How to present yourself

- [Instructor] I've touched on the importance of presenting yourself and pitching properly. Now, I'm going to get into the nitty-gritty, and present examples of what to do and what not to do when pitching. I'll show you a sample of what your email to a music supervisor should look like, and what your follow-up timeline should be, examples of tweets, and more. First off, I'm going to provide you with a list of things to be aware of when pitching your music. Do not do the following. First off, don't send music that is not tagged properly with data. Don't send music using a file website that does not allow streaming and forces any uploaded files to expire within a certain amount of time. Make sure not to disregard submission guidelines posted on the website to which you are submitting. Definitely, don't write a long, rambling email with a ton of links. Please don't follow up every week after you send your music. Give the executives time to listen and get back to you. You certainly do not want to make it hard for somebody to find you and your music online. Absolutely 100% do not send MP3s of your music attached to the email, unless you're asked to. Send a link instead. I don't say this to be mean, but I can't tell you how many emails I've deleted because MP3s were attached. It's simply not respectful of the recipient's time. Here are the things I would strongly advise you to do. I urge you to send no more than three of your best-written and recorded songs, no demos. You need to understand exactly who the writers are on the songs, as well as the publishers, and what the splits are, the percentage breakdowns. If you receive an interested call or email back from a music supervisor, and you don't know the answer to this question immediately, they will likely move onto using someone else's song. That's why I recommend you understand the song rights before you reach out to a supervisor or music executive. Go ahead and send a concise, well-researched email that respects the reader's time. See my previous notes about IMDb and the tables I created. Make sure to send the email with music at the right time. An example of the right time would be leading up to the production of the show, ad, or video game, not after the season just ended or the game production wrapped up. Regarding followups, I'll be honest. Most music sups don't want to receive a followup email. But, if you have to send one, wait a couple months. It's very possible that they will not yet have had a chance to listen four to six weeks after you've sent your original email. This is important. Notify the supervisor or executive if your songs are one-stop. Also, create a great artist website. Go to sites like Wix and Squarespace to create pro-looking websites quickly. Finally, include a music link with the main versions as well as instrumental and TV edits. I'll now present you with a couple pitching emails. One is an example of good etiquette, and you can use it as a guide. The other one is an example of poor etiquette and will show you what to stay away from. You can use this email as a basic guide. I'm not suggesting you copy it verbatim. Use your own words when crafting your email. Okay, I'll take you through it. Hi, music executive. I've followed your work for a while, and I really enjoy the show. Insert TV show name. And the music choices you make on it. One reason the music speaks to me is because it's similar to the music I'm passionate about and that I write, a cool blend of bass heavy electro-pop, or whatever genre you record. I know you're incredibly busy, and to that end I'm looking to be really concise. I'm hopeful that the below music will be a really good fit for the show name, and may make your life easier. My band and I control 100% of the master and 100% of the publishing. Only include this part it if applies. At this box.com link, I've included three songs for streaming and download, high res available upon request, as well as the instrumentals. In the folder you'll also find the lyrics and a quick PDF of recent highlights. Splits, BPMs, and contact info are in the song metadata. Stream and download here. Insert your box.com link. I'd be thrilled to hear back from you, but I know you're probably slammed. If that's the case, then I hope you don't mind if I check in with you in three weeks or so. Thanks for all you do. It's truly inspiring, and I'm a fan whether I hear back from you or not. Then include your artist name, email, phone number, and website. Okay, and moving onto the next email. I cringe even reading this email I created for you. It's a really good example of a bad email. But, it has little bits of real world submissions all through it. Hi, I just finished recording some songs and I'm looking to have someone pitch them for me. I think the songs are awesome. They're perfect for ads and TV. I attached some MP3s. Here is my bio and pictures. Also, I was playing guitar and writing singer-songwriter songs until about a year ago, but then I changed to writing pop music, because all I want to do is have my music licensed. I would send you to my website, but I don't have one. But, if you want to hear the singer-songwriter ones, I'll send you those MP3s too. A buddy of mine did the best on these songs. It's kind of a modern throwback with a sample I grabbed from YouTube, then pitch shifted. It's dope. If you want to license the song, let me know and I'll track down my buddy. He just moved, but he'd be stoked if this got licensed. His SoundCloud page is here. XYZ SoundCloud page. Anyway, hit me back, thanks. Why this email is bad. The opening is generic, and it's not targeting anyone. Also, clearly no research has been done and likely this is on a BCC, a blind carbon copy list. Obviously this person didn't look at any submission guidelines. MP3s were attached, a big no-no. There's no description of the music. A photo was pasted right into the email, adding to the file size of the email on top of the MP3s that are already attached. There's no indication that the writer has any clue about their own writing or publishing information. There's no reason the recipient would want to take the time to sort through this email and listen. Even worse, it's clogging up file space in their inbox. The email rambles, and it isn't respectful of the reader's time. This is a good time for me to mention an industry term that you need to be aware of, and one that will come into play as we go forward. That is, one-stop. It's such an important concept, that if you don't know what it means, then that may be a signal to a music supervisor that you don't understand the basics of licensing, and that may raise a flag. Some companies are known for being a one-stop. They license music to movie studios, TV networks, video game companies, and brands. An advantage of a one-stop is that they secure 100% of the sync rights to the master and the composition to each song in advance. When clients, the licensees, need music fast, they can rely on a one-stop to quickly and easily license music, knowing the rights can be licensed with one signature from the licensor. That's a much easier approval process than trying to track down multiple writers, some who may have publishing deals, and then also track down who owns the master, which may or may not be a record label. The licensing industry moves at a very brisk pace. Supervisors don't usually have time to wait a week or two for approvals from multiple writers and labels. If you don't yet understand the difference between a sync license and a master use license, then not to worry. I'll be covering it later on in the course. Properly presenting yourself to music industry executives is of critical importance and could very well be the difference between whether someone opens your email and clicks on your music, or completely ignores you.