0:00

For our listeners who've been with us for a long time . For

0:02

those of you listening for the first time , we're going to try

0:04

introing our conversation that is coming

0:06

up within the next 10 minutes or so

0:09

on the episode . So we're really

0:11

excited today to bring you an episode

0:13

where we had a guest named Miriam Shulman

0:16

, who is absolutely incredible . I'm going

0:18

to let Stephanie talk about her because she

0:20

found her online and

0:22

was fangirling a little bit and

0:24

, to be honest , I didn't know Miriam's work

0:27

all that well until we started the conversation

0:29

, but once we got to the end I was fangirling

0:31

too . She was absolutely amazing . It was such a good

0:33

conversation and we're really excited for you to be able

0:35

to hear it in a little bit , yeah .

0:37

So Miriam , she is a visual artist

0:39

and she also has a podcast

0:41

called Inspiration Place . But today

0:44

we talked with her mostly about her book

0:46

, which is called Artpreneur , and it's all

0:48

about helping artists to

0:51

make what they do as

0:53

a creative endeavor into a

0:55

career . So how to sell yourself , how

0:57

to sell art , how to build relationships

1:00

that will profit down the line . And I

1:02

was reading about her and I read her book and I was just

1:04

thinking these are read her book and I was just thinking these are

1:06

skills that all of us artists

1:08

can use . Whether you're in visual art , whether

1:10

you're a performing artist , whether you're

1:12

a musician , you can use these skills and

1:14

we're not taught them . So I got so

1:17

much inspiration just from reading her book and

1:19

I highly recommend it . But we talk

1:21

about pricing , we talk about

1:24

knowing your worth as an artist and

1:26

how to sell yourself out there

1:28

on the marketplace . We talk about social

1:30

media , we talk about promotion

1:32

in this episode . So I think everybody's

1:34

gonna really find something that that speaks

1:36

to them , that they need in that moment .

1:38

Yeah , it was amazing how much crossover

1:40

was in that conversation

1:42

and it is so identifiable . You

1:44

know , no matter what discipline of a creative endeavor

1:46

you're coming from , there's just so much you can relate

1:49

in terms of taking that kind of path

1:51

in life . And , yeah , it was just so

1:53

. It was truly so inspiring and

1:56

you know , she got a little woo woo with us , which I

1:58

very much appreciate .

1:59

Yes , I felt like this was like the perfect

2:02

bridge from the Artist's Way . If you

2:04

read the Artist's Way and you did all that and

2:06

you know your morning pages and connecting

2:08

with your inner child , blah , blah , blah . But okay , now

2:10

come into the real world and this is what you need

2:13

to do , now that you know your worth as an artist how

2:15

to show your worth in the marketplace . Yeah

2:17

, absolutely Welcome

2:20

to the Musician Centric Podcast . We

2:22

are two freelance violists living and

2:24

laughing our way through conversations that

2:26

explore what it means to be a professional

2:29

musician in today's world . I'm Steph

2:31

.

2:31

And I'm Liz and we're so glad

2:33

you've joined us . Let's dive in . I

2:40

don't know if it's . Is that like a super sensitive

2:42

musician thing ? Like would the average person

2:44

notice Well , what did you hear ? Okay

2:47

, wait , let's do it again . All right , for even

2:49

more context . Everybody you know how well

2:51

you might not know this unless you have these kinds of headphones

2:54

but one says R and one says L , but

2:56

like they look exactly the same . So you're

2:58

like right Theoretically if you just

3:00

switch them , does it matter ? And then my microphone

3:03

cord wouldn't be across my body , it would just be

3:05

Okay . So I've been playing around with this

3:07

and Stephanie said , well , how is it different

3:09

? And I was like wait , I don't know . So okay , Now

3:11

I'm doing it the right way , which is the headphones

3:14

on the right , right on right , yeah L

3:16

on left . I'm following the directions .

3:26

I don't like even maybe Okay .

3:27

Yeah , even yeah , like across the my head , okay , okay .

3:28

Okay , so now I'm going to switch them . Okay , all right Now . Okay , so , just for continuity

3:30

miggity , mic check , miggity , miggity , mic check

3:33

, I mean truly it's different

3:35

.

3:35

Okay , do it again . I just took the right ear

3:37

off , guys , which is actually the left ear .

3:39

This is like the mirroring conversation we had

3:41

about the camera Yeahity mic check

3:43

, miggity , miggity mic check . Okay , so

3:45

I swear .

3:46

Now , this was my whole conjecture before

3:48

I hit the record button , which was would an

3:50

average person notice this difference

3:53

or is this like musician thing

3:55

? Audio engineers hit us up . Help

3:57

, I want to know . I'm dying to know

4:00

. I don't know why .

4:01

Is this a thing ?

4:06

I don't know why . We've had this set up for a long time , and this is the first time I'm

4:08

deciding to experiment with this . But what's the deal ? Everybody and I don't know , do other people

4:10

hear different frequencies ?

4:11

Yes , so , speaking of

4:14

crossovers , as we hinted

4:16

at the beginning , we're having this conversation

4:18

with Miriam Shulman and she's a visual

4:20

artist , but she has lots of tips for

4:22

us and everyone in the performing arts . So

4:24

if you enjoy this episode I think you're going

4:27

to get so much out of it Please share

4:29

it with somebody who you think would also

4:31

enjoy it Absolutely . Or , you know , yeah

4:33

, tag us on social media . Helping

4:36

to get the word out is huge for

4:38

us and we appreciate every single

4:40

message and every single share and every

4:42

single conversation you have with your friends that

4:44

puts them onto us .

4:45

Absolutely . It means the world to us

4:47

, those of you who have been supporting us

4:50

throughout our journey , and those of you

4:52

joining for the first time welcome

4:54

. And speaking of yet another crossover

4:57

, I'm going to steal Stephanie's line . Please

4:59

enjoy this conversation with Miriam

5:01

Shulman .

