Leah’s back! Where has she been? What’s she been doing? Where to from here for music marketing and the Savvy Musician Academy? In this episode, Leah joins C. J. for an in-depth discussion of her new business, Mythologie Candles, and what her plans are for the near future. But they also discuss this podcast because after a recent survey conducted by…

Are you trying to figure out how to get more streams on Spotify? Did you know we offer a course on this? This week C.J. welcomes Dave Powers, the co-founder of the course, and Kirk Smith, one of its top students and rising stars. Dave and Kirk tell how they started making hundreds of dollars and thousands of streams a day by focusing on getting on …

This week is a paragon case study of a band who has been at it for awhile, doing pretty well, but looking for what they can do to take it to the next level. Insert C.J. sitting down with Elliot and Dave from the band Welter, all the way from Australia, and we have almost two hours of real discussions and problem solving in the new music industry. F…

Whether it’s a top of the line music studio, just your phone and instrument, or somewhere in between, you should be using what you have to be making more music, reaching more people, and building the relationships between you and your fans. So how do you maximize your resources and abilities to increase the output and quality of your music from you…

Are you having writers block? You just can’t figure out what the song is supposed to be about or what goes with that great riff you’ve had forever? It’d be great if the answer just magically fell out of the sky, making it so easy everyone could do it, but we know that’s just not the way it is! Creativity comes from relentless hard work. You keep tr…

This week C.J. is joined by Jason Stallworth, one of our first Elite students. There is so much experience and advice shared that it’s hard to pinpoint any in particular. Really what you get this week is a look into the life of someone who is really doing it and their best advice for you. As Jason states, “That’s the biggest thing—you have to be in…

So you’ve got a social media post to make or an email to send out, but what exactly do you say? Are you seeing the results you want from your posts and emails? Whatever your situation is with your copywriting, it can always improve. This week, we’re sharing a live stream from the Savvy Musician Inner Circle in which C.J. teaches a packed lesson on …

When people think of you and your music, what do they think of? Well, whatever that is, that’s your brand! What we want, is to design and utilize this idea to build your music business. This idea should be personal, authentic, and we want to amplify it however we can. If you understand how important this is, then you already know the next step is t…

Would you keep betting on a horse that never won a race? Seems ridiculous, but people keep throwing money at advertising for posts that never did well in the first place. In this episode, C.J. sums it up perfectly when he says, “If it doesn't work organically without paid traffic, it’s not going to work with paid traffic.” It works or doesn’t work …

Imagine selling millions of records only to end up starting from scratch in an entirely new music industry. This is the story of J.R. Richards and our SMA student guest joining C.J. this week. J.R. was the vocalist for the 90s band Dishwalla, which had two Gold and Platinum albums, and also won Billboard Music and ASCAP Awards. Now as a solo artist…

If you are building a music business, should you focus on YouTube of Facebook? Well, both honestly! But as C.J. explains the pro’s and con’s of both, you’ll find that Facebook by far has the advantage. Would you rather have 1,000,000 video views on YouTube or 100 superfans that would buy anything in your store? If you’re serious about earning a liv…

Continuing our look behind the scenes here at SMA, this week C.J. is joined by our very own Steve Harnett, Leah’s wonderful husband, and our Chief Operating Officer. This is Steve’s first time on the Savvy Musician Show, but he has been with SMA since day one and his experience and insights shared today can not be overstated. Jumping form topic to …

If you haven’t already, you get to meet our very own Customer Service Director, Amy Roy. This is a treat not only personally but also professionally. You name it, she’s seen it and is now giving you priceless insight into a musicians journey through SMA and an online music business. From your first phone call to SMA to years down the road, Amy and …

C. J. has spent countless hours coaching musicians one-on-one on their marketing and out of it he shares seven reasons why musicians fail in building an online business. What might be surprising to discover is that the main reasons for failure or quitting don’t have to do with marketing knowledge or proficiency in technology. It’s more mindset and …

Leah’s been devoted to so many things it’s wonderful to have her back on this week’s podcast and to hear what she’s been up to and her plans for the Summer. As we all know, you can work yourself so hard you just burn out. Leah explains how to recognize signs of this happening and how to go about taking a break and staying healthy. Check in with Lea…

This week C.J. interviews another successful SMA student, Anna Brzozowska, an ethereal pop artist originally from Poland but is currently living in Spain. Anna shares her story of how she almost gave up on her music after the expenses of touring, but after finding SMA, she’s back to building a lifetime music career. If you’re wondering about your a…

If you were to ask someone for $20, who would be more likely to give it to you, a good friend or a complete stranger? Obviously a good friend. Have you ever met someone and had so much in common that you immediately became good friends? More than likely. If you can understand this, you know the foundation of building an online music business. That’…

If you were to ask someone for $20, who would be more likely to give it to you, a good friend or a complete stranger? Obviously a good friend. Have you ever met someone and had so much in common that you immediately became good friends? More than likely. If you can understand this, you know the foundation of building an online music business. That’…

Before we go any further, do you know what your micro-niche is? It cannot be overstated how important it is to be rock solid in defining, understanding, and utilizing your micro-niche, because it is the foundation of building your fanbase and music business. Whether you’re just learning this word for the first time, or well acquainted with it, Leah…

This may be the most concise, yet comprehensive, description of where we are in the music industry and what may be the greatest opportunity for artists in the last 25 years. At the end of the 90s, Napster changed the old music industry with illegal downloading of digitized music, and a few years later, iTunes capitalized on that by now selling down…

Part 2 of “Making Good Use of Your Isolation” gives you more pro tips on what you can be doing right now at home to expand your music business. With so many people at home and online, this is such a great opportunity for you to provide people with some normalcy while building relationships and increasing your sales. In this episode, Leah and C.J. d…

Whether your work has been affected by the pandemic or not, now is the time to seize this opportunity to improve your online music business! People are still online shopping and with Amazon limiting it’s service, there’s a greater opportunity for you and your business! In this episode Leah and C.J. discuss what you can be doing right now to expand …

Concluding the three part series on “The Top 10 Distinctions Between Millionaires and the Middle Class” by Keith Cameron Smith, Leah and C.J. discuss taking calculated risks. How long did you dream about being a musician before you decided to take the risk? What have you risked to get you where you are today? What are you willing to risk for the to…

Continuing last weeks case study of “The Top 10 Distinctions Between Millionaires and the Middle Class” by Keith Cameron Smith, Leah and C.J. focus on the distinction of how one handles change. Musicians of all people, with the recent digitalization of music sales and the rise of online culture, should understand how important it is to not only emb…

This episode begins a case study into the book, “Top 10 Distinctions Between Millionaires and the Middle Class” by Keith Cameron Smith, and you might be asking yourself, “What does this have to do with music?” SMA’s focus is to equip you as an entrepreneur to create and sustain an online music career, and that means you have to start thinking diffe…