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Branding and Marketing Part 1

We did d j names that begin in the day you picked somewhat arbitrary names and some in some respects maybe you know, I think like when you then really get down into it it's important that you really do the research in terms of a name uh, your name? It doesn't mean everything, but it means a lot in terms of like, you know you're being recognized as an artist like this is your brand, you're essentially building the brand the brand is what means more than technically just the name or a logo. So, um defcon mentioned this earlier in my intro that on the brand director for scratch dj academy so being a brand guy and having an understanding about like what your brand should be it's a brand isn't so simple as just a logo or a font or like that's not just what the brand is ah brand is the entire essence like the brand the brand is defined almost even as like why who like what's so different about this versus that? Like the values even that you stand for a part of your brand, the things you talk...

about the music you play obviously, like all of these things become a part of the brand and so it's important to kind of have a grasp on your brand to then no also like what isn't your brand like what doesn't fall in your realm and you have to understand the toughest part is that you as a brand and you as a artists are going to evolve over time so that's also going to have to change and that's going that's going to change as well and you might find that like maybe it makes sense to like keep this as this brand and then established this other brand for this other creative musical approach that you want to go down like, you know, there are a lot of, uh, let's see what would this be like? A good example would be I guess um and I don't know if this is done intentionally or not, but a, uh like a guy like jermaine dupri who's, a music producer um and had produced records and ah label exact and like that was his world I don't know if you know, but he's also a deejay um and djs under the name j warhol and so that's his brand that he's creating as a deejay, which is then independent of his like jermaine dupri brand so, you know, if if I were to think about it and I was thinking like, ok, we'll remain to praise d jane then like, I'm thinking he's deejay in all his own music and it's like going to be very like sort of hip hop and like sort of nineties infused music that like he was like made that he made famous that sound but jay warhol could do a completely different thing maybe, you know, so like really establishing and understanding what you want to pick as a brand in the name part definitely matters on dh then we talked about earlier even like the spelling this belly matters especially when it comes to like google searches and things like that. So you want to make sure that like, you know, if your name was d j lysol that probably that it's going to pull up different things when when you type that in into google or like lysol is not going to pop up to the front like d j lysol won't pop up to the front, you know? So you want to think about those sort of things um the same thing with the domain name um you know, there's a ton of sites out there and a ton of resources in terms of my going and buying a domain, you should definitely own your own sort of like real estate in terms of that you should like have that if you do most of your stuff off of like let's say a facebook artist page and and that's cool too but like god and grab that domain the dome is not going to be too too expensive I mean most remains are going to run you know less than twenty five bucks a domain mostar some are a little more expensive but no go on get a domain and grabbed the dot com like as opposed to trying to grab the some thing that doesn't make as much sense like dot net or something that may not make much sense for you especially if somebody else owns the dot com like then that should be a clear indicator that maybe that's not the right name for you is if if you own if you own ah d j d conn dot net but there's another d j d conn dot com I don't know if that's the way to go you know, maybe maybe even spelling it differently may add tio you know to a better result cool and then yeah, I mean obviously checked the search results has anybody google them themselves or go with their name? You guys have like, you know, look and see what's out there to surprise you how much stuff ends up like floating around on the internet and you're like how did this getting there? You know, so definitely check that out and then consistency is key, you know? So if, um for example so my website is hop a world h epa world dot com and that's my my website um and I also own deejay hop a dot com so if somebody retyping deejay hop dot com just because that's what they assumed my website was it would just redirected to hop a world dot com so the and the same thing could be true on the sites I don't want to get too deep into of websites, but you know, even if you wanted your facebook page or your soundcloud page or you're mixed cloud page or whatever paige you wanted and that was where you spend most your time and that's where that's the thing that was updated the most and that's where all the information was then have your domain redirect to that that's okay too but on that own that domain like that would be my biggest recommendation when it comes to like websites and then the other thing you could do is you can host um email off of your domain so instead of them having d j happe at gmail dot com on my business card, I can have hopper at half a world dot com, which is actually my email if anybody wants to email me feel free hop at half a world dot com on my card and you know and it makes it a lot easier, it makes it feel a little bit more professional in that way instead of just hosting everything off of like gmail um cool on we know in the next line any questions so far you guys in student you guys good way have one question I recently started a deejay group with two of my friends were sophomores in high school and are wondering how to start getting gigs like house parties so just start now in high school in high school two sounds like two deejays working together through a house party