CHERYL ENGELHARDT - How To Make Money From Your Email List

Download the free “Mastering Email” PDF here:
 https://www.inthekeyofsuccess.com/email

And join the free “Musician’s Success Cycle” mini-course here:
https://www.inthekeyofsuccess.com/successcycle

Cheryl Engelhardt is a Grammy nominated artist, producer and composer who has mastered the systems (and mindset) that musician’s need to build a profitable career. Through her various programs and coaching, she teaches artists how to monetize their business through email marketing and following the proper “success cycle” depending on what stage of a project they’re in.

In this episode we talk about the importance of email marketing and how artists can greatly benefit from this often underutilized tool.

Follow Cheryl here:
https://www.instagram.com/musiccareercoach
https://www.instagram.com/cbemusic

Follow Nik Cherwink here:
https://www.instagram.com/nikcherwink

And visit my site to join the mailing list or book a free coaching call:
https://www.nikcherwink.com

Transcript

Cheryl B: 0:00

when they're doing email correctly, and this is a, industry wide, not just music industry, all industries, this statistic, Is true for every one subscriber you have, you will be when you're doing email correctly, and there is a right and a wrong way, you will be making one to 2 per month per subscriber. So if you have a thousand people on your email list, you will be at the end of the year on average, making a thousand dollars a month from your email list.

Nik: 0:36

What's up everybody. Welcome to the headliner mindset podcast. Today's guest is a Grammy nominated musician and composer who is also an artist coach, just like myself. She not only helps people clear out their mental and emotional blocks, but also gets them set up with the proper systems to really build a profitable business, hit their goals and get results. This is Cheryl Engelhardt.

Cheryl B: 0:57

Hello. Thanks for having me, Nick. I'm so psyched to be here.

Nik: 1:01

I am so psyched to be here as well. You know, we just got connected through our mutual friend and mentor and coach. Preston smiles brother. Uh, I literally just put out a podcast with him today. So everybody that's tuning in definitely got to go check out that episode. Preston is amazing, but he's how you and I got connected because we're both in this interesting space where you know, you're coming from the artist background. I'm coming from the music industry background, but we found this really cool place, of coaching and helping people. And, uh, I'm just excited to dig in with you because you are doing some really cool things. And I know, there's a lot of value that we get to provide people today. So thank you for being

Cheryl B: 1:42

Awesome. I'm super psyched.

Nik: 1:44

Yeah. Now, before we get into the coaching stuff that you're doing, I'd love to hear just a little bit of a background of your journey as an artist, as a musician, as a composer, because yo Grammy nominated baby, let's go. That's, that's, that's huge. So what were you. nominated for a Grammy for? And, and what was your, you know, what is your involvement on that artist

Cheryl B: 2:05

Yeah, yeah, totally. So my seventh album that I put out was my third in the new age category. I had done four piano pop albums. Probably over about 10 years, I toured with the band forever and I actually got an, uh, a composer residency in Greece and I was like, Oh, this would be really cool to like, try to do some different weird stuff at the time. I, I mean, I still work on my own anxiety and I was like, wouldn't it be cool to

riverside_cheryl_b: 2:29

create a piece of

Cheryl B: 2:30

music that could meet someone. At the anxiety attack, instead of trying to like force calm, like, Oh, you know, you hear all this meditation music is pretty, it's going to put me to sleep or it's like not really handling it. And I was like, what if I like started the music kind of like complicated and then like slowed it down and, simplified it and sort of took someone on a journey from their anxiety to peace. And that album was my first of my, new age albums. And it was like, Number one on iTunes and Amazon. And I was like, Well, those charts, that's cool. I never did that with my pop stuff. So I was like, am I a new age artist? And then COVID hit and I did, another one. And then my third new age album, uh, was something that I produced, uh, two weeks after my best friend passed away from cancer, it was just in the beginning of 2022, and I decided to. I needed to get away, but I was also exhausted and it was still COVID. So I was like, you know what? I'm going to get on a train from New York and I'm going to go visit my sister in Los Angeles. And we're just going to take this train across country and see what I produce, see what comes out. And I brought a tiny little keyboard and a bunch of different headphones and In those five days, I created what ended up getting nominated for a Grammy in New Age called The Passenger. And I was really committed to the editing, the producing, composing. Everything was done on the train ride there. And then I did a little tweaking on the train ride back, which I did over four days, a different route. And then I mixed it at home. So it is completely self composed, produced, mixed, which is really, Really cool because all my pop stuff, I'd always have other mixers come in and it was, it was such an honor to have that particular body of work that was very, it was so bittersweet too, because my, my best friend was the person I was going to take to the Grammys that year, but he, you know, got cancer and passed away. So it was, there was so much wrapped up into the story of it that I think that was probably one of the reasons why I got a lot of attention and did as well as it did.

