Jason Reeves is an ASCAP award-winning singer/songwriter who, aside from successfully building a career as a DIY artist has also proven that collaboration can be incredibly powerful for artists that want to find new ways to reach fans and get their music heard. Reeves has co-written many songs, including the Billboard chart-topping “Bubbly” and “I Never Told You,” with the Grammy-award-winning  Colbie Caillat. He also wrote “The Show” with Australian pop artist Lenka and most recently worked with A Rocket To The Moon and Hot Chelle Rae. Like many other artists, Reeves threw himself into music early, picking up piano at five, then drums and guitar in his teens. He cites his major influences as Bob Dylan, Led Zeppelin and James Taylor. In late 2004/early 2005, Jason was contacted by producer Mikal Blue who had heard his self-created work on CD Baby and invited Reeves to record in his L.A. studio. It was there that Blue connected him to Caillat, and a career-altering partnership was born. Reeves self-released four albums and an EP before signing to Warner Bros. Records in 2008 and returned to the DIY world in 2011 with his album The Lovesick. His next album, Songs are Silent Films will be released next month.

 

 

I recently got to talk to Jason about co-writing, the process of building up a national touring base and the importance of staying focused on your vision as an artist if you want to have a successful, long-lasting career in music.

 

Musician Coaching:

 

Thanks so much for taking the time to talk, Jason. Tell me how you got started as a musician/singer/songwriter.

 

JR:

 

When I was living in Iowa, I had just graduated from high school. I had started writing songs and putting out records on my own at the end of high school. And when I went to college right away, as most people do, I had no idea why I was going or what I was doing. All I was doing was writing music and not going to class. So, I dropped out in order to not waste my time or my parents’ money.

 

I decided I was just going to go for it, which led me to California, which turned a lot of things on for me and opened a lot of doors. For example, I met Mikal Blue and Colbie Caillat. They were my first two friends when I first came out here. And everything has come from that. But the whole time, I’ve just been trying to write as much music as I can and see where it takes me.

 

Musician Coaching:

 

Correct me if I’m wrong: At the time, you were 19 or 20 and moving out to California on your own. How did you go about networking to even find artists of that caliber? How did that come about?

 

JR:

 

Honestly, Mikal Blue, the producer, is the reason I came out there. He invited me to come record with him. At the time, I’d only ever recorded in little basement studios in the country in Iowa – nothing that resembled a real studio. And I’d never really been to the West Coast. So, I was really excited. And Colbie had just had her first guitar lesson and had just written her first song when I met her. Neither of us had ever co-written a song before. All of a sudden, we met, started writing songs, and it turned into what it did. We didn’t expect that, and it wasn’t our goal. That’s really how crazy it’s been.

 

Ever since that happened, I’ve just been able to write with other people. And it’s been amazing. I know I’ve been very lucky.

 

Musician Coaching:

 

You said you were putting out your own records. How did Blue come across you? Iowa is not exactly a music business hot spot, unless it’s changed since the last time I’ve been there.

 

JR:

 

Not at all. He found it on CD Baby. I still actually use them. But this was before I knew what MySpace, Facebook and all those things were. CD Baby was really the only place I knew to put my music, and that was where he found it. It’s crazy how the Internet has been changing everything.

 

Musician Coaching:

 

For sure. Tell me about what the process of co-writing has been like for you. I know most artists I work with are initially a bit hesitant. They find it a bit awkward and feel like songwriting is a fairly personal thing to share with someone they don’t know that well. I’m assuming you and Colbie weren’t that tight when you initially started writing songs together. Was it an easy process for you, or was it something you had to work to get comfortable with?

 

JR:

 

It’s something you have to learn, for sure. But the more you do it and figure out how it works, the better you get at it. I think being comfortable is one of the most important things, because what you said about people not liking to do it because it feels strange initially or too intimate is true. If you’re not comfortable enough to share exactly how you feel or what you think with someone, you’re not going to get the best song. That’s why I, for the most part, write with people I’m already really good friends with and work well with. That makes the process fun and easy.