throw their own party, go their own house party like I mean invite your friends start small through a house party focus on the details like make that the best house party you've ever been to um and I think in that way you'll start to build something there um and then you know, the other thing is if you can control your own environment and do that yourself that would that would definitely be my recommendation if that's too much to chew on then like who is throwing those house parties you know, find out who is throwing those house parties go to those house parties the same advice I was giving about going to the club but go to those house parties like, you know, who's deejay in those house parties you know, is there a way of you teaming up with them to d j that maybe there's ways of like you being able to help support them like you have two extra speakers and you can help them set up the gear and whatnot. I mean, like everybody's got it. You got to start somewhere and I think, like, I mean, I was carrying crates for easily, like when I first started, I was in the early years of this, like, I was in college and we're doing all sorts of different parties were doing life, hotel ballroom parties, like thousands of college kids and, like, I mean, I remember schlepping like speakers on speakers and lighting and back then it was is was vinyl record crates and crates and crates of records. And I remember loading in, you know, with a u haul at, like, one in the afternoon and then getting home at seven a, m or something like that, you know, the whole time, not having touched the decks at all, sitting there learning so much, watching other djs that were more experienced than iraq, the crowd rocked the parties, like sitting there on, like, record creates watching this having, like, you know, set up all of these speakers and having, like, wrapping cable and and all of that, like that experience was like one of the most valuable experiences of my career was that pardon, so I think this is also very, very true of this I think this new generation of of d jane, is that there's been so much limelight put on the deejay in this day and age that, like that's, what everybody covets, you want to be that guy front and center? Oh, you want to be that guy who's like doing all of the creative stuff when you know, there are plenty of other pieces of that, and there are a ton of other things that, like, I feel like are equally is important in order to, like, really build who it is that you are like, um, and that we're going back to that house party thing, you know, if there's a deejay who's doing a great job with this house party and his d jane, they're like, learn from that, you know, like, you'd be surprised how many people are open to collaboration and, um, you know, uh, definitely put in that sweat equity like, that's, that's definitely worth a lot, you know, I've certainly feel like I've I can say with confidence that I've paid my dues, and yet, at the same time, like, I, I'm not too good for anything like I mean, if the situation were right and somebody that, like, I looked up to, um you know asked me for something or like I saw it, this person out is like, hey, I could learn a lot from this person like yeah, I mean totally for sure like I would take that on and there's a ton of stories like that of people who have had success doing just that quick sidebar have a friend who, um was a party promoter for twenty years and recently had, um wanted to get into hospitality a bit deeper and has a dream of opening his own hotel and, you know, sort of at the age of thirty decided to that one of the best ways to do that would be to intern at a hotel that he really admired, like the way that they did business. So he interned at the w hotel to, like, learn the business at thirty like intern there to, like, learn the ins and outs of just even like, how does housekeeping work? You know, how did how does just how does the business even flow? Because you would need to know that in order to run your own thing and obviously there's a tremendous parallel to obviously what we're talking about here with, like, as a deejay like find this deejay in your local market or somewhere that you like, really look up to and is doing some of the things that you have set as your goal no, you set up a goal of like you guys want a tour who do you know that has towards successfully you know how can you tap them for some resource can take that person out to dinner have drinks with this person and like, you know, like really find out some more info unlike how this has gone down and like, you know, some kind of do's and don'ts and like things that they've learned I mean, I think like that idea of, like seeking out that knowledge is super important for for, you know, having success cool does that hopefully that helps that the and I'd love it where they located you know? I don't know I'll ask him let's see if they let us know if they throw a house party will drop in there uh ok, so cool. So, um logo's obviously we talked a little bit about logos and a desire your logo may change over time you know, some of these logo's are literally just fonts some are a little bit more complex obviously a lot of these logo's you know, like this steve aoki logo is different and I I see I'm seeing other steve aoki logo's uh you know, the avici logo is pretty pretty prominent and see that but, you know, figure out work with somebody work with the designer, figure out what speaks to you the logo should also like um give you more than just words like it should should evoke something like it should have some play on like okay like skrillex is logo is interesting it's definitely like one of those things where you don't think that that would be a person than that plays all country music or something like that you know like that just the way that the font is nero's logo is kind of futuristic in that way um so you imagine like more of a futuristic type of sound um yeah I mean like work within that there's a really interesting website that I like going to and again because I'm a visual person and I kind of do dabble in a little bit of design um I don't consider myself a designer by any means but I kind of know what I like and I know what when I see something I like but there's ah interesting