Nik: 4:21

And I'm really hearing how Emotions have really been tied into the work that you've been making, even just this idea of creating something intentionally to help people work through anxiety, creating an album through, I can only imagine what emotions you were feeling after your friend passing away, you know, I think a lot of times where, Kind of disconnected from that part of ourselves a lot of artists and and and speaking to I think a lot of the music Producers out there that are very much my audience where it can be very Intellectual like very much thinking about what we're making rather than really tapping into Like the power of music the healing power of music the energy the energetic power of music And I and I know that I think leads us a little bit like into your coaching too because I'd really want to talk about systems Processes. We're going to go into email lists. But you also help people and, and, and artists and musicians navigating that emotional side as well. I'd love to hear like what you do on that side of it as a

Cheryl B: 5:25

Yeah, totally. I mean, just before we move into like the, the sort of coaching world of it, I even noticed myself like as an analytical producer person looking at a lot of the data. And that's one of the reasons why I love systems like career systems, which like you said, we'll get into, but even when I'm mixing and I'm looking at the way form, I have to remind myself, I'm like, even though it looks Like the decibel level is where it's supposed to be, or the EQ is dipped here. Like, listen to it, feel it. you can get so caught up in like the very visual evidence base, instead of just stopping and seeing, is that what I'm wanting to be feeling in my body? Is that the, you know, so dropping into that and that, you know, that ties all the, all the stuff in that, that we're going to talk about

Nik: 6:07

And that's such a deep foundation of my work and my philosophy is this idea of duality, right? This idea of balance. We're talking about using your head, being intellectual and studying, you know, the data, but also using your heart, being in touch with your body, being in touch with your emotions. And, it's finding the integration of both of those. It's not one or the other. Like, yeah. You got to look at the data. You should. A lot of people aren't, I'm just learning that kind of in my business, even with my podcast, I'm doing a little podcast course and they're like, yo, are you looking at your stats every day? And I'm like, no, I just kind of make podcasts and throw them out there and have fun conversations. And so, uh, you know, finding that, integration and that balance of using the intellect and also using, you know, the heart, the soul, the gut, whatever we want to call it. So, I love that. I think they, I think you're such a great example of someone that is, um, yeah, finding a lot of balance between those two. So tell me about on, on, on the coaching side, you know, in that more emotional, space, you know, the below the neck work that you're doing. What do you help people with

Cheryl B: 7:08

Yeah, it's funny. It I don't think of it initially as emotional. I got started as, a coach because I was just getting invited to speak a lot at different music conferences because I've had, you know, my small sort of indie successes, like touring all over the world and having some great, playing some great festivals, getting some music licenses. Like I've sort of dabbled in a lot of different areas where musicians want to see success. And so, after speaking in a lot of music conferences and people would come up to me afterwards, I started noticing that a lot of the musicians were asking the same question, different circumstances, different genres, different what they do in the music industry, different, but like the bottom line was, there is this conversation of like, I've done all the things. And. But nothing's working and how do I level up and how do I get to the next point where I can pay my rent or where I can feel really fulfilled or where I can connect with an audience in a meaningful way. And so I saw a lot of people in, in the marketing, music marketing world, giving these sort of very specialized, this is what worked for me do this. And I have such a weird background. I got started in hip hop recording studios and commercials. And I was a scuba diver for the government. Like I had the weirdest path and like, I was a bouncer, like you, you name it. I've done like very strange things and all of these things. Things have sort of morphed and moved myself closer to, to music. But like, I would never say this worked for me and therefore you should go do it. So I was really interested in how can I get trained to listen in a different way so that I can figure out what's blocking each individual person and then dig in with them there and whether they want to get a million streams on Spotify or. You know, licenses or stuff. And like, yes, I've done a lot of these things and I can bring a lot of like, yeah, I got a million streams in a year. Here's what I did that worked. Also, these are the other things that you could do. And sometimes there's stuff that I haven't done, but it's not about the next marketing thing or the next app or chat bot or like, you're like the, the success is, is not You know, That's so specific. It usually has something to do in my experience. And I've been coaching for 17 years now. It usually has something to do with how you are self sabotaging your future for something that has gotten like sort of under the radar, from your past that hasn't gotten looked

Nik: 9:26

buried in

Cheryl B: 9:27

Yeah, that hasn't gotten healed. So when I started doing that work for myself, for my own anxiety, I was like, Oh, this is interesting. I'm starting to access stuff. For myself and my career, but it's not a marketing conversation. What is this magic? So I was like, all right, let me go down this rabbit hole, not just for myself, but to get trained in it and become, Certified as someone who can really listen and say, Hey, I'm trained to listen to this stuff. That's kind of led me to, to bringing in a lot of the marketing, the systems, the dorky data stuff, the stuff that a lot of musicians like want to be good at in the business sense. But a lot of times there's this crossover with like, I am terrified of being seen, even though everything I want with all of my body and soul is to just be seen and heard. But the last time I was really seen when I was like eight, it didn't go so well. I got made fun of or I got attacked or like there's something. And so now we have this unconscious subconscious, like, this is just an example of like, what is kind of common that there's this like hidden part of you that's preventing you and sabotaging any opportunity you have to actually be seen in the way that you and your music deserve to be. So we've got to go back and heal that little thing so that it's not running the show. We don't want. Our businesses to be run by an eight year old.

Nik: 10:45

Yeah. Yeah. Beautifully said. Yeah, I, I love that. And I, like the metaphor of it's like you are trying to drive your car with the parking brake on. You're like, I'm doing all the things. I'm hitting the gas. I'm doing all the strategy stuff that people told me to do. got my foot on the gas. Why is this thing not moving? Right? And it's like, well, no, the car's actually fine. You just got the parking brake on because of that unconscious block, that unconscious limiting belief, that unconscious self sabotaging pattern that we have to dig deeper into the, uh, The roots of it, the soil of it, you know, just to use another metaphor. It's like, I'm trying to get the fruit, right? I want the result. And it's like, okay, it's well, to get the fruit, you have to have a healthy tree to have a healthy tree. They've got to have, you know, strong, healthy roots, but to have healthy roots, you've got to have healthy soil. Like there's a level of

Cheryl B: 11:41

a lot of stuff.

