And, we are back with another The Music Entrepreneur HQ exclusive.
Some artists don’t have a team. Some artists have small teams. And, others have big teams. But the bigger the team, the more complicated things can get. There can be a lot of back and forth between artists and their team members to confirm show details, clarify commitments, and more.
But what if there was an app that gave managers, tour managers, booking agents, publishers and labels access to all the same business data, in one centralized place?
We caught up with Matt Urmy of Artist Growth who shares how this all works. Read on.
1. Tell us about who you are and what you do.
I was born in NYC, but raised in Nashville, TN. I grew up around the country music industry and have been a songwriter since I was a kid. After spending most of my 20s touring around in various bands and as a solo singer-songwriter, I co-founded Artist Growth with the mission of helping independent artists create structure, organization, and business best practices around their music.
Over the last six years, that initial app has grown into an enterprise software platform that now serves major labels, global management companies, and touring artists from club bands to arena tours. I continue to serve on the executive team at Artist Growth, as well as produce and release albums and publish books.
2. What is Artist Growth? How does it benefit artists?
Artist Growth is a cloud-based, mobile enabled, software platform that gives artists and their teams one central place to manage all their business data. We connect all the team members of an artist from the manager, tour manager, booking agent, label and publishers. In today’s industry, everything moves at lightning speed and AG keeps all their information at their fingertips.
3. How can artists acquire capital to launch and grow their careers?
Through our partnership with Pinnacle Financial Partners, artists can now access growth capital in the form of an advance against their live performance guarantees.
Artists can now access growth capital in the form of an advance against their live performance guarantees. Click To TweetWhat is so unique about this is that due to the integrations we have with the talent agencies, we are able to process these requests without having to use the traditional underwriting process of checking credit scores and evaluating tax returns, etc. We just look at the tour data that comes in from the agency. This allows us to approve requests with great speed and low rates that a traditional bank would never do.
4. How are integrated platforms for data and workflow management impacting the touring world?
We are entering a time when these platforms as going to completely transform how the various teams that support an artist’s career connect and coordinate their workflows. The interoperability of data and communication is going to create a level of efficiency that businesses won’t be able to live without.
The interoperability of data and communication is going to create a level of efficiency that businesses won't be able to live without. Click To TweetAn example is how a management team coordinates with the marketing and promo teams at their artist’s label, and all that information getting disseminated to the team on the road, as well as those supporting the tour from HQ.
The old ways of using static documents like Word docs, Excel Sheets and PDFs can’t compete with integrated software that lives in your pocket and is designed specifically for the custom and unique workflows that exist in the touring ecosystem.
5. How have things changed for tour managers? How do you suggest they adapt to stay on top of their work?
I think that the opportunities for connectivity has really changed for tour managers over the last 15 years. I’ve never been a tour manager, but I would suggest to them the same thing I suggest to all the folks that work on an artist’s tour: that they be very focused on finding tools that can integrate to the systems and apps that other members of the artist’s team are using.
Being able to automate as much of the busy work as possible and having access to everything on the phone is key. A great example is replacing those giant paper tour books with having it all live in the app on their phone. That’s one of the many features of the AG platform.
Being able to automate as much of the busy work as possible and having access to everything on the phone is key. Click To Tweet6. Is there anything else I should have asked?
I think that it’s important for people to understand that our company exists to help artists. A big part of how we do that is to help the teams that support them get more connected, efficient and transparent.
But at the end of the day, we want to see a world where artists are more successful, more profitable, and able to spend as many of their waking hours as possible focusing on their art. To the degree that kick ass software can help make that happen, that’s where our focus is.
Final Thoughts
There is no longer any need to rely on old, inefficient systems to track your data. Now it can all be done in one central place. Is that exciting, or what?
If you enjoyed this interview, please take a moment to thank Artist Growth on Twitter: @ArtistGrowth
And, if you have any questions or comments, don’t hesitate to leave them below.
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