 

Musician Coaching:

 

It sounds like your career was something that you built initially based on your success as a co-writer.

 

JR:

 

That’s definitely what has brought a lot of attention to my own music. I’ve been touring a lot for the past three or four years. I did do a lot of promotion with my songs, so it’s a balance between the two. It’s about half co-writing and half putting out my own music.

 

Musician Coaching:

 

You were signed to a major label and have also put out records on your own. Tell me a little bit about that process.

 

JR:

 

I was on Warner Bros. Records until last year. Before I was on the label, I put out about an album a year. But the important part for me was that, when I was doing it myself, I could put out music whenever I wanted to. Warner was good to me, and I liked being on the label. But in all honesty, I didn’t get very much done. In fact, it kind of slowed me down. So, the fact that I’m not on the label anymore just means I can actually put out the music I have that’s just sitting around. Because, I write so many songs, it’s hard to even keep up with myself. That’s why I’ve been really excited to be able to have people who are willing to help me do this. It’s amazing. I have a feeling a lot of work is going to get done just in these next couple months by a few people than it did the whole time I was on that label.

 

Musician Coaching:

 

I first came up in the Atlantic Records system. And I would watch what I called “The Shiny Shirt” phenomenon happen over and over again. What would happen was, after Hootie & the Blowfish, Atlantic seemed to be mining the Southeast region for the next Hootie. They signed all these bands from the Carolinas and Tennessee and Florida.  These bands would be doing all this local promotional, getting on local radio, then putting together regional touring.

 

Then, the label would come in and say, “This is all great. Quit your jobs. We’re just getting this release together.” And these musicians tended to all stop, say, “Cool, we’re rock stars now” and wait. They would be waiting on the photographer for the photo shoot, for the mastering engineer who was going to spend $20,000 of the band’s money to make the record sound marginally better, or for the publicist to show up and say, “Singer? We’re going to get you into the gym, have you lose a little weight. Bass player? Cut your hair, because you’ll really be cute when we have this whole makeover/reveal thing together.” The guitarist would wear leather pants instead of jeans, and everyone would get shiny shirts as opposed to flannel. That was almost all I saw really change. Then, they would throw it at radio, and it would mostly miss.

 

JR:

 

That’s an amazing description.

 

Musician Coaching:

 

That was just my experience. But, you’re in the vast majority of people I know that have had a major label experience where they saw their name with a major label imprint next to it, and it just didn’t quite deliver the way they expected it to.

 

JR:

 

Yes. It was frustrating.

 

Musician Coaching:

 

Let’s get down to some nuts and bolts. I think a lot of people have the tendency to say, “Okay, I’m going to leave my hometown, and then what?” How did you go about building a national touring base?

 

JR:

 

It started around the time I put out my album The Magnificent Adventures of Heartache, which was in 2007. It was in about 2008 that I decided I needed to tour. I got two guys I met in L.A. – a bass player and a drummer – and we just rehearsed and did a residency at Hotel Café for a month. After that, we just started touring as much as we could. Eventually, they got really long. One of the tours we had was 37 shows in a row. It was more than circling the U.S. once. It was totally amazing, but crazy. It goes up and down, depending on the day and is really hard to predict how things will go. But the more you play cities, the more people come back to see you. And you just hope you can keep their attention.

 

Musician Coaching:

 

Obviously you regularly get feedback on which songs work and which don’t. Other than just playing well, is there anything else you’ve learned about how to keep people’s attention?

 

JR:

 

I think for somebody that’s touring the way I do, it really comes down to the songs and if they connect to people. At my level, it’s not necessarily mainstream media that’s promoting my music, so people aren’t finding out about me that way. They’re hearing about me through word of mouth and Internet. I’m sure that’s how most music is. But at the end of the day, it’s about a song connecting to the person that’s listening to it enough that they want to tell their friends and come to the shows. Other than that, I think it’s a mystery. My main goal is to write the best songs I can.