Nik: 11:42

there's something deep in there. And the more we can clear that stuff out, it's great. Cause I mean, to be honest, a lot of. Work and the stuff that I've been doing it more so recently. Like it has been really on kind of on the surface level. It's like, let's build the brand and come up with, you know, content ideas. And at the end of the day, like I much more love doing that deeper work and being able to, work with people that are willing to go there and do that work. A lot of times people don't realize that that's actually sort of really what they need. They're coming to like, Oh, me get the marketing strategy. It's like, are you down to actually go deep and really figure out what's going on in there?

Cheryl B: 12:18

Yeah. Are you ready for it? Yeah.

Nik: 12:21

for it? You know, and, and just being open, you know, being open to, to doing that work. So let's talk about strategy side of it though as well because that's that's really what I want to dig into with you. Um, systems and processes. I, I'm not going to say I'm not a systems and processes guy. I'm not going to claim that identity. I'm learning how to become better with systems and processes. And I feel like this is a very common thing for a lot of artists is they're very tapped into the flow, the creativity, you know, creating music and stuff. but then actually sitting down and having systems and processes when it comes to the business and running the business, oftentimes is there's kind of a big gap there. So what do you help people with there?

Cheryl B: 13:00

Yeah. So to me, when there's something in my life that's not working. It mostly can be pointed to a system that is either not installed or not optimized. And that can be anything from my time management, my calendar system, to my email, how I connect with my fans, to my finance system, to my nervous system.

riverside_cheryl_b: 13:23

like.

Cheryl B: 13:24

How am I optimizing my nervous system? Like it's called that for a reason. So I work inside of all the systems and I have one sort of bigger system in which all the systems can be placed so that you're not battling, Oh, I'm in creative mode right now. How can I go set up a very technical metadata system for my licensing songs? You know, they're, they're different phases. And I, so I have this thing called the musician success cycle that allows you to go through five phases. One at a time and remove the overwhelm of feeling like you have to do all the things at once, like focusing on building and optimizing one system at a time is really, really, really powerful. And it doesn't matter which one it is. I usually start coaching with what do you want right now? Like what's most important to you and then work backwards. Okay. What systems are already in place? What systems need to be in place that would really support that thing that you want?

Nik: 14:15

What are the five phases?

Cheryl B: 14:17

Uh, the first one is learning and determining. This is where you sort of get to. energetically, just get some downloads. What do I want? You have to determine the goal for this time around the success cycle. And by the way, I say, I call it a cycle because for those of us that are in this for the long haul, it's not like, okay, I hit that goal. Now I'm done. Goodbye music. So we, some of us are going around our, our 20th success cycle. Some of us are fifth, some of us are a hundred, you know, so you're always learning and building. So you got to figure out what do I want for this time around the success cycle. Second phase is creating. What do I want to build? Sometimes this is an album or, or a song or a single or something that's very obvious, but other times it's like, I really want to master my email list. So maybe this is where I sit down and I write my nurture series that are going to be automated and I start telling my story. And there's some sort of muse present in phase two. It's the creative muse and it doesn't necessarily need to be music. Although it often is,

Nik: 15:07

I wanna shout that out real quick because I talk about the Muse a lot. I love that. I mean, it literally is where the word music comes from. The Muse, One of the nine goddesses of inspiration from Greek

Cheryl B: 15:17

I'm one of them. Did you know

Nik: 15:19

the, the, you definitely are your, your, your inspiring me, you're inspiring me, it's in giving me creative ideas. So 100%. But yeah, the, Mythology that would grace the painters and the poets and the musicians with, with, uh, with inspiration. So, uh, but I love that it's not only art though. It's like the, the creativity to create an email list. I always say it's like creating content. It's a creative process. There's so much resistance to people not wanting to create content. And they're like, Oh, I don't want to have to be an influencer. It's all this struggle. And it's like, wait, no, the muse is available to you, in all of these. And It can be fun. It can be inspiring.

Cheryl B: 15:58

totally. So once you create something, a lot of musicians just like to get it out and they skip to phase four, but that's not phase four, phase three after phase two, which is the key. The creation phase phase three is really the admin, the foundation laying. It's like the preparation phase. So this is where you sit down and you get an online and you get your distributor, you get the copyrights and you do your metadata and you, you know, maybe you're getting your, Google docs or air table ready for who you're going to pitch in phase four. So phase three is a little bit of grunt work and a lot of people like to skip it, but it helps you be really ready and feel not like you're a chicken with your head cut off when you get to phase four, which is pitching and promoting. So depending on the goal you set back in phase one, you might be, maybe you're going out for. To support this album. So it's a touring goal that you have. So you're going to be pitching a lot of promoters and you might be promoting to your fan list to come to the shows, or you might be going after licensing, or you might be pitching Spotify curators, but either way, there's pitching and promoting to do in the energy is really outward in phase four and then phase five is where you fulfill on all the yeses. So if you did a fan funding campaign, this is when you go do the house concerts or you send out the brownies or you do like whatever you said you were going to do, you go do the shows. If you were booking a. Trying to book some tours. Right. So that's when you show up and you start to monetize, if that's part of the goal, what you had created. And then at some point you'll start to feel the itch of like, okay, now what's next and, and you get to celebrate and then move back into phase one. All right, now what do I want next? What's next important for me? How can I build on what I just did? So that's the musician success cycle in a nutshell. And I can give you a link for like, so people want to take notes to that too. I know we've got a couple of things we're going to be talking about, but

Nik: 17:35

Yeah. Super cool. yeah. definitely check the show notes. We're gonna add a bunch of links. We're gonna have a free download for you. We got a bunch of resources coming, so, very cool. Very, very cool. I love that you've, uh, yeah. Just dialed in those systems. I could take a page outta that book.

