It takes a lot of effort to succeed as a rapper in the music industry. This is why most people usually start their careers but never really see them through to success.
One of the reasons why rappers fail is because they fail to invest in themselves. Which is really sad because, self belief is what makes other people be interested in investing in you.
You may be wondering how rappers can actually invest in themselves to improve their odds of success. This post will give you some pointers on how to exactly go about this.
Investing in yourself is the biggest leap of faith and bet that you can ever place on yourself. With this said let’s look the various ways in which rappers can invest in themselves.
Pay for high quality beats
The first way that a rapper needs to invest in himself is by paying for high quality beats. When it comes to hip-hop, the beats are just as important as the vocals.
This is why it’s important to develop a good ear for beats over time and invest into high quality beats that will make a huge difference or will atleast put you at an advantage to make a hit record.
One of the more similar traits surrounding hiphop is that most rappers don’t want to pay for beats. They would rather use free beats that are most of the times pretty average. This is bad trade craft and wont really get you anywhere.
Investing in yourself means equipping yourself with the right tools that can help you elevate your career and set you up for success. Therefore invest in some good beats and you’ll be ahead pf most average rappers.
Pay for good recording sessions
To make great records you need to literally record music. If you’re signed to a label, it will probably handle all recording and production costs.
If you’re an independent artist you’ll need to invest your own funds into your recording sessions. This is part of investing in yourself and will require financial effort on your part.
You’ll have to identify good recording engineers that can help you curate your sound and ensure that you record good takes that can then be processed.
Good recording studios and engineers usually come at a cost. Good services will always require more financial power from you therefore invest in good sessions to get your music properly recorded.
Invest in good Audio engineering
After recording, your job as an artist is done but now the next step is getting a handle on the technical parts of production.
Music is highly dependent on good audio engineering, that’s what differentiates the good records from the average records.
Therefore you’ll need to invest in good quality audio engineering services. This is investing in yourself and in your craft.
Be sure to go for industry level audio engineering because that’s the only way you’ll get your records to compete with all the commercial stuff that’s out there.
The last thing you need is a poorly mixed and mastered song that will make it difficult for the listener to pay attention to.
Therefore invest in good mixing and mastering for your records.
Invest in high quality Artwork
One of the promotion materials that makes a huge difference with the way a record or records are recieved is the artwork.
The music artwork is the descriptive image or images that provide context for the music.
You need to invest into good Artwork from good graphic designers because it will say alot about your brand.
As a musician and rapper, investing in your art is crucial and also counts as investing in yourself.
Invest in record features
Features are a great way to reel in some new fans and get your music to reach new people.
In hip-hop and rap, features usually come at a cost and it will be up to you as the rapper to account for these costs.
If you’re signed to a label, they’ll usually financially handle this kind of stuff for you but if you’re independent, you’ll have to handle it on your own.
Therefore invest in some good features for your songs and albums because it can help your career and can help you deliver better music to your fans.
Don’t hold back on this and get trapped into thinking you can do it on your own. Sometimes industry features mean a co-sign that can propel you to even greater heights.
Therefore invest in features for your music from a variety of artists of different genres.
Invest in music videos
Music videos are part of the portfolio of a rapper or musician in general.
Good music videos can help you bring in new fans as well as bring some awareness to your brand.
Music videos don’t come cheap, but they are a very effective marketing tool. Therefore make them part of your plan and invest money into good videos that are unique.
Invest in promotion
Promotion in the music business is crucial to the success of an artist.
Most of the times pushing your records to recognition means investing in promotion.
Therefore, once you identify good ways to market and promote your music. Invest some money into these promotion strategies because this can help you make money at the end of the day.
Even music videos pretty much serve as promotional tools, but there are a variety of other ways to promote you and your music.
Invest in self education
To succeed in any field you need good education about the field. Good information will help you navigate better and essentially make you a better rapper.
Therefore, get you some education in the rap genre, look into what others are doing, study hip-hop, study music, know how music is made, know how music is created etc.
It’s not always that you’ll have to rely on other people to handle production for you. Learning the game sometimes means learning how to produce, learning how to rap better etc.
Therefore investing your time to basically learn more about the music industry will put you ahead because most people don’t do that.
I assume that you’re aiming to become a great rapper if you’re reading this post. Which means you’ll need all the knowledge you can get about music and all its counterparts.
Knowing the music industry in full depth will save you a lot of time and money. Therefore invest your time into learning the game of music.
Invest in good branding
Good branding works hand in hand with a successful music career. People will know you by your rap name.
Your rap name is your brand and it takes you as the rapper to cultivate a good brand image.
Good branding will make you money and may sometimes mean investing money first. This is okay because any business has a “cost of production”.
Therefore, leverage yourself, promote, nurture and build your brand by investing in good branding practices.