 

Musician Coaching:

 

It’s something that a lot of musicians lose, for sure. I notice you’re active with Instagram and Facebook. What online marketing strategies have worked the best for you?

 

JR:

 

It’s so crazy how much is happening with all that and how it just keeps changing and getting more intricate. I can’t even keep up with it, honestly. There are too many for me. So, I try to just utilize a few the best I can. I just got Instagram, because until recently, I didn’t have an iPhone. I just kept holding out and telling myself I didn’t need one. I didn’t realize how amazing they actually are, even though it scares me terribly to own one. But with Twitter, Facebook and everything else, there are so many different tools now.

 

The fact that you can connect immediately to people anywhere in the world is very wild and futuristic. And it’s happening right now. Obviously, the whole music industry and everything about music today has been changed by it. So, I’m still learning just like everyone else is what all these things mean.

 

Musician Coaching:

 

If you had to give yourself advice as you were releasing records in high school, based on what you have now experienced, what would you tell yourself about what to expect, what to avoid, or what to prioritize?

 

JR:

 

I would say, you have to be more patient than you can even imagine. Also, it needs to be about the music the whole time. That’s still one of my main goals, and I think it’s what being a songwriter should be about. I think it’s about trying to keep everything you do as real and as honest as you can make it.

 

Musician Coaching:

 

Do you feel like you ever lost sight of that along the way?

 

JR:

 

I don’t think I did. It’s just something that I have to keep working on. There are so many things pulling people away from the music and being honest, at all times. And if you are somebody that wants to stay true to the vision of what you want to represent, you have to stand strong on certain things and not give in.

 

To learn more about Jason Reeves and his music, you can visit him on Facebook or follow him on Twitter. His album Songs Are Silent Films will release in June 2012.

Shikhee is the founder of the band Android Lust, a band that combines mixes elements of rock, industrial and electropop. A Bangladeshi-born New Yorker, she has always been an avid musician and songwriter and got her start playing in bands in the New York City area in the 1990s. Eventually, she decided to branch out on her own, founding Android Lust as a one-woman project in 1996. For the past 15 years, she has continued to maintain a rigorous performance schedule, toured throughout the U.S. several times and has put out four full-length albums on several different prominent industrial record labels. Android Lust has been covered by publications such as the Village Voice, Boston Globe, Jane magazine as well as MTV, a number of underground music zines and a variety of international blogs and periodicals.

 

 

Shikhee spoke to me about the unique experience of building up a presence within the Goth/industrial scene and provided some insight for other artists about creative on- and off-line methods of marketing, networking and building personal relationships with fans.

 

Musician Coaching:

 

Thanks so much for taking some time to talk, Shikhee. How did you get into the business, and how were you able to build up the Android Lust band within the industrial/Gothic music community?

 

Shikhee:

 

I was always interested in music and songwriting. I started a few bands that didn’t work out because there always seemed to be personality conflicts or directional issues. Eventually, when those fizzled out I realized it was difficult for me find people that I really identified and clicked with. It was exhausting going through the process of trying to meet people. I even put out ads on Village Voice at one point.

 

I pretty much just decided I just wanted to do it on my own, because the process of trying to find people to work with wasn’t worth the frustration. It was creating a lot of negativity instead of producing something positive. I decided I would just start and figure it out as I went along. And I did. I had learned a bit of recording from my last band, Strange Fruit. We had a guitarist, a drummer and a bass player. But the core of the band had been just the guitarist and I. And after all the conflict we had, it was easier just to figure out how to do things myself than to look for people.

 

So, I started Android Lust and put out my first cassette demo in 1996. I basically just started going to a lot of Goth clubs in New York and connecting with people:  Bat Cave; the Bank and a couple clubs in Jersey. It took off from there.

