After a very successful week 8 it’s time to begin the Final Week!…

This is wonderful as I’m on the last week to completing Ariel’s Music Success in 9 Weeks blogging challenge. Win or loose, I’ve come away with a much greater understanding of “social networking”and have now implemented all the right tools to really take my music career to another level! I truly mean that, this is a very, very good, up to date book and program.

I’ve bought and read a lot of books online that for me was a total waist of time and money however, Ariel Hyatt’s book and program is a must have and more importantly a must do program for all indie artists!

Social Networking to me 9 weeks ago was a total mystery. I’m a solo artist with no current street team however, now at week 9 I’m gaining an average of 4 to 10 followers every day on Twitter & Facebook alone.

I now have a blog with over 130 posts that is now drawing a lot of relevant traffic and comments. Last week I had a day with over 800 hits!

My website traffic 9 weeks ago averaged 100 to 150 each day now I’m averaging 250 to 300.

My online sales remain the same however with my new and now regular news letter format as well as creating my continuum programs I know it’s only a matter of time before my online sales increase.

Not only has my online presence increased, I have learned how to better network in the real world, learned to create a better brand for myself, how to set goals and put a task system in place to chip into each goal daily until it’s done. I wake up each day now full of enthusiasm, just itching to begin chipping into my task list! I can now realistically see and predict were I’m going and it’s really very exciting! I don’t say to myself “if only I had a good agent, manager, a record deal…”

The cool thing is once I’m finished my 9 weeks I’ll now have everything in place to begin my soon to become very successful music career.

To date I have accomplished a lot but just watch me now…

So let’s begin the final week.

Week 9 – Day 1… Week 9 is about creating a continuum program. It involves getting my customers to purchase my merchandise as well as how to create other revenue streams such as fan site subscription, etc. This is the week I’ve been waiting for! So time to hit the book and see was Ariel has in mind for me this week…

Today I’m going to begin by creating 2 funnels. Funnel 1 is for the “music listener” and funnel 2 will be for the “guitar playing” fan. This is good as you will now see some of the potential revenue streams that has been getting me so amped up.

I’ve taken Ariel’s funnel and applied it to my Funnel No.1 – the music listener/fan/customer and for Funnel No.2…  It’s going to target my guitar player fans that would like to learn from me. I still have a few blanks to fill in with both funnels however, I’m almost there.

I believe I could create a 3rd funnel to sell my services as an online session player. The ideas seem to be coming quickly. I’ve also heard of an artist from the cdbaby DIY podcast that has been extremely successful selling video songs. I’m also good at working with video and video editing so that may also be a potential download income stream.

Week 9 – Day 2… (I think) It’s now 12:38am and I’m finally using phplist to manage my newsletter and mailing list! It wasn’t as hard to setup as I thought it would be. So much to do however, I need sleep! Zzzzzzz….
I’m back and awake. Today I’ve finish configuring most of phplist. What a great program for handling and managing my email lists! I’ve also finished uploading all my cd’s and music to bandcamp and now fans can street, share and purchase music much easier from my website and blog. My music is now available as 128k mp3, 320k mp3, flac, or just about any other format you could possibly desire. Now it’s time to get back to my week 9 tasks…

Week 9 – Day 3… I think I’ve decided to continue my music success in 9 weeks blog as my now public on going music career journal. It feels so good to be doing this and I don’t want to abandon it just because the challenge has ended.

These post are keeping me accountable to myself and on task. I also think other artist may find the posts helpful. Maybe it’s a good way to pay it forward. Other artists can see were I began, all the ups and downs and see that it does make a difference. Every little goal and task, every little day. Some days are great and some not. They can bounce around from week to week and see were this is taking me.

Next week will be the beginning of Week 10 and beyond. (there is a lot of book left) and there is so much more to do, on going, from the previous chapters.

Also, because of my new social network of artists, fans and friends, I’m now connecting with other artists that are creating great work and are really doing well. I’m surrounding myself with like minded people that I respect, admire and look up to. Artist’s such as Matt Stevens and Tomas Michaud. (to name only two however, there are many. I’ll introduce you to more through my newsletters)

These are people you may not know because you don’t read about their Allien girl friends in the National Enquirer. But these guys are brilliant and have 10′s of thousands of fans. Myself as one!

Let’s all continue to get to know each other, continue to create great musical works and live our artist career and lives!

Ok, back to work… Today I spent most of the day re-configuring phplist. Always, back up your files! I know better however, I was messing around with a config file without a backup of the original and it cost me half a day’s work. All is back up and running with phplist and for those of you that maintain their own websites and files I highly recommend Filezilla. It’s a free program for transferring files from your computer to your web host site. I get a little frustrated when I’m not on task and having to take a little detour. Today is one of those days.

Week 9 – Day 4… Today I’m continuing to tweak my Funnels. I’ve added a $5 per/month fan club to implement. There are a number of continuum programs for me to implement so I’m setting goals, dates and tasks for these to get them going. My first task is to learn to create a password protected site for my Fan Club, Guitar Lesson Club, Song of the week Club for paid subscribers to log into. Anyone have any ideas. My friend Tomas paid $250 for software for this to work with his blog. Is there an inexpensive solution for this?

Decided to try something new… I still need to increase the number of people I follow on twitter. An interesting thing I think I’ve learnt about twitter followers is that most of the people I follow tend to follow me back. So I thought I would begin following the people who follow an artist I feel my music is very similar too as these followers may like my own music. It’s also another good way to research my own demographic. I think? Ok, so it’s just a thought but who knows? Stay tuned and we’ll see were it goes.

Week 9 – Day5… So here’s something else I didn’t know about Twitter. You can only follow 2000 people max. (1000 per day) However you can be followed by an unlimited amount. Also, twitter may not allow you to follow 1000 if only a handfull are following you. As you gain more followers twitter will allow you to follow more. (up to a 2000 limit). I hope that all made sense.

Thanks to Carla at Ariel’s CyberPrMasterming group! This is the answer to my Day 4 question regarding a membership site. There is a  (relatively) inexpensive software program that can do this. If your blog uses WordPress, there is a plugin available called WishList Member. And it’s only $97.00 for 1 domain or $29u.00 for unlimited domains. The program come highly recommended! I’ll purchase it once I’m ready to implement my members site. If anyone else is interested here’s the software link: http://member.wishlistproducts.com/

Week 9 – Day6… Today I began by tweaking phpist. The program is all ready to go for my next newsletter. I added a couple of great plugins to give me all the stats and data I need to effectively track and manage my email lists. I also spent time on completing a blog post and time on twitter. My tactic above seems to be working as I’ve more than doubled my followers in the last 2 days. Followers that are interested in my music. I’m also spending time planning my 2 members sites for fans and lessons.

Lots to do each day, to bad I have to sleep once in a while. Zzzzzzzzz…

Week 9 – Day 7… Today I’m going to have a day off and spend it relaxing with my wife. Later tonight I have my students to call to update my fall lesson schedule. Then tomorrow it’s time to begin week 10!

Thank you Ariel Hyatt and the CyberPrMastermind group for all your guidance!