Cheryl B: 17:48

But that system, like the success cycle is where you can plug systems into. So like I, we were saying emails sort of, sometimes it can be phase two. Sometimes part of it is phase two, phase three. But if you're working on like time management, maybe that's phase one. You're like, all right, what skills do I need to learn right now to, to be better equipped for this next cycle? So maybe you're going to get, try out a different calendar system, right? So maybe if that system happens there, if you're working on finances and really monetizing and you're like, I'm going to clean up and like really dig it. Maybe your finance system happens.

riverside_cheryl_b: 18:17

Phase five.

Cheryl B: 18:17

So you don't have to do all the things at once. That's what the beauty of that success cycle is. And I'll just side note this as a musician. So the musicians listening, the way I like kind of stumbled upon this and created this framework was I was on tour, just did this huge festival in Switzerland and my band and I were like on the rooftop of our hotel. And I was like, that was amazing. And I was like, I should write a song right now. And this is like, The coolest thing ever. And I could not come up with a single lyric. And I was like, Oh, well, this is after my second album. And I was like, Oh, it was a good run, two albums. And my, my, I think it was my bass player was like, are you kidding me? You're in like tour mode. You are performing. You're figuring out what train to get on with all of our gear. Like you're in a totally different energetic state. I, this is not what he said, but this is what I took away. Then sitting down and writing a song. Like what? What a demand to put on your muse when you're in such a different mindset. And I was like, Oh my God, I can give myself permission to let myself be in the phase that I'm in. And that was so freeing and remove so much overwhelm of having to do all the things at once.

Nik: 19:19

That is so, so, so huge and so almost counterintuitive to I think the way that a lot of artists and producers and DJs specifically are operating where it's like, I got to produce every day I got to make content every day. I literally had this on my group coaching call yesterday where we're talking about schedules and I'm kind of having people like, look at your calendar and let's be intentional with our time. And where is your music fitting in and whatnot? And one of the guys was saying, you know, he's just switching between four or five different things throughout the day and maybe that works for some people, but it's like, yo, you know what? Maybe you need just a whole. One or two days that's just music, and a whole one or two days that's just, you know, content and creating these other things during the week. But if we expand that out even further, Maybe you have a month where you're not making any content at all. You're not in content creation phase whatsoever. It's just like a whole month just to make music, Right. What if you didn't worry about posting a content for a month? And then what if you, what if you took a month off of making music and you made all of your content for the next six months, you know, uh, that, that, that you really could, there's just other ways of doing it that I think we're not looking at.

Cheryl B: 20:30

And for some people, honestly, creating content for social media is that phase three foundation laying stuff. It's not part of the muse. It feels like drudgery work. And it's like, all right, let's just lay the foundation, get the stuff out. And for some people it's stuff that they are doing every day, kind of like brushing your teeth, brushing your teeth, doing your taxes. If you teach piano lessons regularly, like those are not part of the success cycle. If it's just stuff that you're doing. So you, you need to work those in. So it's part of your lifestyle or. It's, if you really, really hate it, I, I always like to tell the musicians I work with, make sure next to your computer, next on your desk somewhere, you have a, I don't wanna list. I don't wanna. Because if you start writing down stuff, you're like, Oh, I really hate this, but I'm going to put it on this. I don't want a list. Eventually you're going to be looking at. Requirement for your first hire or your next hire because you're, I don't want to list is someone else's. I wish I could list video editing, content creation. So just putting it on a, I hate this, but I'm going to do it right now. List feels really good. You're like acknowledging that this is like, Oh, but I'm going to do it because it's part of, it's aligned with my goal for the success cycle. It's not just, I'm doing this because I think I should

Nik: 21:40

And that is really thinking like a business owner is I'm going to run this business at a, to a certain extent, you'll run it a hundred percent by yourself. But at some point, if you want to scale, if you want to grow, hiring other people, hiring a team, outsourcing, is going to become very, very important. And I think there's a great. Opportunity here to think about yeah that I don't want to list like maybe that's I don't want to do the video editing I don't want to make the content. I don't want to do XYZ. There are so many people out there I'm thinking of like a young kid right out of college. That's like I want to get into the music industry I don't know how, right? How do I break into this industry and to be able to give somebody an opportunity to say, Hey, look, you can get involved in an artist project. Like you can help me build this business. Like, let's learn this together. Like get on board. There's so many people out there that are hungry on like the music business side that they're not, they're not like, I don't want to be the artist and make the music, but I want to be involved somehow. they're out there, they're out there. So I love that you planted that seed.

Cheryl B: 22:39

Yeah. It's a great way to sort of figure out, yeah. What do I want off my plate?

Nik: 22:43

Yeah. Now let's talk about email marketing. That was what really inspired me about the conversation that we had when we first got connected, because I just think email marketing is something that most people and artists, DJs, and the electronic music industry are not really thinking about. Most of us are thinking about how do I build my audience on Instagram? How do I build my audience on Tik TOK? I got to make content. We're looking at just building those numbers, building our followers and our fans there. not really looking at building an email list. So, why is an email list important for an artist to have?

Cheryl B: 23:20

So, so before you're like, uh, email, I'm going to turn that dial and

Nik: 23:25

Yeah.