5:04

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5:06

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5:10

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.

6:07

Our guest today . Miriam Schulman

6:09

is an artist , author and art

6:11

business coach . From her own journey working

6:13

on Wall Street to building a thriving business

6:16

from the ground up , she truly believes

6:18

that anyone can make a living from their art

6:20

. Miriam learned so much in her path that

6:22

she started a podcast , the Inspiration

6:24

Place , in 2018 . She wrote a book

6:27

, artpreneur , and she coaches

6:29

artists to use what she's learned to create

6:31

freedom in their careers while doing what they

6:33

love creating art and we are so

6:35

excited to welcome you to the Musician

6:37

Centric Podcast , Miriam .

6:38

Thanks so much for having me . I'm excited

6:40

to be here and for our conversations . We were having

6:42

so much fun before you hit record , so

6:44

I know it's going to be yeah , yeah

6:47

, it's going to be great .

6:48

And I have to admit that I'm fangirling a bit

6:50

here , having just finished your book but

6:52

for anybody who doesn't know your story , I

6:54

think you need to give us a short version , because

6:56

it's so moving and I think that so

6:58

many people will find it familiar and

7:00

relatable , like especially if they've come to

7:02

their creative career after doing something

7:05

else .

7:05

Yeah , Well , like many people

7:07

maybe in your audience , I was told you can't

7:09

make a living that way , right ? So

7:11

I wanted to be an artist

7:13

and I was told no , and

7:16

, being from a single parent household

7:18

, my father passed away when I was very young

7:20

and I was on financial aid and I had

7:22

a going to graduate with a mountain of debt . So

7:25

I took what I thought was the practical route

7:27

and went to Wall Street . I mean , I did take

7:29

a lot of art and art history classes while I

7:31

was in college , but I took

7:34

enough of the other stuff that I was . I went

7:36

to Wall Street . You know it was . The money was

7:38

great . I can't lie about that . And

7:40

, being from somebody who did not grow

7:42

up that way , we really struggled

7:45

for a lot of times during my childhood

7:47

. My mother was on , we were living off of Social Security

7:49

. It was great . The

7:51

financial freedom is something . However

7:54

, when 9-11 happened

7:56

, I knew I couldn't go

7:59

working

8:02

in the trade center during that time

8:04

, but I had worked in the trade center and

8:06

I was on my own kind

8:08

of extended maternity leave . Like I

8:10

had just told my bosses , I want

8:13

to take a break from this and I didn't know

8:15

if I was going to go back after a year

8:17

either to that job , another job

8:19

. I didn't know what I was going to do , but when 9-11

8:22

happened , I took that as a sign from the universe

8:24

not to go back , and I know

8:26

that a lot of people look

8:29

at the pandemic through a

8:31

similar lens , that that was a turning

8:33

point for them , that you know , we had the great

8:35

resignation and people quiet

8:38

quitting , and this was something

8:40

that I was determined

8:42

to make a living out of my art

8:44

thing that

8:46

I was determined to make a living out of my art . At first

8:48

I still didn't believe that I could do it , so I took other jobs . One of them was

8:51

as a Pilates instructor and when I

8:53

was working for the health club

8:55

, their business model is to

8:57

sell personal training packages , so they had

8:59

a vested interest in training us in

9:01

sales techniques and I

9:04

was like , well , I really don't care

9:06

about selling personal training packages , but

9:08

I could use this to sell my

9:10

art and all this is transferable

9:12

. So everything we're talking about it's going

9:15

to be true for visual artists

9:17

like the ones I coach . It's going to be true for musicians

9:20

. It's going to be true for entrepreneurs

9:22

who maybe sell life coaching . It's true for

9:24

graphic artists who sell web design

9:26

. My husband read my book . He says oh , this is what we do

9:28

in the real estate world . So this is

9:30

really just time-tested

9:32

advice that works no matter

9:34

what your industry is . So if you're an artist

9:37

and you think you're a unicorn and things don't apply

9:39

to you , that's just not true . That's reassuring

9:41

.

9:41

It is , that's right . You don't have to

9:43

reinvent everything in order to make something happen

9:45

.

9:45

Yeah , and in terms of the parallels

9:48

and of course you have a personal tie

9:50

to this world that we live in , Miriam

9:53

that as musicians , especially

9:55

classically trained musicians

9:57

, we tend to not think of

9:59

that as applying to us as business

10:01

skills , applying as sales skills applying to

10:03

us . But I found early

10:06

in my own life that that is 100%

10:08

not true . The better you are at those

10:10

things , the easier it is to craft your

10:12

own career and the more rewarding , in

10:14

a way , because you're doing it for yourself

10:16

and that's a really big theme that we

10:18

have , of course . So just curious

10:21

to know if you have any direct

10:23

ties to share with our experience

10:25

as musicians . Well , I'm so glad you

10:28

asked that .

10:29

Okay , so , one of the things that I felt

10:31

I was at a big disadvantage when I did

10:33

decide to make a career as an artist is

10:35

I had not gone to art school

10:38

, and so both of my kids

10:40

actually are very musical , and

10:42

one of them is a career

10:44

musician she teaches right

10:46

now . She's teaching middle school orchestra . We'll

10:49

gossip more about her in a little bit

10:51

.

10:51

Oh , god bless her . Yes

10:53

, we will discuss ?

10:54

No , we will discuss . But you know , when she

10:57

was coming up and struggling with

10:59

traditional academics

11:01

, I was like well , you can just be a music teacher . And

11:03

so she went to Interlochen

11:06

, she went to Hart and

11:08

she has a master's in

11:10

music ed from Columbia , so she's

11:12

very much in this professional

11:15

world . When I tell people , oh , my daughter's a cellist

11:17

, who's professional like you , people are like yeah , yeah

11:19

, your daughter plays the cello , who cares ? You know , so does everybody

11:21

else's kid , but yeah , she is conservatory

11:23

trained .

