Making The Right Contacts

A few days ago we published a post detailing how to tell whether or not a contact is worth pursuing and when to give up. Some advice that is probably even more valuable since it applies to those with no contacts at all, is how to make and reach the most important contacts from the get-go.

One very simple thing to remember when mounting a networking strategy is that no one is going to talk to you if you don’t talk to them first.  The obvious options are trade magazines and industry events. The biggest perk of those avenues are that people are there because they are open to and expecting people to pursue them as contacts. However for that very reason, it can be more difficult given the thick sea of competition you are up against and its much easier for someone to write you off if you’re not a seasoned networking pro.

One of the still intuitive but not necessarily pursed avenues is making contacts through your friends. Other musicians (or friends in general) may already know key people they’ve never mentioned. Or maybe you already know that they are well connected but are too proud and/or respectful to ask for the favor. There are certainly times when they may say “no” and have a very good reason for it, but no matter what the result, there is very little chance that you will do damage your friendship just by asking for a little help.

Another possibly, though it is a long shot, is finding out where industry people might hang out. Hanging out and frequently patronizing new/trendy restaurants and bars or established industry haunts can be a great way to make contacts if you have at least a vague idea of who you’re looking for (and what they look like). For example, prolific and legendary songwriter Robert Pollard of the 90s band Guided by Voices had an informal policy that if you were a small record label and you could find him among the bars of his hometown (Dayton, OH), he’d give you unreleased material for an EP. The only catch was that you’d get 1-2 good songs, 2-3 okay songs, 3-4 bad songs. You wouldn’t get a masterpiece but you would get a release that was sure to sell to his legion of cult fans.  

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