Cheryl B: 23:25

there. It's like, just stay with me, y'all. First of all, email is the, in my humble opinion, the most untapped resource for musician. It is. It is. A musician's untapped ATM. And I've seen this over and over and over again with myself, with my clients and with people in my Amplify membership that when they're doing email correctly, and this is a, industry wide, not just music industry, all industries, this statistic, Is true for every one subscriber you have, you will be when you're doing email correctly, and there is a right and a wrong way, you will be making one to 2 per month per subscriber. So if you have a thousand people on your email list, you will be at the end of the year on average, making a thousand dollars a month from your email list. Now that can look like a number of different things. So if you're doing, let's say you're going to do a Kickstarter for an album or fan funding, like that might all come in one month. Or so if you have a thousand people on your list, that would be 12, 000 for the year. Or if you, are touring and you do house concerts and you offer your email list, uh, like house concerts or something, you'll be making a thousand dollars a month on average, or through merch sales during holidays or through ticket sales or through, um, when you have new releases, but there's so many different ways you can monetize. And email list. I'm going to dig into a couple, a couple structures and we'll, we'll talk about it. But I, I know I talk fast. I just want to like give people a heads up. Everything I'm going to say will be in this PDF that we're going to give you at the end of this. So just like, it's all good. Don't like, you don't have to pull over the car to like take notes.

Nik: 25:00

Yeah, yeah. and, This was really what excited me about this conversation is even just the idea of monetizing your email list, monetizing your fan base in a way, it really just even in general, outside of, again, just the, the It's kind of normal thought process of most DJs is like, I need to get booked and play shows. We're really just looking at this one revenue stream, mostly like I got to get, booked at the club. Uh, I got to get an agent. I want to start touring and for sure there's a lot of money to be made there. You know, some, you know, big artists, big DJs, they're getting paid, you know, tons and tons and tons of money, to tour. Cool. And there's other ways to make money as an artist.

Cheryl B: 25:42

if that's the goal, if you like want to go play those big gigs, email can help you. So like, that's the, that's the cool thing about this because. If you're trying to go viral on TikTok so that you can like prove to promoter that you're cool or whatever and have like one 15 minutes of fame or something like that, great. We love that, but like, where are those people going? Are they all following you? Are they like, looking at where you're playing next? I'm going to show up at the, cause that's what the promoters are going to want. Are you bringing bodies into this venue?

Nik: 26:11

Yeah, can you sell

Cheryl B: 26:12

So are you

Nik: 26:13

getting getting getting views on Tik Toks. Does not equate selling tickets. Let's just get that clear. Getting plays on Spotify doesn't. And I've talked about this before. I have friends that they have tens of millions of plays on all of their songs on Spotify. They crush it. And then I've seen them, come to town here in Austin and it was like, There's 12 people here. You got like a half a billion streams on Spotify and 12 people at your show, so it, it doesn't, it doesn't equate always.

Cheryl B: 26:39

And here's, here's why. When we are on YouTube, which I consider sort of a social media site as well, or streaming, it's streaming meets social media. So we've got Spotify streaming, YouTube, it's a little bit of both. And we've got, of course, TikTok, Instagram. If you're on those as a user, you're there most likely to get that dopamine hit and you're scrolling through. And it is a one. To seven second view, maybe you'll engage for 30 seconds. Maybe you'll like, like something if you follow someone because you like it so much, like that's extraordinary, right? A follow is extraordinary, but you're not really in as a user, as a potential fan of your music or of your live show, you're not sitting there being like. My credit card is out. I am ready to buy a ticket to this thing. And like, sometimes we see ads and like we buy on, you know, like occasionally, but like, that's not what we're doing when we discover something new. Right. So we're not in transaction mode when we are on social media or on streaming sites, when you're on your email. And by the way, email is not going anywhere. You need an email to sign up for Tik TOK. Like it's. It's like a horseshoe crab, and this is where I bring in my biology major. Horseshoe crabs have not evolved for about 20 million years because they are perfect. They have everything. Like they know how to turn over, they know how to protect themselves. So email is kind of like the horseshoe crab of systems. And when people are on email, they're more likely to be doing work. They're more likely to be doing transactions. They're more likely to be in engagement mode where there's like a back and forth more than just, Oh, this person posted this for the world to see in an attempt to get viral. So email is a really beautiful opportunity. Even when you are writing to. Your list and people know that they're on your email list and that it's a one to many structure, it still feels way more personal and that's why the statistic is you are nine times more likely to make a sale on email than on social media. You need to post nine to 16 times for someone to do the same thing on social that they would do in one email. Like that sounds way easier to me.

Nik: 28:42

Yeah. Yeah. And I like also that you said email is not going anywhere, whereas when we look at social media platforms, MySpace,

Cheryl B: 28:52

Snapchat, Vine,

Nik: 28:55

to a certain extent, you know. like, Myspace and Vine, yeah, they don't even exist at all. Uh, I mean, Myspace used to be the thing. It was the Instagram. There is a possibility that this shit might not be there at some point, you know? So, yeah, your email, like you said, horseshoe crab, probably not going

Cheryl B: 29:12

And then you own it. You have access to those people. You have that data. You can download it. You can never lose them. My, my worst touring memory ever, and I have a lot of from the road stories was we were 13 out of 14 days in a tour and about to, Leave the next day. We went from San Diego all the way up to Seattle, the entire West coast. And it was me and my band in this van. And we were staying at my bass player's brother's house in like suburbia Seattle. And we got up early to go get our flight and the van had been broken into. And I left like one big suitcase in the van that I didn't need. And that had the little notebook that had everyone's emails from all of the shows that we had done, like probably three to 500 new names of, it was one of my first tours. And when I realized that when I got home. I, and we had a guitar stolen and a keyboard stolen. We got, we got insurance for that. It was great. And when I realized that that was what was missing in that suitcase, I cried for like three weeks cause I will nev I was never going to get, be able to get those fans back, this is, you know, before Instagram, this is my space time. But, Those emails are so, so, so valuable. So now every night after a show, I put those right into my email system.