11:24

We get that a lot , even as professionals like

11:26

oh , you play that instrument , that's so cool

11:28

.

11:34

It's such a great hobby . You know it's not a hobby , it's a career . Yeah , it is very interesting

11:36

. And you know what I get as a visual artist ? Oh , my kid is doing great stuff

11:38

. You want to look ? I'm like no , I really

11:41

don't .

11:41

Yeah , it's that challenge to

11:43

communicate to the greater

11:46

society in which we exist

11:48

that art of any form is

11:50

a viable career path . It's challenging

11:52

. That is a challenging thing it is .

11:54

And then , like people who will meet me , they'll say

11:56

, oh , but you don't really make money , right , it's your

11:58

husband . I'm like , oh , that's so cute , stephanie

12:01

is seething over there .

12:03

So when I was reading your book , there

12:06

are so many of the sections that absolutely

12:08

resonated with me , but one that I think

12:10

that musicians really overlook , and

12:13

that is selling yourself . We always

12:15

think , at least in the classical

12:17

music world , we're going to take an audition and

12:19

our playing will speak for itself , we're

12:21

going to get a job , or we're going to go to academia , or

12:24

we're going to go to academia , we're going to become

12:26

a teacher , and we don't think of

12:28

what happens if that doesn't happen for you . What

12:30

are you left with ? And a lot of musicians

12:33

just don't know how to sell themselves . So

12:35

what can you offer

12:37

our listeners , who are musicians

12:40

, and why should they be able to sell

12:42

themselves ? Why is that important ?

12:44

Okay , so let's do a reframe

12:46

, because what most people

12:48

think , and my artists especially

12:50

, is they have to sell themselves and

12:53

they make statements like I've always

12:55

wanted to be an artist and ever since

12:57

I was five I had a crayon in

12:59

my hand and I love to paint and

13:01

when I paint I feel so good

13:04

and whenever I make a painting it

13:06

connects me to God , and it doesn't matter

13:08

how pretty these words are and

13:10

I know my daughter being a musician

13:12

, when she goes in interviews it's the

13:14

same thing . I want to do that . Notice . Every

13:16

single sentence begins with the word I

13:19

, and the number one rule

13:21

I would say in business but this is really

13:23

just relationships and life in general

13:25

is nobody cares about you , nobody

13:28

cares about you , they only care

13:30

about , especially in business , what you can

13:32

do for them . So every sentence should

13:35

start off with either the word

13:37

you or who the consumer

13:40

is going to be . So , for example , can

13:42

we just like circle back to the dreadful middle

13:44

school music teacher job .

13:45

Okay .

13:46

Yes , please . So my daughter she's had a few

13:49

leave replacement jobs , which have all been lovely

13:51

and nice . She loves teaching orchestra

13:53

and this year she accepted a tenure

13:55

track position , which she was so excited

13:57

about where she gets to teach a few

13:59

orchestra classes to middle schoolers

14:02

and she also teaches general music . Now , for

14:04

those who don't know what that is , the

14:06

kids who don't want to sign up for orchestra

14:08

and don't want to sign up for band and

14:10

don't want to sign up for chorus have

14:12

to take something . Yes

14:14

, in New York I don't know if it's true everywhere

14:17

, but in New York , at least in her county

14:19

, they do and those kids are in

14:21

middle school general music , and

14:23

so basically she's like a corrections officer

14:25

. And she has never had to experience

14:27

this before , where she's with kids who just really

14:30

don't want to do it . I mean , she's had the occasional

14:32

kid who , whose parents were making them do

14:34

it , but not like the whole class was

14:37

like out to get her . You know his life

14:39

and their mean girls , their mean girls

14:41

. You know it's like . You know , middle school

14:43

is Mrs Shulman , what are you wearing

14:46

?

14:46

It's really bad , and

14:49

they have this language that you can't even understand . That's

14:51

right , and my daughter was , like as many musicians

14:54

like she was not a cool kid , so it's like

14:59

it's like PTSD in there , like what am I doing in here with these

15:01

bullies ?

15:02

Okay . So she was prepping for

15:04

an interview and she's saying well , you

15:06

know , I'm going to tell them how much I like this and how much

15:08

I like that , and blah , blah , blah and why I love

15:10

music . And I said , oh , that's very lovely

15:12

. I gave her advice . I doubt she took my advice

15:14

because I'm the mom , but I hope your listeners

15:17

will listen to me . So I said to her

15:19

think about , even in this job

15:21

or in your last job , tell me about that little girl who

15:23

wrote you the letter at the end of the year , who

15:25

the eighth grader , who said she made friends

15:27

and she loved it and she

15:29

was so happy she stuck with it . She

15:31

said Sophie . All right , tell them about Sophie

15:34

on the interview . So why do you want to teach

15:36

middle school orchestra ? Then you can say something

15:38

. Well , last year I had this child

15:40

, Sophie , and I made such a difference

15:42

in her life . Or talk about the letter

15:44

you got from the kid Rio who moved to Japan

15:47

and how much that music helped him when he was struggling

15:50

with the language . Or tell

15:52

them about a fifth grader who you had a breakthrough

15:54

with . So this is business skills

15:56

. They don't realize . It is telling

15:58

case studies of your clients

16:00

, and if you're a teacher , your clients are your students

16:03

, and that is what somebody interviewing

16:05

you as a teacher would want to learn about

16:08

it . They don't care how much you like doing it , they

16:10

really don't .

16:11

Yeah yeah , yeah , that's . It's such an important

16:13

skill is to be able to tell stories right

16:15

. That's what people relate , yeah .

16:16

And this is great , because I know for a fact that we

16:19

do have other musicians

16:21

in exactly the same career field who listen

16:23

loyally to the podcast , and so they're

16:25

going to be laughing right along with that story . So

16:27

let's take this from an interview

16:29

, setting into a musician

16:32

who has something they're

16:34

trying to put out there that's their own . It could

16:36

be marketing for a private studio , something like that

16:39

, where they're teaching , but it could also be their

16:41

own music . Well , it's the same thing

16:43

.