 

Musician Coaching:

 

Were you just playing those clubs, or were you also attending when you weren’t playing and getting to know people?

 

Shikhee:

 

I was doing a little of everything. When I wasn’t playing, I was going pretty regularly back then and making friends. That was pretty much my scene back then.

 

Musician Coaching:

 

Most artists at one point sit down and think, “Who am I as an artist, and what kind of people would ‘get’ me?” Did you actually have a moment like that, or did you just say, “Underground night clubs, etc. are going to get this”?

 

Shikhee:

 

I never really sat down and thought about that part of the process. I think at that point in my life, it was the music that I was listening to and surrounded by I felt connected to. So, I naturally gravitated towards it myself. And the people that were receptive to it just happened to be there at that time. It wasn’t necessarily a conscious decision to push towards a specific goal. I was just there, and I happened to fall into something that I connected with.

 

Musician Coaching:

 

Did you ever feel like you had to politic, or had you just become friends with the people who were the gatekeepers into the clubs you wanted to play?

 

Shikhee:

 

Politicking and building relationships with people would’ve probably helped a lot, but I’m really bad at networking. I am really not good with just schmoozing, so I never did that. It just happened that I met a guy who was a DJ at one of the clubs, and he had was the head of Tinman Records. He liked my demo, and he ended up wanting to sign me, which was how my first release came about.

 

I did give out demos, but it was always hard for me to present myself, so I just gave people my cassette demo without doing much else. I guess I was lucky in that way. Networking is a skill I’m still working on, and I don’t know how far I’ve come, but I must’ve gotten better.

 

Musician Coaching:

 

You’ve been working on Android Lust for about 15 years now. Knowing what you know now, what are some of the things you would’ve told yourself in 1996, when you were just starting out, that would’ve helped your career?

 

Shikhee:

 

In the late ‘90s, it was pretty much all about the music. And I think I was really naïve in a lot of ways. You mentioned politics, and that was something I really didn’t think about. I just thought if the music was good, it would get attention, which I know now just isn’t the case. It just doesn’t work that way. Everything is about relationships and the people you know, those you do favors for and the people you’re friends with. It’s something that I know exists and I accept, but it’s kind of hard to swallow. There are a lot of other introverted artists out there, and it’s difficult knowing it doesn’t really matter how good you are. Ultimately what matters is the relationships. And networking and building relationships is a skill people need to learn, especially now. Because, with social media and everything else, that’s where we’re at, for better or for worse.

 

Musician Coaching:

 

And have you found one type of social media more useful than others in promoting your band and getting your music out there?

 

Shikhee:

 

I use Facebook and Twitter more than anything else. MySpace kind of died away, and in terms of all the others, I just don’t have the time and energy for them. Facebook has been successful for me, in part, because people who become your fans on Facebook seem to not be out to put you down. With some other sites, there seems to be this sadistic streak where they want to put down artists. There is no accountability,  because you’re an anonymous face, and you can just get away with saying whatever you want. You can say things you wouldn’t say face to face. I think people tend to be more genuine on Facebook.

 

Musician Coaching:

 

Sure. They’re connected to real personas.

 

Shikhee:

 

Right. Of course, there’s other negative stuff that happens there too; I don’t go to Facebook except to manage my band page, because I can’t handle all the noise. But that has become the most supportive community for me in terms of promoting Android Lust.

 

But interestingly, I’ve actually made some real-life friends through Twitter. In fact, my merch and touring manager, and our road tech are people I met through Twitter. I haven’t found myself building real-life relationships like that through any other social networking sites.

 

What I find curious about Twitter is that you could say, “I made chili today,” and you’ll get 30 responses. But then you’ll say, “Hey, I bared my soul and created this piece of art that I connect with,” and you’ll get one response. And that’s usually not the case on Facebook, where people tend to respond to that kind of thing. I’m not sure why that is.

 

Musician Coaching:

 

Everyone’s experience with social media is different, which is why I enjoy talking to people about it and what they pull away from it.