Nik: 30:24

And even just the mindset around selling to your fans. A lot of us are like, I'm, I'm building my fan base. Well, first off, what does that even mean? I'm collecting Instagram followers. I'm collecting, TikTok followers. And I'm really going to focus on those two platforms just because that's what everybody's looking at. We're just thinking about getting followers, right? As opposed to, I think most people aren't even thinking about. what am I selling to my fans? Like, let's look at, look at them as potential customers. Right. On the one hand, those fans can come to shows and buy tickets. We know that that's an important part, especially for, you know, touring artists and DJs. Uh, maybe I sell them merch. That's the other big thing. If I have fans, I can sell them merch. You make a good point. Are you just selling that through your social media, right? Are you just making posts about, Hey, buy my shirt, or do you have an email list where you're actually sending it to them with the designs, with the link, but Sales are probably going to be better there. Now there's this other part about just other stuff that you could potentially be selling. I love, you mentioned briefly about, house performances. I think that this is such a cool idea that, okay, let's say you do get booked in whatever X, Y, Z. State or city, by the promoter. Right. And you've got that going, you get flown out and then you send an email to your list and say, Hey, I'm playing in this city. If you want to book me for a pre party or an after party at your house, right? I'll do that for, for whatever X amount of dollars and have a VIP experience with like you and your friends at your house. You could be, you know, tacking on and doubling your, rate by, but that's just one really cool idea that I had never thought of.

riverside_cheryl_b: 32:04

Yeah. we talked about that when we when we were first connecting and I was like, Yeah! house concerts are huge. It's house concerts are also where I found my super fans. Because when you're in someone's home, they get to be vulnerable with you, you get to see a part of them, right? And that's not something that's going to be easy to sell on social media. Hey, can I come to your house? How creepy do you sound? Like you sound like you can't, you can't do that on social media. Like, but if you email them, be like, Hey, we've been connecting. Like you've been reading my stories because I took Cheryl's email course and I've set it up. Right. So now you are here for the long haul because that's the purpose of an email list is to have people there that are going to be there for the long haul. And. Hey, like I can, be in your area. Do you want to host a backyard barbecue or whatever your type of music is like, Hey, let's do a wine and cheese or, or, and there's a lot of different ways. Like they could do it for a fee or they, they could charge people. Like there's so many different ways I get into house concerts and other places, but

Nik: 32:59

I just love that idea because I just don't think I don't, if anyone's out there is doing it, or if you've seen other like DJ specifically do it, please let me know. I think it's so rad just to shout out real quick. I remember back in the day, Dylan Francis, he's, he's a huge EDM artist and DJ Dylan Francis used to have a thing on his website that was. Very similar, it was real a lot of silly shit It was like I'll come to your birthday party and like sing. Happy birthday, or I will drive your little sister to school for 500. It was like like really just he's a Wacky dude and humor is a big part of his brand, but he was offering these like very funny left of center Outside of the box services. And, um, yeah, I'm sure he did some of them along the way, but it's just like outside of the box thinking, you know, we're just, okay, look, it's more than just playing shows. It's more than just selling merch. There's a hundred other ideas that you could be offering your audience and selling to them and, and, and connecting with them. Also, let's talk about just having that deeper level of connection. That, like you said, probably not going to do it through social media

riverside_cheryl_b: 33:59

Yeah. You should not offer to drive anyone's little sister on social media. You will get arrested. You will get arrested. You said that you said like, You know, you're collecting followers and you're growing a fan base. What does that even mean? I actually like have a pretty good definition of it. And it usually is applicable mostly to my, to my email list, to my fan list. And that is a fan base is. A group of people who are willing to show up for you when you ask them to.

Nik: 34:24

Mm.

riverside_cheryl_b: 34:24

could be anything from, Hey, come to my show. Or, Hey, will you stream this? Or, Hey, will you buy this? I'm trying to hit charts or hate, you know, and I have done, I have a fan challenge kit where anytime I come out with something, I have a seven day. If I'm going after charts, it's like, all right, today we're buying it on Amazon, everybody. The next day we're buying on iTunes. And I'm like game on And, I make it like a team, a fan of mine actually said to me, she's like, Cheryl releases are my favorite team sport. Cause it's like, we're in this, we're trying to get on this chart and, sometimes I get it and sometimes I don't but it takes a little courage to just be like, this is my goal. I may or may not hit it, but are you on board with team Cheryl or team whatever this game is?