16:43

Let's say you're gigging . Let's say you want

16:45

to play your harp at weddings , but you

16:47

know , nobody

16:51

cares how much you love it . Oh , I love to play at weddings . That's not what's going to get you hired

16:53

. It's like I played this piece at the wedding and everybody

16:55

was crying , you know when

16:57

I do weddings . This is

16:59

like their big memory , and

17:01

it's so . You're , you're painting a picture

17:04

with what you do , but you're thinking

17:06

not about yourself and how you like to do

17:08

it , but the audience , and that's

17:10

what you're selling to people is the

17:12

result .

17:13

What is the result of what you do so ?

17:15

there's something I like to talk about and

17:17

this is not in the book , but we'll maybe the

17:19

next book . So , as a musicians , you

17:22

should you probably relate to this . We have

17:24

two aspects of our soul , and the creative

17:26

aspect of our soul is the what and the

17:28

how , and as artists and musicians , we're

17:30

very concerned with the what and the how . But

17:32

what people buy is why

17:35

and who , and that's what you need to talk

17:37

about .

17:38

Okay , so the two sides of our soul

17:40

are the creative side is the

17:42

what and the how , the why and the who

17:44

is the sacred side .

17:46

Yeah that's giving me artist's way vibes big

17:48

time . It's

17:50

a .

17:50

Kabbalist concept of having .

17:52

I love it . I love it so much and it

17:54

makes so much sense because and I was

17:56

just thinking this before you said that , Miriam

17:59

, that the artist , often when

18:01

we have some sort of creative endeavor , we are

18:03

concerned with this expression coming from ourselves

18:06

. That's where it comes from right , it comes from

18:08

me and I'm doing this thing

18:10

right , and so the shift

18:12

is in once you release

18:14

that , like the answering those questions

18:17

means everything and , yeah

18:19

, it's just so good .

18:20

Love it , I mean it should make it easier for

18:22

you and more aligned when

18:24

you are air quotes , selling yourself

18:26

like not to think of it that way . But think about is

18:29

that you're sharing the sacred side who and

18:31

why , what and how is what you

18:33

do ? And we're human beings

18:35

, not human doings .

18:36

Yes , it's one of my favorite

18:39

things I love to talk about

18:41

pricing your art . There's

18:43

a really great section all

18:45

about this about how to determine

18:47

how much to charge for , you know , appearances

18:50

in your world , pieces in our world

18:52

maybe it's private lessons , maybe it's

18:54

classes , these kind of things and

18:56

there's one thing that I think that all of us are really

18:58

guilty of , and that is crowdsourcing

19:01

our prices . So could you talk

19:03

a little bit about what that means

19:05

to crowdsource and what we

19:07

should be doing instead ?

19:09

Yes , so crowdsourcing

19:11

is ? You're making earrings , so you go to

19:13

a flea market and you say everyone at

19:15

this flea market is selling earrings for $15

19:18

. So I can't possibly sell my earrings for

19:20

more than $15 . But since I'm just starting

19:22

out , I should probably charge 12 , which

19:24

is like pulling in another starving artist

19:26

thought . As opposed to

19:28

I'm making these earrings . And

19:30

then , instead of going to the flea market , you go to Bergdorf

19:32

Goodman and you say , okay , let me

19:34

look around and see what these bespoke earrings

19:37

are Now . Oh whoa , those are $240

19:39

. And so that's not crowdsourcing

19:42

, that's like going high end . But to get

19:44

rid of that thought that you're just starting out

19:46

, I can't charge those prices

19:49

. These are all thoughts , so this

19:51

gets into a lot of what I talk

19:53

about , and I laced this throughout the book

19:55

, because mindset is so

19:57

important for life

19:59

and for business , and we all

20:02

have these thought clouds that pass through , and we think that our thoughts are facts and

20:04

they're not just because you think something doesn't make it true , and but we observe our through

20:06

. And we think that our thoughts are facts and they're not just

20:08

because you think something doesn't make it true

20:10

, and but we observe our thoughts and we're like

20:12

, well , I could never do that . So whenever

20:15

you have fear . So this is a evolutionary

20:17

mechanism , people who feel this way it's

20:20

not because there's something wrong with you

20:22

, it's not because you're stupid , it's not because you're broken . Humans

20:24

have evolved for survival . We're supposed

20:26

to be afraid of tigers . We cannot tell

20:28

the difference , though , between a tiger and

20:30

charging a high price . But if something

20:33

makes us feel uncomfortable , our brain

20:35

is going to sense that discomfort or fear

20:37

and it will come up with all kinds of reasons

20:39

why it's a terrible idea . So I

20:42

don't call it excuses , I call it doubts

20:44

. But when we feel something's a terrible

20:46

idea and the more and the smarter

20:48

you are and the more creative you are which is everyone

20:50

we're talking to today the better you'll be

20:53

at coming up with those kinds of stories about

20:55

why it's a terrible idea . So you have fear

20:57

that leads to doubt , doubt that leads

20:59

to these stories . So what do people

21:02

do ? They're either going to crowdsource , as you

21:04

said , which means they're going to research

21:06

, all this research , procrastinate , learning , what do

21:08

I charge ? Or they just get confused . I

21:10

don't know , I don't know , I don't know . And either way

21:12

, they end up pretty much either procrastinating

21:14

or doing nothing , because if you do lots of research

21:16

, you'll get conflicting advice . Maybe

21:18

something else will come up . Oh , that's a bad

21:20

idea , I can't never do that

21:22

. And this ? So , like I said , it

21:25

leads to procrastination . The confusion

21:27

, overwhelm , leads to procrastination , which ends up

21:29

making you just feel bad because you're not taking

21:31

action to move your dreams

21:33

forward . And it's not your fault . You're not

21:36

alone . This is the way humans were

21:38

built to keep us alive

21:40

and safe learning

21:49

.

