Don’t Create To Make The NExt Hit

When you create, your goal shouldn’t be to create the next hit. 

You should create to express your Self…the art (I use this term loosely–it’s not just paintings or music) and your passion for the creative process should be the focus. The impact and the outcome shouldn’t be a part of the creative process. That can come once you are done creating.

I was blown away by a number I heard on a podcast with Guy Raz and Macklemore—there are over 100k new songs a day that hit the streaming platforms. One Hundred Thousand new songs a day (there was a slight question whether it was a day or week but it doesn’t matter…the is a lot of new music on a regular short-term basis). A very small percentage of these new songs will become hits–the majority of them will only be heard by a small fan base but that doesn’t mean the music is not good or that the artists have “failed”. The “success” of each song is influenced by the expectations of the individuals who created it.

The barriers to entry have never been lower in not just music but all forms of creation. 

• An artist can sell her artwork thanks to building a following on Instagram, leveraging YouTube to show behind the scenes of creating her art, and making her living exclusively from her art. 

• A yogi can begin sharing free videos on YouTube and eventually build a valuable and successful business around her yoga practice–just look at Yoga With Adrienne. 

• A producer can upload his music to various websites for other creators to use in their videos and other musicians to use as the background to their songs, and put it on YouTube for people to listen to as they work only to find an artist like J.Cole create a song on one of his beats.

Creators can distribute their art easier than ever, which is great, but it also means consumers have an overwhelming amount of choice. 

It has become harder to stand out amongst all of the great Creators–but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t continue to create.

Keep expressing your Self and creating but make sure you are creating for the original reason you started in the first place–passion, expressing your Self, and enjoyment of the creative process…not to go viral. 

The odds are you will not go viral. The odds are you will need to be patient, consistent, and play the long game to grow your audience. The odds are you will not become the next “star”.

And that is ok.

If your main goal for creating is to become famous it is more likely you walk away from your craft when you do not become an overnight success. Without a greater purpose for your creating, most individuals will not continue to create long enough to have a chance to be discovered. Look no further than the world of podcasting. 

There are over 4 million podcasts and only 720,000 of those podcasts have MORE than 10 episodes…around 44% of podcasts have LESS than 3 episodes. While I haven’t interviewed every podcast host, it’s safe to assume the majority of the shows stopped after not seeing many downloads with the first couple of episodes—the shows weren’t started because of a passion to create, they were started to become “big”. Passion is a must to continue to record, edit, and hit publish because of the commitment it takes to stay with the process long enough to grow your audience.

Don’t mistake today’s message–if your goal is to grow a big audience and increase the impact you have I want to see you do so. However, work on growing your reach AFTER you have created your work–allow your creativity to run free as you create and then become strategic in how you distribute your work and reach more people.

Focus your creativity on your passion and self-expression, not becoming the next star. Once your work has been created go into growth mode and be strategic about how to share your craft with the world.

See you tomorrow and keep pursuing,

JC