hosted by: AskPat 589 Episode Transcript
Pat Flynn: Hey, what's up everybody? Pat Flynn here and welcome to Episode 589 of AskPat. We're approaching number 600. How crazy is that? Thank you so much for being here. As always, I'm here to help you by answering your online business questions five days a week.
We have a great question today from Brendan who's a musician.
Brendan: Hey, Pat. Thanks for your podcast. Loving the daily questions. This is Brendan from ClaimTheThrone.com. Claim the Throne is my heavy metal band. We've been experimenting with podcasting and content marketing, so we have episodes and articles to give our fans an insight into what we do behind the scenes, but we've also started sharing our successes, failures, and knowledge to encourage do-it-yourself band management to other musicians. It's been going okay. I think it's starting to cause some confusion to the diverse range of people that are tuning in.
We do have some ideas for providing premium content, so things like guides and courses and e-books for aspiring musicians, perhaps even some affiliate marketing. The question is should we separate the two ideas to make the two audiences clearer? Whether we have the band stuff aimed directly towards our fans and then a different site for music industry stuff directed to the DYI musician niche. Would appreciate your thoughts. Cheers and keep up the great work.
Pat Flynn: Hey, what's up, Brendan. Thank you so much for the question today. It's funny because I have all the questions for AskPat that I've listened to and will be listening to in the future here in my Google spreadsheet file, and what I came across here is I had read it initially as should I split my personal brand stuff from general music industry stuff? Now that I see it's actually should I split my personal band stuff. I actually had a completely different answer than what I'm about to tell you, which is yes. You should absolutely split it because…you said it yourself…you're confusing some of your people there who come to your site specifically to get to know you guys.
I think it's great that you're adding personal stuff, and I don't think it's bad that you're mentioning that you're helping other people who are starting their bands and stuff in the music industry. I think that's great, but you don't want to have them both live on the same site. I think what you could do and really benefit from is actually creating an offshoot brand or a separate website at least where all of that other information is housed. Because a lot of your audience who comes to you for your music and your artistry isn't going to be interested, and actually, it's going to cloud some of their brains.
It might be cool for some people, and like I said, that's why you want to mention it every once in a while or actually have some links and navigation from that site to your site where you actually talk about this stuff, but for your primary core audience, it's not really what it's there for. I would separate it out and turn it into a separate brand that would make it much easier for you to build a separate brand on that website, obviously using the same name. Not same name domain name, but you guys are there. You're there and you're helping provide this value. You're using your other site as social proof that you have this band and whatever else you need to do to show that you actually have expertise in this space is great.
Then that's a great site that other people who are in the music industry might be able to refer to. When people share that music industry-related stuff, it's going to go directly to a place where those people who they share it with, it's going to be related to that and not just, “Oh, here's their band” and you have to go to this website or this portion of their website to find all that information. No, it's right there on that website, and again, you become a leader in that space, and you become a leader in your own personal band stuff too. The efforts aren't diluted on one place and it doesn't confuse anybody. I think that's definitely the way I would go about it.
Cross-referencing is great, but having them live on separate sites is the answer. That's it, and Brendan, I really look forward to learning more about your band and what you do. I think it's really cool that you're trying to help other people out there too because it is definitely a pain, and I think you guys have gone through that experience. Like with many people who are out there building businesses, it's based on a previous experience and the fact that they know a little bit more than somebody else. A lot of people are willing to pay for that information, so great job, good stuff. I would also recommend checking out Gumroad.com, Brendan, to sell some of your stuff.
They're a great platform that has helped a lot of musicians like yourself sell things and courses and exclusive memberships and things like that to the band stuff. It's definitely a top solution for offering digital products too, so Gumroad.com is a resource I can offer you and everybody else out there, especially those of you who are in the creative space for selling stuff online. Check that out. Again, that's gum like the gum you chew, Gumroad.com. Thank you for the question, Brendan. I want to send you an Ask Pat t-shirt for having your question featured here on the show.
For those of you who are listening, if you have a question that you'd like potentially featured here on the show, just head on over to AskPat.com. You can ask right there on that page. Thank you so much, and as always, I like to end these episodes with a quote. Today's quote comes from Kim Garst. She says, “Sell-sell-sell sales methods simply do not work on social media.” It's very true. Cheers, take care, and I'll see you on the next episode of AskPat. Bye.