21:49

That's so good . I just listened to one of your podcasts in this month that came

21:51

out right when you got back from Israel , it seems , and you were talking about emotional discipline

21:53

and in that you referenced this , but related

21:55

to even just the motivation

21:57

to get started with something , that you feel that

22:00

you can't create this and you can procrastinate

22:02

out of fear . Oh yeah .

22:04

And the thing about procrastinating

22:06

is it feels like you're doing

22:08

something . It feels like very necessary

22:11

research . I'm doing this , I don't , can't make a mistake

22:13

. Like it feels like you're doing something

22:15

, but you're really not taking action . And

22:17

it's much better to just try

22:20

something . Scientific method . Let's try

22:22

it and see if it works , and

22:24

then , if it doesn't , try something else or try

22:26

it in a different way , you'll learn much faster

22:28

, taking action and being willing to fail

22:31

at it .

22:31

Yeah , it's in those failures , though , that

22:33

we learn things . You have to have those

22:36

failures in order to learn . If you did everything perfect

22:38

all the time you wouldn't learn anything . Yeah , I love

22:40

that . I love that just getting out there , because

22:42

I'm personally totally

22:44

guilty of the procrastinating

22:47

. I want to learn everything there is so

22:49

that I do things right the first time and

22:51

it leads to a lot of unfinished projects

22:53

.

22:54

And then the expectation that you should do something right

22:56

the first time . So if it doesn't go right

22:59

, well then I must be stupid , I must

23:01

be this , I must be that , rather

23:03

than be like well , I'm just going to try it a different

23:05

way , see I appreciate this

23:07

about you , Stephanie , because I don't

23:09

have any of that in me whatsoever

23:12

.

23:12

I'm more of the person who's like I

23:14

just have failure to launch , like it's . It's

23:17

like I know I want to do a thing but

23:19

unless I feel that , unless I push

23:21

myself past the , I

23:23

could just jump in and try a thing . But it's like

23:26

it's just starting . It is the problem

23:28

. The research part . I'm too ADHD

23:30

for that .

23:30

Liz , what's the project ?

23:32

You already know what the project is . I

23:34

know I want you to share it . I'm trying to cross

23:36

over into a market

23:39

that is more related to the rock and roll world as

23:42

opposed to the tradition I come from

23:44

, and in order to do that

23:46

, it requires me to build up a set of

23:48

skills . But in order for me to get that set of skills

23:50

, I just have to jump in and start trying

23:52

it , and that's where I've been

23:54

stuck for a little while , because I

23:56

keep thinking I'm going to do it , but I don't know how to

23:58

do it and I don't know where to start , and I wish I was

24:00

doing research .

24:12

But I'm not doing anything . So it's you know . Yeah , that's where .

24:13

I'm at .

24:13

Miriam , I think , especially somebody coming from a conservatory world where there's such a linear

24:15

path to where you need to go and there is a lot of training and education involved

24:18

, so to do something where it's more

24:20

of a wild , wild west . But I

24:22

see you guys both started a podcast . Did you

24:24

take like years of podcast ? Did you get an

24:26

MBA in podcasting ? No , right

24:28

. Okay , no , you told

24:30

me , you bought the cheapest thing you could find on Amazon

24:33

. And there we go .

24:35

Okay , let me actually I'm gonna . I'm gonna

24:37

share this too , because this is something I've been thinking

24:39

about a lot , particularly in the last several

24:41

months , when I when I sort of decided this is

24:43

something I want to do . I'm also

24:45

a very collaborative person

24:48

, and so starting this podcast

24:50

didn't actually feel the least bit

24:52

scary because I had my partner

24:55

with me . But doing something

24:57

that's just an expression of myself , it's

24:59

something I desire for myself . Being externally

25:01

motivated is a big thing for me . Having

25:03

that internal motivation is much more

25:06

challenging .

25:07

Well , why don't you create some external accountability

25:09

by telling your podcast people

25:11

what you're doing and give yourself a deadline

25:14

. It's finally very specific

25:16

. I mean , this is what I do . I like nouns

25:18

on the podcast . Guess what ? I'm writing ? A book

25:20

you know , like okay , where is it

25:23

?

25:23

I love that . Yes , that's

25:30

so important .

25:30

It's so important for many people people to be like I said I was

25:32

going to do this thing and now , okay , I guess I have to do this thing now

25:35

, like there's very few people . If you're

25:37

the only one who knows you're going to supposed to do

25:39

it , we'll do it . Maybe hermione granger , I don't

25:41

know who else you know ?

25:42

yeah , I keep telling my friends , but

25:44

then ? But now it's out and now it's on the internet

25:46

. So it . Stephanie's

25:49

going to make a social

25:51

media reel about it .

25:53

That's a great point , Miriam . When

25:55

is this going to ?

25:56

happen , and how will we ?

25:56

know that it's actually a thing .

26:00

Well , the goal is to actually put them online . So

26:02

my experiment is going to go online . So

26:04

why don't we just say that I'll have

26:07

something within the next six

26:09

weeks . I'll have something online ? I've

26:12

been stewing about it for a very long time

26:14

, so six weeks seems reasonable .

26:16

Six weeks from today or six weeks from when

26:18

this airs .

26:19

How about six weeks from today , just to be super

26:22

? So it's the end of March , it's March 28th

26:24

, so by the end of six weeks from now .

26:26

By Mother's Day , you'll give birth to some

26:28

rock and roll by mother manifesting

26:31

, yes , okay .

26:32

So , miriam , what's your spiritual

26:34

take on making things happen in your

26:36

life ? Is it something that you put out into

26:38

the universe , like we just did , or how do

26:40

you get yourself to ?

