Hey, everybody. Welcome to 30 tips in 30 days in three minutes or less, I realize this is almost impossible, but we're going to have a lot of fun with it and take the challenge. So in this tip, I want to talk about becoming an original, the four questions that all headliner levels answer almost. Whether you're Garth Brooks, Taylor swift, Queen Van Halen Journey.

Um, you answer these questions, you answer them one of two ways. One is instinctively and intuitively or the other is mentally you're conceptually making a mental decision to answer and go a certain direction. So this is super abbreviated from the full Hacking music training. But. I want to get this into you so you can begin thinking about it.

So a bit about the ERC framework, the ERC framework is invaluable for artists and entrepreneurs. It allows you and your team to understand what has to be done to become an, an original in a business full of complex. As your team grows this earth framework that I'm about to give you serves as a tool that allows your team to generate answers for yourself.

So I want you to think of these as kind of steering wheels, handlebars, that you're going to be steering and making little Iterative changes throughout your career. Um, and the home ground of this tip came out of Harvard in a book called the blue ocean strategy. And we were fortunate to. Launched the original hacking music book there at Harvard a few years ago.

But the idea of the book is that there are blue oceans and there are red oceans. Red oceans are littered with competition. They're bloody. The sharks are eating everything. You're competing on price and there's not a lot of originality there. But if you're in a blue ocean, you are an original think of Tesla. Think of Apple,  The band Journey. Think of Taylor Swift. Think of Garth Brooks. You can only get Garth Brooks with Garth Brooks. Your Going one of two ways. You're either building towards a red ocean or building towards a blue ocean. So that's the big concept of a blue ocean strategy. So lets look at the benefits of the ERRC framework here.

There's four benefits:

 First is that it forces originality music. Artists are pushed in new directions in a manner that benefits them, maybe in ways they don't want to go, but they need to go. 

The second benefit is that it requires. Allignment. Teams are given clarity. As they answer these questions in a day-to-day level. 

The third benefit is that it requires honesty completing these questions as a team or individually, is a little bit of a challenging task and it encourages the team or yourself as the artist to honestly scrutinize everything about the current condition of your business.

The fourth benefit is that it encourages whole brain thinking. Often artists like to just be on the right side of their brain and, and be the creative unicorn. These questions kind of force you to think about the whole brain about the left and the right brain about the content and the platform in a way that really benefits you as an artist.

So those are the four benefits forces. 

1. Originality, 

2. Requires teams to align 

3. Requires honesty,

4. It encourages whole brain. 

All right. So the four questions think of these as handlebars. 

The first question is this, Which factors should be eliminated from what is currently an industry standard or popular.?

So eliminated what needs to be gotten rid of? You can think of this through e-commerce you can think of this through your show. You could think of this through your mix approach. You could think of these as songwriting, uh, what needs to be eliminated. First handlebar, 

Second question. Is this what factors should be reduced? What are we going to do less of well below? What is currently an industry standard or popular for most artists? You want to think about, is it though e-commerce we want to reduce, is it social media? We want to reduce, is it be an imitative and chasing the Beatles and the rolling stones and the nostalgia porn that's out there. What needs to be reduced? 

Third question is what factors need to be raised. We're going to really focus on these and increase these. Maybe this is your newsletter signup. Maybe this is your e-commerce. Maybe these are promotions. Maybe this is product . Maybe these are experiences the micro-moments on your shows that really connect you to your audience. Number 3: What factors should be raised well above? What is the current industry? 

And the last question is this, what factors should be created or invented that are currently not offered? So what are you going to start doing that nobody else is doing again, think about it through e-commerce think about it through your experiences, maybe your live streaming or social media, maybe think about your promotions and your products are. What are you going to create that has never been offered? 

So these are the four handlebars, the four questions that you're going to ask. Iterative iteratively throughout your career. Maybe it's weekly. Maybe it's monthly, maybe it's daily, but these four questions will get you out of a red ocean and start moving you towards a blue ocean.

So that's tip number one, becoming an original, the four questions that all headliner artists answer in their career. We'll see you next time.