Just Be Consistent

Just Be Consistent
Just Be Consistent
Just Be Consistent

Well, it’s Monday, which means that it’s time for another blog entry on the Now Hear This website.  After all, that has been the case each Monday for the last 24 weeks since this blog first started up.  It’s not unlike the “Now Hear This Entertainment” podcast that comes out every Wednesday and has done so since the show’s debut in February of 2014; as in, last year.  That’s right – when Episode 58 comes out this week it will be over 13 months now that we’ve consistently put a new show out each week on the same day.

Are you trying to build a following?  Show people a pattern they can latch onto.  But be careful about it so that you’re not too aggressive.

If you perform somewhere the first Friday of every month, that’s great.  Surely you’d like there to be more bookings at that spot, but take what you can get and know that there’s some value in people being able to “set their watch by it,” as the saying goes.

As an aside, if you’ve just started somewhere and they’ve had you the first Friday of the month this month and last month, unless you’ve got the first Friday of the month booked there for the rest of the year, don’t generalize and start telling people, “Yeah, I’m there every month – first Friday.”  Wait until it’s etched in stone instead of making an assumption.

Are you doing a blog at all?  You don’t have to, but if you do, just be consistent.  Don’t put one out “whenever I feel like it.”  Readers will have no idea when/that the mood struck you and will give up quickly on coming to look to see if you’re posted anything new recently.  If you’re starting from scratch, err on the side of less frequently instead of more frequently so you don’t run out of ideas and start dreading ever having started it in the first place.

Sometimes you might accidentally be doing something consistently that you should be aware of in case people feel it’s a deliberate pattern.  The example here is an established act who has put out a new CD for three years in a row now.  Uh oh.  Whether you intended it that way or not, fans might now be getting used to that and are becoming convinced that they can look for a new release from you every year.  Yikes.

If you’re traveling back and forth, say, to Nashville, once a quarter, that pattern will become distinct and could impress the Music City folks.  Be sure you can plan to stick with it, though, before you start announcing ‘your routine’ to every person whose hand you shake in Nashville.

Oh, and if you came to this blog post because you read about it on social media, that’s because it’s a calendared item to ensure, yup, consistency.