Nik: 34:59

don't know too much about the scientific back end algorithm of Spotify, but the idea that I know is that if you get a lot of pre saves, that it will kind of like trigger the algorithm, that'll, you know, a lot of people are excited about the song, they've been waiting for it to come out, so when you have a bunch of like pre saves, that pre release, then when it comes out, Spotify will start playing it. Pushing it out to, to playlist and things like that. So I see a lot of y'all like, Hey, pre save my song. You're talking about on your social media. What if you had a 5, 000 person email list that you blasted that to where it's like, yo, this is your inner circle. And you could get even a fraction of them to do it. Like all of a sudden, boom, you're getting a nice little boost on your

riverside_cheryl_b: 35:40

And you get a fraction of them to then go share on their social media so that they can even grow it. So I have a whole sharing campaign and these are all little, yeah, these are all little series of emails that are in templates that are in my email course that I've already pre written and tried and tested. So I have like the house concert, series, I have the merch series. I have the single release. I have the pre save. I have the day of album. Like I have all of these, like. Emails sort of templated out and just plug and play so that you don't have to worry about like, how do I actually form this and how, and there's different, you don't, you're not saying the same thing all the time. Like when I'm selling something or it doesn't even need to be selling. And it means anytime I'm asking my audience to do something. So if it's kind of like, Follow me on Instagram or if it's pre saved the song, or if I'm just having, Hey, I want to boost this song because I really want to get on our playlist. Let's I have an impact days. Let's make an impact on this song. And even if the song is released, if you have a hundred people, 300 people suddenly listening to a song that will also trigger the algorithms on Spotify and say, Hey, something's happened. Maybe it was on a TV show or something's happening. People are listening to this. So then it gets sent to the editors being Like Hey, check this out. So you are correct. That is how the, we had someone from. Spotify actually on in my, my membership, talk about that, that impact days are great. So anyway, if I'm asking my fans to, to do this and they're really clear on what the outcome will be, people want to be on a winning team. So you just need to be really clear about. what it is and why it's important to you. It's not constantly saying, will you do this? Will you do this? Will you do this? Will you do this? Which is what we see a lot on social media. Like, Hey, pre save my album, pre save my album. It's like, here's why this is important to me. Here's what the goal is. We're so close. we, I use we language a lot, you know,

Nik: 37:26

yes. The team. I, like you said, team, I wanna be on a winning team. And you're creating that sense of community, creating that sense of, of comradery like that. That's really, really cool. A lot of people, you know, we talk about wanting to, build a fan base, building an audience, really building a community. Around your brand and artist project, you know? So, I think a lot of Facebook groups were kind of popping for a little while. I have a lot of artists were doing the Facebook groups and kind of building their communities there. But yeah, the, like build it on your email list. That's so smart.

riverside_cheryl_b: 37:56

And here's the, here's the like, sort of like the womp womp news that people don't want to hear, there's a good news and bad news. The bad news is that followers, and even when someone first signs up for your email list, you're like, Hey, I'm going to give you a bundle of songs. Just sign up here. They become a subscriber, a followers, a follower, which means they are not yet fans. They're probably just curious at best. So when people say, Oh, I have all these followers, or I have all these emails. Fans on my email list. I'm like, well, have they bought anything? Have they done anything? No, they're just on the list. I just got them at the show. I haven't done anything with them. I'm like, you don't have fans, you have subscribers and it's your job through the emails you send to turn them into fans, turn them into customers, turn them into repeat customers, and then you have your super fan who will do anything for you and, and also probably go share your stuff to bring more people into that little staircase in the first place.

Nik: 38:47

Yeah, yeah. It makes me think about, back when I worked at Capitol records, this was back in, it was 2008 to 2011. That was where I started my career in the music business. So dating myself a little bit, some OG, you know, uh, street team. Stuff was what we used to do. We had a, we had a grassroots marketing department and their whole job was like building the street team and it would be like the Katy Perry fan base. And we would basically give like, Hey, you're a super fan of Katy Perry, or you're a fan of this band, or you're a fan or whatever, of whatever. Okay, cool. You want to get involved. We are going to mail you a bunch of flyers to go post up around your town. And we would get, you know, we'd get them involved. We'd hook them up. Here's some free CDs. Here's, you know, tickets to the show, but we were building these little armies, building these little street teams of, people out there that were just, preaching that artist. And so, even just that mindset. It's like, it's not 2008 anymore. We're, we're probably going to do it in a different way. And I'd actually be very curious if. What the major labels are doing now on that sort of like street team vibe, but it sounds very similar. I'm just like, Hey, build my community, build my little army, have some call to actions here as well. I'm going to give you value and in exchange, you're going to be a part of the team. We're going to feel more connected and you're going to go also go out there and spread the word for

riverside_cheryl_b: 39:59

Yeah. I think that actually labels are not doing email really well. I follow a bunch of artists that used to be indie that are now on major, major labels, and it is such a bummer, the lack of, of connection. And I think even them, they are sitting on. Some serious little gold mines that they are not tapping into because if people are still sending newsletters, we are not in a newsletter culture. Do not send an email with five different things. People are not going to know what's important. They're not going to click on anything. They don't give a crap about most of it. You've got to be really singular in your delivery. And, doesn't have to be a call to action every time those are called nurture series. Those are the get to know you stuff. But I mean, it's kind of a lost art to do it really well. And when it's done well, it still works. That's what's so cool about it. And that's the good news is like, we actually, if we can sit down, set up the systems, take a week or two and write the automated emails, be willing to just pay a couple bucks for us. You cannot send emails to like a hundred people from your Gmail account. It's literally illegal. Set yourself up with an actual system. I love Kajabi. And. Do it right. And, and then that's the system that you will optimize moving forward. You can, you know, give people easy access to free downloads to the demos that aren't released. Like all these digital products are available on the backend. Like when you have that system, that's really clean and set up, take the time to set it up. And then it's like, you don't have to worry about it. And it's really cool to not have to think, Oh, what do I need to write this week to my email? Oh, I wrote like 10 emails in a nurture series that I send one out every two weeks. It's all automated. That's like. Yeah. It's like almost half a year. I don't have to think about it if, if I'm sort of in between gigs or projects.

