Wendy Day explains when and how to hire a publicist. Wait until you have regional buzz and a fanbase, then vet candidates by asking bloggers and researching who covers emerging artists like you. Expect to pay $3,000 to $5,000 monthly for a minimum three-month commitment. A publicist secures press and event placements, nothing else.
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Hi guys, how are you today? Wendy Day here, and today we're going to talk about publicity. It's such an important part of what you guys are going to do with your careers. Um, I always consider a publicist part of your team. And the reason that I consider a publicist part of your team is that if people don't know what it is that you're doing, it makes it really hard for you to gain fans. The way that you gain fans is to inform them, and having a publicist is one of those ways. Um, a publicist is someone who is like a megaphone, if you will. They take exactly what you're doing and they let the world know. And they do that mostly through their relationships with the bloggers and the hip-hop media, the music media. Um, they also interact with your local press. So if you're from Atlanta, for example, they're going to interact with the Atlanta Journal and Constitution. They're going to interact with Creative Loafing and any of the small publications that exist in your region. Um, when you go out on tour, whether it's promo tour or whether it's a paid tour, they're going to reach out to the press in the cities where you're performing. And they're going to reach out to any of the press that would normally cover artists, whether that's mainstream press in their entertainment sections or the African American press or the music press, the hip-hop press. Their job is to be your megaphone and let people know who you are and what you've got going on. They also will get you into events in If you are large enough, meaning if you have built enough of a fan base and you have enough of a buzz, your publicist will get you involved in things like the BET Awards, MTV Awards, Grammys. Um, they will get you onto the red carpet at bigger events and smaller events. If there are local events going on in your community, um, your publicist will call and get you involved in those events. And, and basically hook you up so that you can see and be seen. This is very important because a lot of your success is going to come from you looking larger than life and you looking like a star. Stars become stars before they're stars, basically. The way that you can find a publicist is you can ask around to to other artists that you know. Um, but the way that I do it, I do it two ways, because a publicist who is hot today may not be hot next year. They might not have the same relationships. As bloggers change, their relationships change. So, um, the way that I find publicists, again, I do it two different ways. Um, one is I reach out to the bloggers that cover the type of music that I'm going after, and I ask them to recommend 3 publicists. And I do this with like 10 different bloggers, and usually I'll get a bunch of different names from different people, um, because the first person somebody's going to recommend is somebody that they're friends with rather than somebody that's great at their job. Um, after they recommend the 3 people, I'll ask them, you know, are these folks really great at follow-up? You know, who's really great at follow-up without bothering you. Sometimes it's the same people that they recommended. Sometimes they'll add another name or two into the pot. Once I have all those names from those 10 different, um, journalists, there will be a couple of names that keep coming up. Those are the people that I reach out to. And another way that, um, I find publicists is I go through all of the different blogs and the press that I'm seeing, and I'm seeing who's getting an awful lot of press that's not a superstar. Meaning, I don't look at the press for Future, I don't look at the press for Drake, Nicki Minaj, Remy Ma, anybody that's got something that's going on that's buzzing currently. Chris Brown, Soulja Boy. I don't look at, um, who's doing publicity for people that are naturally getting press, I look at the artists that are coming up that are getting a lot of press. Um, 21 Savage got a lot of press while he was coming up. Chance the Rapper got a lot of press when he was coming up. So I tend to look and see who's currently, um, hot in the media, and then I do a little bit of research to find out who those publicists are. And then I have a phone meeting with them to see if they'd be the ideal candidate. Um, once I narrow down who the publicist is— and understand that I hire publicists when we've got a little bit of a buzz and we've got something to publicize. I don't hire a publicist for an artist who's brand, brand new because they're not going to be able to get press and I'm just going to be wasting money. And a publicist can cost anywhere on the low end from $1,500 a month up to $10,000 a month. And for the level of publicist I'm looking for, they're usually somewhere between $3,000 and $5,000 a month. That's what, you know, the level of connection that I want a publicist to have for one of my clients. And when I hire them, it's for a minimum of 3 months. So that's basically a $9,000 to $15,000 commitment. So I make sure that we've got enough happening in our camp to warrant spending that kind of money to get the coverage. I know that a lot of blogs today, um, will accept payment for posts. Um, I don't do that. The reason that I don't do that is if I have to pay somebody to write about my artist, then my artist isn't big enough yet to be getting press. I make sure that we've got a movement behind whatever we're doing and that we've got a whole lot of, um, events and movement going on within the project. And then that's when I hire a publicist. Um, again, I don't pay for blog posts. There's no point because if people aren't aware of who the artist is they're just gonna look over the post. You wanna have enough of a fan base, at least a regional fan base, to start going after press because then at least there's enough people to read whatever's written and leave comments and hopefully go and follow your artist on social media or check out the music and tell their friends. But if you're brand new and you're using Publicity as a way to get on, then you're wasting money because it's going to be very difficult to build a fan base from absolute scratch without working the streets, the internet, and the clubs in your area, the colleges, you know, that whatever, whatever you're doing to build your buzz, you should do that for quite some time before you spend the money on a publicist. And then once you're at that level where it makes sense to hire a publicist, you'll find that it's easier for him or her to get you results. Um, a publicist is really just one piece of the pie that you need for your marketing pie. Um, so hire somebody when the timing is right so that you don't feel cheated out of your money. And then the last thing that I'm gonna say about publicity is that understand that a publicist is very often the entry level for someone trying to get into the music business. They figure that they can buy some blog posts or they can easily interact with some bloggers and they sell a service for around $1,000 a month or $1,500 a month or even $2,000 a month as a publicist. But a lot of new publicists are not effective because they don't have the relationships yet to get press for somebody that is relatively new. So just keep that in mind when you're hiring a publicist. It's not the perfect place to save money. There's better places to save money, and you want somebody that's been around for a while and has some great placements and some good experience. So it's up to you to interview the publicist, just like it's up to the publicist to interview you to see if he or she is going to be able to get you placements. It's not easy. It's a very, very, very difficult and stressful job. And, um, understand that your publicist is there to get you press and to get you into events. They're not an A&R. They're not someone who picks singles. And they're not somebody who gives you career advice. They are somebody that gets you press. So, um, that's what a publicist does. That's when you should hire them. That's how you find them, and that's about how much they cost. So I think I've answered most of your questions. If not, every Wednesday night at 7 PM Eastern Standard Time, I do a live, um, question and answer session. So feel free to tune in and hit me with your questions then. Okay guys, take care.