26:42

the next . I'm very spiritual and I pretend not

26:44

to be , but I tell , I tell some people

26:46

I manifested my husband , my

26:53

daughter manifested our cat . Yeah , so you know there's some

26:56

things like if you look for things in your life , you'll see that there's more about that

26:58

than you know . I like to pretend I'm very

27:00

, you know , miss scientific method

27:02

and everything , but it's

27:05

not that I pretend . It's like sometimes I really think that way and

27:07

then other times I'm like no wait , there's a lot more

27:09

going on here . And if you

27:11

are open to finding

27:13

and being very clear about

27:15

what you're looking for and believing

27:18

that it's there and that's

27:20

really what manifestation is about

27:22

. It's about being willing to

27:24

believe about what is possible

27:27

for you .

27:28

Yes .

27:28

Yeah , we get in our own way a lot of the

27:30

time , and you're familiar with this , with

27:33

the starving artist mentality . And

27:35

where do you find the belief

27:37

in yourself , in your art

27:39

, in order to put yourself ?

27:42

out there . Great question . So what I

27:44

talk about is the belief triad

27:46

. So I do hear a lot of self-development

27:49

gurus . They talk about what you said , Steph

27:51

, the belief in yourself , belief in

27:53

your art . But the third part of that triad

27:56

is belief in the buyer

27:58

, the customer , the audience , whatever

28:00

you want to put in for that third part of the triad

28:03

, and the best way I can illustrate this

28:05

is in the movie Pretty Woman , when

28:07

Julia Roberts . she's still dressed like a hooker

28:10

, but she's got Richard Gere's gold card

28:12

and she's going down to Rodeo Drive and

28:14

the mean salespeople won't wait

28:17

on her because they don't believe

28:19

in her and we all

28:21

think that we're not the mean salespeople

28:23

. But we are , because how many times are we

28:25

thinking , oh , she won't pay that

28:28

for my music class , and

28:30

we think we're not being mean . But you're not believing

28:33

in the other person , you're not believing

28:35

in the audience . Oh , they won't like it if I do

28:37

rock and roll . I'm classically trained

28:39

, yeah , so you're not believing in the audience

28:42

. So it's that third part , that

28:44

that's what really sabotages most people

28:46

.

28:46

Immediately . Think of multiple

28:48

examples where that's true . For me

28:50

and , I think , for people in our discipline

28:53

in general , I think that's very true . So

28:55

that's really interesting . And

28:57

also , if you want something really

28:59

nice and woo-woo , to tie together your scientific

29:02

method and your manifestation . One of my

29:04

favorite pieces of information that I've learned

29:06

and of course this is not this , is not new information

29:08

, but that in science , what we've

29:10

discovered is that every piece of matter

29:13

is all made up of the same particles , right

29:15

, which means that everything is connected

29:17

. No matter which approach you

29:19

take , whether it's scientific or it's spiritual

29:21

, everything's connected . And

29:23

so if you're trying things out through

29:25

the scientific method , you are

29:28

manifesting right . You're putting

29:30

things out there and seeing what comes

29:32

back , and so I love that so much because

29:34

there's room for both , and I

29:37

think a good balance of the two is

29:39

really that's the way forward

29:41

more than anything else .

29:42

That's so good , yeah , so let's

29:44

say , you have a belief in yourself

29:46

, a belief in your product , a belief in your audience , and

29:49

you need to market yourself

29:51

. Now , right , you need to get yourself out there

29:53

into the world . There's an incredible

29:56

section on your book about prospecting

29:58

, about how to get

30:00

in front of the right people , and one

30:03

thing that we all have in common now is social

30:05

media , right , so there's some advantages

30:07

to that way of getting yourself out there

30:09

, but there's other ways to do it as well . So

30:12

could you talk about how

30:14

you coach your clients to get

30:16

their art in front of people and what

30:18

are some of the benefits , the pros and cons of social

30:20

media , the pros and cons of the other ways that you

30:23

talk about ?

30:23

So many things we can unpack

30:25

right now .

30:26

I know , I know .

30:28

So there's that myth that

30:30

is put out there that you just have to post on social

30:32

media and it makes it really easy

30:34

and introverts love that idea

30:37

that they can just post things on social media

30:39

and people will find you and you know the art

30:41

sells itself and you know it's really

30:44

, that's what people are thinking . And

30:46

then the gurus who charge oodles

30:48

of money to teach you how to build

30:51

these followings on the social media they're the ones

30:53

who's pushing this myth . So I did research

30:56

for the book because my

30:58

my first draft of the book the publishers were

31:00

. The editor who was assigned to my book was really

31:03

upset with me . They're like well , you really

31:05

didn't talk about social media . I think that's because

31:07

you're in your 50s and you're old fashioned

31:09

. I was like crying , by the way , with this editor .

31:11

I was like oh my God .

31:13

But then Once I dried my eyes

31:15

, I was like the problem with my book was not

31:18

that I didn't talk enough about it , but I didn't make

31:20

a strong enough case about why

31:23

it's not effective , because it

31:25

isn't because I'm old fashioned . The

31:27

old fashioned way is to think that

31:29

you can just rely on this . So let

31:31

me share the numbers . The

31:33

numbers . The numbers don't

31:35

lie even if you're woke , Because

31:37

the numbers don't lie even if you're woke . Yes , yes , the

31:39

average engagement rate on

31:42

Instagram and I did update

31:44

this . It's

31:47

still pretty much the same for 2023

31:50

, 2024 . The average rate for a person an engagement

31:52

rate is 0.6%

31:55

. Not 6% , not

31:57

60% 0.6

32:00

. What does that mean ? If you have a thousand

32:02

people following you , six

32:04

people will engage with what you're

32:06

doing on average . So you

32:09

can think well , maybe I need to learn better techniques

32:11

for engaging so I'm not average anymore . The average

32:14

engagement rate for an

32:16

influencer . An influencer

32:20

is a pro .

32:21

Someone who does it full time A pro 1.2%

32:25

, 1.2 .

