How to Attract an Agent, Publisher, or Label

From Portfolio to Platform to Preparing Your Pitch

In the publishing world, most agents won’t even consider a prospective author without an established platform. Same goes for the music industry. Without a platform, you are simply not worth the risk to them. So let’s put the work in and get established — before we think about attracting an agent.

This might come as good news. It means that you can stop spending all your time sending emails, pitching, and cold calling. Unless you have a proven platform and an established presence, this will likely be wasted effort anyway. Instead, let’s start setting up a business around your creative work to demonstrate to industry partners that you are a worthy investment.

Before we go through this point by point, here’s the great thing about this plan. Even if it doesn’t work — and you don’t secure an industry partner — it’s still a good business plan. Either way, you’re running your own business as a creative. You want to put yourself in a position to succeed, no matter which path you take.

Let’s go through everything you need to get started, in the form of a checklist. Obviously, there are a lot of nuances that go into setting everything up. What follows is an overview to help lay out the most important baseline activities.

Set Up Your Basic Business Infrastructure

1. Your website. Online hub = required.

• Start with simple “landing page” site; expand it into a portfolio.
• Tell your story in clear language and images.
• An About page and a call-to-action (a contact/subscribe form).
• No “digital sharecropping,” this has to be on your own site.

2. Your email list. Start this immediately.

• Email is your “conversion instrument,” way more effective than social.