 

You guys are definitely in a very specific niche. Do you find that having a presence on niche sites, like, for example Goth/Industrial sites like Vampire Freaks, etc. and other scene or lifestyle sites has helped out?

 

Shikhee:

 

Yes. Though, our presence on sites like Vampire Freaks is probably not as active as it could be, simply because I don’t have the bandwidth to maintain all those sites. Also, to be honest, the whole “push, push, push” style of marketing has always been incredibly draining for me. I want to focus on creating and of course I want to connect to fans. But this whole style of constant promotion, which is the new paradigm, is I think in some ways very harmful. It really drains you and takes away that bubble that artists used to be in, that was a good thing for being able to create – the bubble that really isolates you as an artist and allows you to immerse yourself in your own world. Now, you’re constantly doing a  back-and-forth. For me personally, that’s not been a great thing.

 

Musician Coaching:

 

How did you go from touring regionally in New York, New Jersey and Philly, to pulling off a cross-country, national tour?

 

Shikhee:

 

That was a great experience. Over the years, I’ve been getting a lot of DJ play and club support. That was when the music was more club friendly. Now it’s a little more experimental. I did build up a lot of contacts across the country that way. And I basically just put together my first national tour back in 2005.

 

Musician Coaching:

 

And when you say you built up a lot of contacts, was that pursuing relationships with other bands or directly with clubs?

 

Shikhee:

 

It was about getting on playlists and having people say, “I really like your music. I’m spinning you.” I basically contacted a lot of DJs in different cities that were playing our music and said, “Hey, do you know of a promoter in your area who would want to book me?” I collected a lot of names by emailing and asking for contacts from people that already liked what I was doing. From there, I started contacting the promoters and tried to put a route together across the country. My first cross-country tour was three-weeks long.

 

Musician Coaching:

 

Had you talked to these DJs before you got on the label, or was your success with them the result of being on the label?

 

Shikhee:

 

Being on the label helped. At that time, I was on Projekt Records. And that definitely helped me get a lot of plays. Back then, I was also in contact with people across the country through MySpace. And in the industrial scene, the DJs were the ones that knew who the promoters were in their local region.

 

Musician Coaching:

 

Do you have any other parting words of advice for artists?

 

Shikhee:

 

Something I tell myself all the time is, “Self doubt is your biggest enemy.” You need to have faith in yourself. That attitude is something I try to practice, and sometimes I fail, sometimes I succeed. But you need to go for what you believe in, because nothing else really matters.

 

To learn more about Shikhee, her story and her music, visit the Android Lust website. You can also follow the band on Facebook and Twitter.

Todd Hansen is the Founder of the website Better Than the Van (BTTV), an online service with over 5,000 users that utilizes social networking features to help bands and music fans find free places to stay, shows to attend and venues to play in cities and towns across the U.S., Canada and Europe. Currently living in Austin, TX, Todd got his start playing in a variety of bands that toured throughout the U.S. Before starting BTTV, he also ran a small label in Minneapolis called 2024 Records.

I recently had the opportunity to sit down with Todd and talk about his own experiences within the music industry, what makes BTTV unique, how even bands that are just starting out can tour sustainably and get beyond their home cities, and how he hopes his site will grow in the future.

 

Musician Coaching:

Thanks for taking the time out to talk to me, Todd. How did you get started in the music business, and what were you doing before you founded BTTV?

TH:

I’ve been in the music business for a while. I guess I just started like anybody else starts, playing in bands. Many of my bands ended up touring and opening for other bands. I also ran a small record label for four years out in Minneapolis called 2024 Records. Like most of them, it’s not around anymore. At the time, it was the thing to do, so I decided to put out friends’ records with a buddy of mine. I had a really good time doing it, but it ended up being too much. And we were doing it at a time where everyone was trying to figure out what to do as a smaller label. Now the climate’s changed a little bit, because that process is more defined. After the label, I basically went back to just playing shows and playing in bands. And about three years ago, I moved to Austin, TX. I just stopped playing for a while, because I had been playing for close to ten years and I wanted to figure out what to do next.