32:27

So out of their thousand followers

32:29

, 12 people . So what

32:31

about email Email ? So the

32:33

average open rate on email

32:35

is 24% . So if

32:37

you have a hundred people

32:39

I don't even talk about 1000s anymore you

32:42

have 100 people on your email list

32:44

, you would have 24 people engaging with

32:46

you . To get the same exact result

32:48

on Instagram , you would need 4000 followers

32:50

, which is why it's much easier

32:53

to build an audience and

32:55

make money from that audience

32:57

when you build an email list rather

33:00

than a social media following

33:02

. I'm not saying don't do social media , but

33:04

it's a lot harder .

33:05

Yeah , Can we go further down this rabbit

33:08

hole ? So emails 24%

33:11

engagement .

33:12

Open rate Open rate . So that means they will

33:14

see what it is you're talking about .

33:16

Yeah , that's right . That's right . And I

33:18

mean , I know from another business I run

33:21

that once we started consistently

33:23

writing and sending emails advertising

33:25

our performances , we sold more tickets

33:27

. We sell more tickets . We just do . It's

33:30

actually you know , I have firsthand

33:32

experience with this which is great . In

33:34

the world of sales . There's this whole

33:37

other universe of networking

33:39

and I'm curious to know how that

33:41

ties in , because if you have

33:43

this much you can expect from your emails

33:46

, then when it comes to in-person

33:48

engagement or showing up , how

33:50

do you increase that exposure

33:53

in that way ? Or do you have suggestions

33:55

for that ? Because I know it's

33:57

difficult for us to envision , probably

33:59

as musicians like what that might look like . I always

34:01

think on a gig we're networking , no matter what , with

34:03

everybody we work with , but I don't know . Are

34:06

there other avenues to take that

34:08

offer you even more ?

34:09

Right here what we're doing today

34:11

. So , there's three

34:13

ways that you can build your audience

34:16

. So the first is your universe

34:18

. Your universe is your social

34:21

media , your , if you do

34:23

blogs , if you go in person , any

34:25

, any place that you interact with

34:27

people in your world . That's what we talked about those

34:29

warm people that you're already in front

34:31

of . The second way , which I think

34:33

has the most opportunity

34:36

, because people do not take advantage of

34:38

this , is free

34:40

publicity . So the first part

34:42

is your universe . These are other

34:44

people's universes . This is earned

34:46

press and the artists

34:49

who do it , and artists , visual artists

34:51

as well as musicians . When

34:53

you take advantage of this , this is

34:55

a huge opportunity to introduce yourself

34:57

to a new audience while

34:59

building credibility for yourself

35:02

. So it's not just who gets who sees

35:04

it in your local paper , but now that

35:06

is part of your portfolio of

35:08

as seen on . and then the third

35:10

way is paid press

35:13

, so in other words advertising . So

35:15

those are the three ways to build

35:17

your audience .

35:18

Yeah , those are great ways like for us as a podcast

35:21

, even , you know to go out and find

35:23

publications , find someone who's going

35:25

to do a story on your next

35:27

concert or you know , like press

35:29

contacts , things like this . Yeah

35:31

, I love that , and I don't think enough people I don't

35:33

think enough people think that what they're offering

35:35

is good enough to go out and do that . I think that's

35:38

where the big handicap is

35:40

for many people .

35:40

Totally that and also circle

35:43

back to what we were talking about before . When

35:45

they do go out to pitch themselves

35:47

their aye-aye instead of thinking

35:49

about how is this interesting

35:52

, so it's not the what

35:54

and the how , because they'll write all about the what and

35:57

the how .

35:57

It's who and ?

35:58

why and that's what makes

36:00

the most interesting stories for

36:02

the press is who are you doing

36:05

this for and why does it matter

36:07

? Your art matters art

36:09

, music , theater . It matters

36:11

more than any other time when you have these existential

36:14

crises . This is when people need

36:17

art , they need music . This

36:19

is , this is the who and the why . This is the sacred

36:21

part that's going to help them make sense of things

36:23

, and they need it . And right now

36:26

with AI looking like it's going

36:28

to take over the world and

36:30

you can stream any music you want

36:32

for $9.99 a month . Who's making

36:35

the most money ? Taylor Swift has

36:37

like billions of dollars , and why

36:39

is that , when you can stream it all for free

36:41

? Because people want the real thing

36:43

.

36:43

Yes , Yep , they want to

36:45

go to the concert . Yep , yeah

36:48

, they , they want it . That's so

36:50

powerful . That's so powerful and

36:52

you deserve to be paid for it too . Yeah

36:54

, there's this wonderful quote that is in your book

36:56

that this just reminded me of that when you were talking

36:58

with Denise Duffield Thomas , and

37:00

she says why should art and beauty be

37:03

so cheap that we burn ourselves out

37:05

creating it for people ? You know that

37:07

at the root of this is the belief

37:09

in yourself that you are providing something

37:12

that is valuable to other people and

37:14

that without that , you can't go

37:16

out and sell yourself to anyone .

37:17

Yeah , it's really true and I

37:19

think it happens in so many

37:22

little micro ways along the course

37:24

of a career because you're so dedicated

37:26

to the art that you're willing to take

37:28

whatever you can get without recognizing

37:31

maybe early on that you you can

37:33

assign that value for yourself and you can

37:36

decide . You know this is worth a

37:38

lot . Actually I've been , I've been toying

37:40

recently with . I still get emails

37:42

sometimes from people that I used to work

37:44

for for far less per service we

37:46

call it per service in our world than I do now

37:48

. I would never say yes again and

37:50

I'm really graceful . I just kind of write

37:52

great , you know , I write back with gratitude

37:55

and I say thank you so much , but I'm not available

37:57

and part of me recently . I

37:59

got one recently and I thought I feel like

38:02

there's a respectful way for me to just say

38:04

thank you so much . But like my expectation

38:06

is that you know I get paid X

38:08

amount per service now and nothing less

38:11

.