Nik: 41:33

Yeah. So just to remind all of you guys, we are going to give you a free download. Uh, there will be a link in the description that it's going to like really kind of bullet point, a step by step process for, how to actually get out there and start building this email list. All right. Yes. Let's touch a little bit more just on that process, I guess, uh, to like, where do, where do people start in terms of building the email

riverside_cheryl_b: 41:56

I like, this is a great acronym, um, stages, us performers. Um, so if you think of the word stages, the S is the strategy, meaning Get really clear why you want an email list? Is it to monetize? Is it to connect? Is it a bunch of things? Is it because you are sick of being on social media? So just get clear for you so that why can be present. The T of stages is the technology. The next thing to do is to get on an email platform. You've heard of like, Brevo or Sun and Blue or MailChimp. Um, like I said, I use Kajabi. They now have like a really great price point that's competitive with all those other ones. Don't nickel and dime. Oh, if I have, I've seen people literally not want to pay the extra 10 a month because like once you go past 500 subscribers and they keep themselves small, that's the scarcity mindset. That's some coaching work to do. Like what you don't want to pay 10, but do the math. 500 subscribers is 500 a month if you're doing email correctly, right? So go back to that number. So the S is strategy. The T is technology. Um, set yourself up, figure out what merge tags are. Take a couple days to just watch some 10 minute, 20 minute YouTube videos on whatever platform you choose. Just get really good at knowing what that technology is for you. That's the technology part. S. T. A. A. Is awareness. Do people know about your email list? And how are you going to entice them to come in? Which leads to G of stages, which is gathering. So, okay, people know you have an email list thing. Know that you I like to keep my email list. The most people Special of all of the places where I'm announcing stuff, even if they know something or they get, uh, my new singles out, whatever, even an hour before I post on social media, they will feel special. And that's what you want for your email list. So, so people know that you've got this email list. How do you gather them? What are you giving away that we, you know, the marketing world calls us the free opt in. Like I'm giving you a free bundle of songs from my. Best record or something really easily consumable because like I said, they're not Fans yet. You don't want to sell them the 70 sweatshirt because they're not invested yet. So just get them in with something that they can check out and become a fan with. So that's the gathering and then ease engaging. So once they're in, what do you send them? The welcome series. And this is, uh, I have templates for welcome series is like the most valuable for emails that you'll send the first four emails, because that's when people are most curious and they want the thing that you said you were going to give them. So they're going to open the email. And you're going to be able to start training them to click and to do things. And the links are going to be correct. And they're going to learn that they can trust you. So there's this whole psychology that happens in the first welcome email. So the E of stages, strategy, technology, awareness, gathering, engaged. Then we start sending them emails and we start asking them for their opinions. And then we start telling our story and then we ask for their stories. And then maybe we sell something for a week, or we have a flash sale on a bundle of merch, And then you, you hit the ground running and then the last S of stages is selling and how to really do that without feeling like a salesman or like you're burdening people and how often do you send these emails and blah, blah, blah. So that, that's kind of all in the, uh, PDF send you. And, you know, I have a program that literally holds your hand through every single one of those steps.

Nik: 45:15

yeah, amazing. That is amazing. I think, again, this is just such a valuable resource and tool that is not being talked about enough. I think there's probably so much, money being left on the table. I think there's so much just engagement with fans being left on the table and being missed out on. So, uh, I don't know about you guys, but I am excited to go and download this PDF and I, I used to have a email list. I mean, I have an email list. I just. it out in a long time. I've just been doing, I dunno, really? I just been lazy. I've been

riverside_cheryl_b: 45:46

That's okay. And one of the series,

Nik: 45:49

I've been focusing on the Instagram and, and, you know, the podcast, but it's like, wait a minute. Like I have a, it's such a huge thing here for me as well, to do that. So I'm going to download this. I'm going to go through your course. I'm going to, I'm going to get my email popping again as

riverside_cheryl_b: 46:01

it popping and you can use all that stuff that you've already built Instagram, Tik TOK. If you've got audiences elsewhere, you can say, Hey, I got a thing that I'm really psyched about. You can bring them in And, they're going to be your source for fans, which is great. I think that there's a little bit of like, Oh, it's scary and techie and like boring. And it's like, yeah, it might be, but it's also so, so worth it. So Yeah. the PDF, you go to www. inthekey. co co slash mastering email. Cause it's called mastering email. The musicians untapped ATM.

Nik: 46:32

Hell yeah, hell yeah. Awesome. Well, the link will be in the show notes. Uh, Cheryl, thank you so much for coming on and sharing all of this with us. I'm really excited. You guys, if you, if you go download this and you get your email set up, please let me know. I would

riverside_cheryl_b: 46:44

my God. Yes.

Nik: 46:45

celebrate that win with you. Like, let's all do it. Let's do it together. And, um, just excited to see what, what people create from here. So thanks again for hopping on, Cheryl. You are

riverside_cheryl_b: 46:55

Wait, I want to celebrate that too. Like totally tag me. I'm a at musician career coach because anyone that's doing email well, I want to show you to other people too. So I would like share you with my audience. Like you totally hit me up if you, if you start to implement this stuff, because it's, it's so, so powerful and when you're doing it right, it's pretty much guaranteed. Like you will be making that money. If that is something that's interesting to you.

Nik: 47:19

Yeah, hell yeah, let's celebrate those wins. I love that. Alright,

riverside_cheryl_b: 47:23

thanks for having me.