lie, I was a bit nervous! I talk on camera all the time, i’ve done live streams with more people than this on them, i’ve played shows with more people than this in the crowd (17 years ago though lol). But in my opinion I think it went well, and I was glad my first time was on a panel and with a crowd as awesome as this.

When I announced my panel topic on social media some people said ‘why is Spotify of all companies having a panel about money’? And honestly I think they did it specifically because of statements like this. They didn’t vet my answers ahead of time or tell me what I could or couldn’t say, they just wanted me to talk honestly like I normally would.

Helpful information

This post is getting pretty long so I feel inclined to get into some helpful information I learned at the event in here before you stop reading.

Here’s some things Ryan Tedder said that I think are worth hearing:

1. Talent doesn’t get you far, it’s all about work ethic

2. Ed Sheeran used to write and record 5 demos a day (1st verse and chorus), then listen to them the next day to decide what to keep and finish

3. Melody is god

4. Take chords from a hit song and put your own melody and style over it

5. You don’t need hit songs to be a successful artist

6. Write hits for people in Oklahoma, not in a big city

I understand the chords thing is controversial, but keep in mind there really aren’t that many chord progressions in pop music so this isn’t actually unusual at all. He did however mention that he sometimes will purposefully try to write like other artists, because inevitably when you do that it ends up sounding nothing like them which I think is a fair point.

The Oklahoma thing is weird and funny, but basically his premise is that people from middle America represent the average or ‘more basic’ version of Americans. Companies apparently do product testing in Oklahoma all the time because it’s a better test audience than LA or NYC. To me this makes sense if you’re going for writing HITS, because the vibes in LA and NYC and Boston are all quite distinct, it makes sense why songs might pop off there but not everywhere.

The JP Saxe songwriting workshop was insane and honestly one of the highlights of the event. He invited random artists from the room on stage to write songs on the fly. It’s hard distilling any lessons from this event verbally due to the nature of a workshop, but i’ll try anyways:

• You don’t need answers in your songs, an open ended feeling or problem is more interesting than an answer

• Lyrics don’t have to be clever, people more often want honestly than cleverness

• Instead of thinking ‘what should I write a song about’, think ‘what’s keeping me up at night’

• You can’t control when creativity strikes, but you can show up every day and be ready for it

• If you’re stuck in a rut, just write for 30-60 minutes every day no matter what with no pressure of anything being good

Another fun fact is that on my flight back home I ended up sitting next to JP.

There was a talk I went to with members from Spotify’s editorial team. One interesting fact that was stated is that they listen to ‘nearly all’ of the music that is pitched for editorial playlists, which I wasn’t expecting. They also gave some specific details of what they’re looking for in editorial pitches:

The vibes

The last thing I want to talk about is the vibes at this event, because they were fabulous.

The artist’s in attendance were primarily 10k-100k monthly listeners, with a handful that were larger. Most around 18-25 years old. All of them were not only incredibly talented musically, but also very hard workers. Developing indie artists that represent the future generation of larger artists.

Everyone understands the grind, the struggle, the constant rejection, the social media game etc.

The Spotify team that put this together cares deeply about indie artists. There have been plenty of fair criticisms about Spotify as a company over the years, but this event really showed that there are many people at the company who are insanely passionate about helping indie artists. And they’re constantly fighting on our behalf from the inside.

One more thing…

I’m not much of an R&B fan, but the John Legend performance that closed off the event is going to be something of a core memory for myself and a lot of people. Not only is an exclusive performance from John Legend in the 3rd row in a room of only 200 people pretty epic by itself, but hearing the voices of 200 musicians singing and harmonizing with him was insane.

There were literally people in tears.

I really hope Spotify does more of these in the future. I’m sure this cost them a ton of money to do, but the amount of community building and positive impact on these artist’s lives is really priceless.

Whenever you’re ready, there are 4 ways I can help you:

1. My courses. Spotify Growth Machine teaches you how to use Facebook ads to promote your music on Spotify. YouTube Growth Machine teaches you how to grow a YouTube channel organically and how to use YouTube ads. Fan Growth Machine teaches you how to build a website, online store and grow your email list.

2. My ad agency Southworth Media specializes in running Meta conversion ads to promote your music on streaming platforms, email list growth, tour promotion and more.

3. Website / Store / Funnels. MusicFunnels and FanFunnels are the best all-in-one platforms for music artists to make a website, online store, sales funnels, build a mailing list and more!

4. 1-on-1 consulting. You can book 1-hour calls with myself or my team here.

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