38:11

Well , yeah , I mean like for some reason , this

38:13

is what you were saying earlier about the education for

38:15

other people is like they think we'll do

38:17

it for exposure and us artists

38:19

, we can dive over exposure . And

38:21

this doesn't happen in any other industry

38:24

, like you would never say to your plumber

38:26

you know what ? You should give me a deal on this because

38:29

, well , we'll just hang a sign over my toilet

38:31

that says you did the work because because

38:33

there's a lot of people who use my

38:35

toilet . You would never

38:38

do that . So it's like why should

38:40

we do things for free for exposure

38:42

? We don't need exposure .

38:43

Right To create it for ourselves .

38:45

Well , it's hard to like us

38:47

in the in the music industry . There's all

38:49

these singer songwriters on tick tock that are

38:51

doing this for free .

38:52

Let them it's gonna be banned soon anyway , yeah , well

38:55

, yeah .

38:55

So change that to whatever you want Instagram

38:58

, Facebook , whatever that's on social media

39:00

these days but I think it kind of

39:02

perpetuates the idea that we'll do

39:04

it for free . You can get this art for free .

39:06

Well , you can , but that doesn't stop people

39:08

from buying spending a lot of

39:10

money on it . My husband has a tremendously

39:13

large and expensive

39:15

vinyl collection . People

39:19

like investing in things like that

39:21

. We already talked about the Taylor Swift

39:23

concert . People want

39:25

the real thing , so it doesn't matter

39:28

if they can get it for free on TikTok Sitting

39:30

at your phone . That's not the experience

39:33

. That's not sacred . There's nothing sacred

39:35

about looking at my phone .

39:37

It's the community and it's being with

39:39

other people . That's what makes concert experiences

39:41

so moving .

39:43

Yes , and in our world as freelancers

39:45

, whatever that might look like let's say it's a

39:47

singer , songwriter trying to make this work it's

39:50

finding those other doors . It's finding

39:52

, like , okay , you know , if I just try

39:54

to do this on social media , I'm just going

39:56

to be like another voice in the crowd

39:59

. But if I find , if I find the right people

40:01

in the right place , the who , if I

40:03

find the who , then I have something marketable

40:06

. You know it's , it's that's really interesting , amazing

40:08

.

40:08

Yeah , so many great points oh and

40:11

. I'll say that for any any

40:13

artist , musicians included , the

40:15

your book art print is worth a read . It's

40:17

not only hilarious and moving

40:20

, it's very informative , and this

40:22

is stuff that we don't learn in music school and I

40:24

bet that a lot of artists don't learn . That's

40:26

why it's so valuable . That's why you wrote it

40:28

.

40:28

I mean , I wrote it for me of 20 years

40:30

ago . This is like I basically

40:32

talking to my past self , but many

40:35

, many selves out there who need

40:37

, who needed this voice .

40:38

Yeah , it's , that's really beautiful and and

40:41

you also started doing

40:44

a podcast on these topics

40:46

kind of before it was like

40:48

hugely , hugely , hugely popular . I

40:50

feel like you were a little ahead of the curve . I

40:52

don't know , at least in the art world

40:54

or in the artist world

40:56

, because we , you know , as

40:58

musicians , yeah , these conversations

41:01

relate so much , like all of

41:03

the topics that you discuss on your

41:05

podcast as well , just so helpful

41:07

and inspiring , which is literally

41:10

the title of the podcast

41:12

. So it's really refreshing

41:14

to speak with someone who has this understanding

41:17

, maybe in a different discipline , but there's

41:20

so much we can relate to and so that's so great

41:22

and I think our audience is going to love it too

41:24

.

41:24

So for all those folks that love

41:26

what they heard here today , like we did . Where

41:29

can they find you ? What other things do

41:31

you have ? Well , if you like what you heard today .

41:33

This was good Kool-Aid . I have more of that

41:35

at the Inspiration

41:37

Place . It's on every

41:39

podcast app and my

41:42

book , artpreneur , is available

41:44

in Barnes Noble Amazon

41:46

, and I have some freebies for you

41:48

. If you head on over to artpreneurbookcom

41:52

, you'll see the bonus package that

41:54

you can get for ordering the book .

41:58

Awesome , nice , I haven't checked it out yet . You don't have to order the

42:00

book through me .

42:01

If you order it someplace else , whether it's an indie bookstore

42:03

, just let us know . You can email us

42:05

a picture of you holding the book . We don't

42:07

.

42:08

I love it . That's right Low tech I got it

42:10

from the library .

42:11

That's fine , too Accessible .

42:12

We don't care , but you also

42:14

offer coaching as well .

42:16

Those who want to take it to the next level , I have

42:18

the artist incubator . The lessons

42:20

I teach in the book are for everybody . My

42:22

coaching program is geared more towards

42:24

visual artists , but visual artists of all kinds

42:27

digital photography , painting

42:30

, ceramicist macrame , et cetera

42:32

, et cetera . So you can learn about that on

42:34

my website or just by listening to

42:36

the podcast . Amazing .

42:37

Great Well . Thanks so much for making time for us

42:39

today this has been really

42:41

inspiring .

42:42

Thanks for having me . It was such a fun conversation .

42:47

Thank you so much for listening today . If you

42:49

loved this episode , consider writing us

42:51

a five star review on Apple Podcasts

42:53

, amazon Music , spotify or wherever

42:56

you listen .

42:57

Thanks also to our season sponsor , Potter

42:59

Violins .

43:00

If you'd like to support the podcast and get

43:02

access to bonus content , consider

43:04

joining our Patreon community .

43:06

You can buy all your musician-centric

43:08

merch , including shirts , water

43:10

bottles , koozies and a variety of

43:12

other fun items .

43:14

Our theme music was written and produced

43:16

by JP Wogeman and is performed

43:18

by Steph and myself .

43:19

Our episodes are produced by Liz O'Hara

43:21

and edited by Emily McMahon .

43:23

Thanks again for listening . Let's talk soon

43:25

.