Musician Coaching:

Which bands did you play with?

TH:

A lot of bands no one’s probably ever heard of. One of them was The Winter Blanket. The other was Fitzgerald, which was a rock/folk kind of thing. I filled in for a lot of people. I also played in an alt country band called Lackluster Dodge, which was really fun and funny and good. I was basically always playing in two or three bands at the same time. Some of the bands were a little more serious, so we went out and toured. I did a lot of touring around the Midwest and down South, and we’d go out to each coast every so often with people. Some of the tours were really good, where hotels were involved, but the majority of them were, some nights you could scrape together a few bucks to get a Motel 6 and some nights it was staying with friends or strangers on floors.

I started playing music like this at 17 or so, and it was just what I was used to, so basically the segue into the idea behind BTTV happened when I figured out that the whole social network type thing was going to get to a place where people felt pretty confident in the identities people were portraying online, and seeing that this might open up a space for a site that promoted free places to stay a la couch surfing. I wanted to use hospitality as a baseline for a connection so people could network a little bit better and more easily. There was a time when Myspace was young and innocent, and you could actually network pretty decently with other bands and get shows. You could scrape it together that way. And then Myspace blew up and turned into whatever it is now, and I thought that there was room for the BTTV idea. And when I threw the “music hospitality” idea out there, and it took on a life of its own. Now, we keep working on it and build what people want it to do.

Musician Coaching:

You’ve been a performing and touring musician, and now you’re running this connective service, where you’re building a community for people to trade shows and couches and to put tours together. Is there anything you’ve learned about touring in a sustainable way that you feel would’ve benefited you when you were just starting out?

TH:

I think just having a place to start is really big. The service is definitely geared towards the younger bands and people that are just getting going. There are a lot of those, and a lot of bands that don’t have any idea how they could possibly tour outside their city or town or further than a couple towns away, because have it in their minds they need a booking agent or a friend to manage them and do it all. The site has become something that is geared towards the whole DIY thing, which is cool, but that’s not all that we necessarily intended or what it’s all about.

Someone said, “This is a really cool site. It’s the corporate version of DIY.” And I thought that was pretty weird. But, I guess it makes sense, even though it was never our intention. Our intention has always been just to be a point of contact and a way for the younger band to help get going. Someone might say, “I live in Minneapolis, MN, but I’ve never been to Chicago or Indianapolis before on tour,” or “I want to try to tour my way out to the East Coast and play Dayton and all these other towns along the way.” BTTV can be a great connection point, because the people who are on it are playing shows in those cities, really active in their scenes, want to help bands out and are very approachable people. It’s not a marketing platform or a promotions platform. It’s about trying to make authentic connections.

We were just talking with a band the other night at a studio here in town that is using it. This is a band that easily has friends in tons of cities and is playing other cities, but they said, “This is really cool. We’re playing in cities we would’ve never played before. We’re finding really good people there.” Whether it’s a place to stay, or a promoter or just making new friends or fans just by trying to make other connections, it ends up working as a quasi LinkedIn in some ways.

Musician Coaching:

Can you get other members you know on the site to vouch for you, or are do you give people the opportunity to review each other?

TH:

Eventually, we want to do that. We’re a small shop, so all features take a little time to build out. Right now, there’s a commenting system on all the profiles that people can use. If somebody has a rough experience or it doesn’t work out they can comment. So, if a host didn’t show up or the band trashed a house, the person that was wronged can comment on a particular profile about that. There’s a feedback loop. And we are working on a feature that’s similar to one you find on LinkedIn, where you can make suggestions to other people based on the connection you have. I think as we grow, the goal is to show all the connection points people have. Then we will have people saying, “Oh, you play in this band? Our bass player was in this other band that knows them.” And then the other person will say, “Oh yeah? My bass player was friends with their other friends.” And then you connect the dots and can suddenly have a show in Portland.”