website the font df twenty dot com that just has a whole bunch of funds and you can start to kind of play around with that and I kind of like play around with a font for your name maybe that like looks good and maybe even if that's a starting point and that I will give you a better idea than when you go to like a designer ultimately a designer is going toe if you're gonna if you're gonna work with the designer on creating a logo a designer you should be giving as much information as you can to this designer about like what you envision in terms of the brand and what this is I think don't just go to a designer and be like, cool, I need a logo as a deejay like they're going to give you some sort of real stock like thing which were kind of joking about yesterday in terms of business cards was I actually think, well, we don't have a slide for but I do want to talk about business cards really quick business cards are tremendous like sort of tool that you can utilize um, you know, I often like um I've been fined more more these days that there are less and less people traveling around with business cards than even before, but I do think like business cards are still a really good tool toe have, um we're joking about this a couple of quick do's and don'ts about business cards first one would be to create a business card, take some time and like the design of it, work with somebody to help design it print you know you can print different quantities business cards, print them on actual like business card paper trying don't print them at home go and like have them printed somewhere it's fairly inexpensive to print business cards there's a ton of printers out there that will run off business cards for a pretty low cost I mean, you'd be surprised I think the last run that I did I think I paid like twenty bucks for, like, five hundred business cards I mean and you know, I mean, that type of pricing isn't any sort of special deal out there's a ton of like pricing out there for that but actually pay to have cards printed, have them be of, you know, good quality you can go as crazy as you want on a business card but ultimately like, make sure that it, you know is in line with what you've kind of set out as your brand um try and make the business card stand out if you can if that's sort of the goal um and then, um couple of other like quick little do's and don'ts there's, a company out there called vista print do a ton of like advertising online stuff like that for a while there they were running a deal where they would print your business cards for free but that you had to put a vista print logo on the back of the business card. You're shaking your your stay here and then you had to pay for shipping on top of it, so it was like it ended up sort of being a wash, but you ended up with this like they've got they've got a bunch of people though so I don't you know I ended up I'll go to like different conferences I'll go to different places with like a lot of people like and like I remember coming back from a conference like one year and like you know, just kind of looking through business cards and caught and like probably two or three business cards with the vista print logo on the back of it which is just kind of like man that's unfortunate because you know now you want to do business of some kind you want me to pay for your services yet you can't even pay for your own business cards not a good look not a good look at also like you know be conscious of that kind of stuff too um out there in terms of like how this is perceived like you know the perception is is ah is an important part of it to you need to be better able to back that up obviously you know but you what you put out there is important just the same you know? So if you treat yourself with respect and you trade treat you as a business this value than other people are likely to treat it at that same value if you treated at this value other people treated at that values well so be mindful of that as you're going through this sort of journey and then a couple of quick, low things on business cards. If you're number changes or there's an error on the card, reprint the car, do not just take a sharpie to your business cards and changed the number yourself on the car same sort of thing for the same reason, you know, um and, uh, I don't any other do's and don'ts that you guys have out there for you smartest things that I ever heard about business cards was make sure one sided has white on at least so like a lot of low goes up their solid black it's all black on both sides. You can't write on it. Good point, good point s o there are people that do, like toe, like right on the business card and say like, hey, I met this person here, whatever it might be that's a good that's a good point? Yeah, fine print. Like too much information on there's. Just not necessary, right? You don't put your entire bio on your business card. Probably not necessary to dio I think the permanent information is what's needed and less is more in a lot of ways. Yeah, for sure. Anything else with business cards, do's and don'ts? Yeah with that make them a standard size yeah I mean every now and then I'll get like business cards from people that are like these small little ones and things like that and it's kind of cool in some way because it's an odd size but yeah I mean the toughest part is that like I actually think I've lost quite a few of those over time just because they've like fallen through the cracks somewhere or something like that so a standard size might be good and there's ways of definitely customizing your card without changing the size or no honestly though whatever whatever suits you and your brand you know should make sense and you know, go with with that there's also ways of like making your cards a different shape like die cutting the card I've seen that from from different people to where it's like a circle like they've made like a circle business cards more expensive but you know you may find that that works for you and your brand um cool and it can get as as it's like as extravagant as you want to get like I know god like I knew a guy who this is not a d j but I know a guy who owns a leather shop and all his business cards are leather business cards makes total