Musician Coaching:

The world ends up being that small when you’ve been around long enough.

TH:

I think BTTV is innocently trying to make a way for people to connect in that way. And, as mentioned, it’s using hospitality and tour dates as the center totem around which everything else revolves.

Musician Coaching:

You’ve played in touring bands, and you’re now really at the nexus of watching these touring connections happen for people at various stages. What advice would you have for people just starting out with touring that want to go to that next town over or fill in dates in between two towns?

TH:

I think a lot of bands when they get going want to go play the bigger cities because they think it’s going to be awesome, and that they’ll get a big turnout. I would say, don’t do that first. Try to play the smaller towns or cities around that city to try to gain a following and pick up some steam. Go to a place where there aren’t a lot of things people can do other than go to your show that night, or where you can open for or play in the middle slot with another local band that has a following. Get into a position where people will actually notice you instead of getting that opening slot at a good club that has ten people there just waiting for you to be done so they can hear the next band play. The key is to really try to hone in on those bands that – even if they don’t necessarily stylistically match yours – are drawing people and like you and want to help you out. I’d rather play Champaign, IL or Rockford, IL than Chicago.

Musician Coaching:

I interviewed Martin Atkins not too long ago, and he was talking about how you go to New York or L.A., and not only are there 100 different bars between you and the destination for anybody just walking to any given club, but on any given night there’s a national headliner that’s offering free lobster rolls and fireworks and God knows what else. Having fewer options probably helps.

TH:

It does. Play the odds. The odds are that if you’re playing a show in Spokane, WA or in a smaller town or city at the only place they do shows, more than likely there’s just going to be people there that don’t know anything about you. But if you can fill that out with maybe ten people that you might know or have met online, they can vouch for you before you come. I don’t think that’s really changed. I just think it’s easier to get those shows now because people can connect a lot more easily that way.

Musician Coaching:

What business model fuels the site?

TH:

Right now we do site sponsorships, where a particular company or brand sponsors the site for a month or as long as they want to do it. Within that package is advertising. Eventually down the road, we have a few ways we feel we can monetize it, but therein lies an interesting issue, because our audience doesn’t necessarily want to spend money on stuff they’re used to getting for free, which is “connection.” It poses an interesting problem. We’ve tossed around a very light subscription model. We’ve tossed around an idea where people only pay for what they use, so we give them an a la carte menu of features we think are really handy that they’d want to pay a dollar per month for. We’re really approaching it not as, “For $15 a month you get this,” and then they only use 20% of what they’re paying for. I think there’s opportunity to make money and have it be a self-sufficient thing, but we have to scale much more. We just rolled out the new site and redeveloped the entire thing over the last few months, so we’re seeing what kind of traction we get out of that. Right now, it’s totally free.

Musician Coaching:

At a certain point you may have the uptown problem of getting the kind of traffic that Myspace gets, because any social networking site can become incessantly noisy and self promoting. How do you plan to grow without reaching that level of cacophony?

TH:

That’s totally the right word:  the cacophony of sound and noise. And, that’s a really good question. I think right now for us the people who use the site drive what we do. We really only have the time and bandwidth to give them the tools they need that they’ll really use, and then to prepare by looking at what doesn’t work. We try to find those functions or features that can easily be abused and try to limit them. At some point, people will always find a way to use your site to promote themselves if you give them a little window of light to do that. I think a lot of that can be honed in as we make more money and can hire more developers and good, smart people to figure out how to handle those noise problems. As far as scaling right now, it’s “come one, come all,” and “try to grow as much as we can.” When we start noticing excessive noise, that’s when we’ll get creative and decide if it’s good noise or if we need to tune it to the kind of noise people want to hear.

 

To learn more about Todd and his friendly social networking site that touts itself as “Music’s Home for Hospitality,” you can visit Better Than The Van directly.