sense for I mean I still remember to this day I met this guy years ago and I couldn't remember his name though but so that might be a problem but the uh you know it's a leather business card it somewhere in my stack of business cards cool uh would've got on the next flight here photos ok, yeah well I mean images mean a lot images meat a lot these days I mean like you look a uh a social media platform like an instagram there's something that which is like all photo base and how like you know, I feel like the world for the most part is a very visual um place the photos are important you notice that the the photos if you've got these types of photos that be amazing um of your u d j and in front of like what is that probably like thirty, forty thousand people at least that they're um probably close that that would be a solid if you have those types of shots I think like one of the things that is important especially as a newer d j and the more up and coming is like make sure that you like again and this goes back to that cost of like what you then end up spending like no trying to hire a photographer did to do some proper head shots um and at least have some good shots that are kind of like this they could be used for a ton of different things you know hopefully, you'll have need for press and flyers and stuff like that, and those can all go in that type of material. They can go on your web site. All of that is like a great investment. Find a photographer that you like, find photos that you like on. Then find out who that photographer was. The greatest thing about what I think creative live here. Is that there's a huge photo like department section here. Like with classes on photographer and stuff like that? I would imagine that there's a ton of photographers in the local area here in seattle, then, obviously, in every local market that's out there, there's somebody who's, a photographer. Um, and try and team up with them, maybe there's something, you know? Hey, from one of the things that I'm a really big fan of his barter. And, you know, I think often times it's, it's under utilized the idea of, like, I have a service that I can help with, you have a service that you could help me with. How do we make that happen without us? Change, exchanging checks? You know, life my services worth x, your services worth x as well, cool, that works out, you know, and I think I'm a huge huge huge fan of that because I don't think that like people really lose that way like you find a way for both people toe win and it's it's not messy at all like it could be really easy to do so um you know, maybe same thing with designers you know it's like oh cool like your birthday is coming up you were looking to hire a deejay cool you're going to design my logo for me and I'm going to d j your party cool that works out you know, like and that's a great exchange of how we're going to do this s o definitely a part of that dull and this is I don't want to get too far off track but part of that is one of the hardest questions to answer and you're gonna have to answer it which is what are you worth? What is your value it's one of the hardest things to answer and it's going to be the thing that probably it should change over time like you know, hopefully the idea is that you be worth mohr over time that your time would be worth more overtime because the experience you've gained and like, you know, sort of like the skills that you've now obtained like that it would be worth more but like you know you need to determine the the answer to that question um and that's yes that's hard to do um and yet you'll have to do that because, you know, one of one of the, uh, one of the biggest issues I think in recent time in the d j world recent being the last sort of ten years or so is on and this has been a problem even before this, but more so now with technology is the undercutting of djs for gigs um that's a huge, huge issue, like most veteran djs will tell you that is a huge issue uh, and so you know how I think how you fix that is by posing that question to everybody, you know, what is your worth? What is your value and ok, so if you are valued here and this guy over here is valued here, is that is that right? Is that clear? Or do you need to up your value of what you feel like you're worth? Because everybody around you, you can do what everybody else around you does? Everybody else around you is making five hundred bucks a night, you're over here charging two hundred bucks a night doing the same thing as the guys that are doing five hundred bucks a night something's wrong here you have devalued yourself by putting yourself in that position and in theory, then have almost then devalued what they're doing because then you're saying, well, no they're asking for five hundred but all of us that can do this really should be here at two hundred you know so this is a really tough issue to address because it's not like you can change everybody who's out there doing that thing ultimately though you need to be able to like set a value and then they go out and like actually meet that value if exceed if not exceed that value by a little bit you know um cool so photos photos very very important and very important to kind of keep those photos updated have don't just have on ly like phone selfie photos like on your excite or what not like literally like find a photographer when you do a gig and if you do ah gig that like let's say there is a photographer there at the cia that you're doing in the photographer does grab a couple of shots of you exchange business cards with that photographer and see if there's a way to like grab those photos from him if that would be a possibility that he might have some good like action shots of you d jane and like being able to get like this cool shot of you in the crowd that's almost like that or something and like cool like and the worst you could say is now and then okay cool you didn't have those photos but you should ask you certainly ask um uh another possibility would be to bring a photographer with you. But your friend with you, that can take photos, even like, um, and at least even then, you'll have some. Some sort of, like, you know, photos that are out there that, like, this is me in action. Everything cool?