The first thing you need to do when planning a tour is to determine how much upfront money you can invest in your tour. Knowing what your budget is will determine where you go and how long you can stay on the road. For a lot of us independent artists, money is always a factor in what we do. So, I would be remiss if I didn’t warn you from jump that this tour will take money and you will have to invest. This is not to say that the tour wouldn’t be able to pay for itself or you won’t be able to turn a profit. By all means, pursue the profit! In fact, I’ve got a resource to help you make a profit on every tour here. But, you won’t be able to measure your profits until the end of the tour when earnings are tallied. In the meantime, you still have to cover lodging expenses, pay for gas, feed your belly, pay parking fees, and so on. You don’t want to be stranded out there if you didn’t earn as much as you thought you would. That is no fun. Make sure you have the money in the bank, or at least a credit card to hold expenses if you know you can pay it off later. Personally, I use a travel rewards business card to cover upfront expenses for each tour and pay it off at the end of the trip with my tour earnings.
However, if you’re trying to avoid using credit, I will share some ideas about how you can raise upfront money toward the end of this article.
Touring is a dream! It is the most wonderful thing you can do with your music because you get to meet so many people and make new connections on the road that you may not have made otherwise. The more you tour, the more money you can make. Let’s face it, you can only make so much money performing in your hometown. New opportunities are infinite on the road.
There are many ways to book a tour. I’m going to focus this post on how to book a tour for those who are just starting out. Don’t be discouraged. Even if you don’t have any fans, touring is still attainable. In fact, this is how you get fans in other cities – by touring. You just have to start small. If you are new to #roadlife, the best thing to do is try to land an anchor gig. These are well paid shows that make it worthwhile for you to take a trip. I would recommend that you try to shoot for a house concert or a house party that a friend or family member is willing to host for you. Try to keep your first couple of tours short and limited to a few states away. That way you can keep costs down by making the trip short and within driving distance. You could also save money by staying with friends and family for the night.
+Save Money on Tour Lodging ($35 Off AirBnB Coupon)
A house concert or house party is perfect because you don’t have pressure to promote and fill seats. Once a date is confirmed, then try and get another person who lives along the route to host a show. A lot of my tours early on were built around anchor gigs. I would book a college gig, a house concert, a private function, or a niche show. Once I had landed an anchor gig, I would put together a route and find venues along that route to reach out to for booking a performance. There are several different types of shows I can do such as art galleries, coffee shops, listening rooms, hotel lounges, bars/restaurants, farmers markets, and more. I would just go down the list looking at every opportunity until I ran out of opportunities to look into. If I didn’t find anything in a particular city, I’d re-route to a different city and keep going until I landed a show. What’s nice about this method is that once you land an anchor gig that will pay for all or most of your tour, you’re not so worried about the budget because you know it’s covered. You can focus on playing shows that may not pay as much but will help you break into new territories.
If you can’t find anyone to host a house concert for you, try finding shows with some form of a guarantee. IndieOnTheMove.com is a great resource to start with. They offer listings by state and city of venues that host live music. You can also do a quick google search for live music in whatever town you are looking at. You may need to call and ask for the person in charge of booking in this scenario because it’s usually not listed on their website. Another thing you could do is research wineries in the area you will be traveling through. They may have an opening where you could be a good fit. Remember to pay attention to your expenses/earning ratio when booking these shows. If your goal is to have the tour pay for itself, don’t take on shows that will not cover the overall expenses of the tour.
If you haven’t had a chance, take the Free 4-Day e-Course – How to Book Gigs. It is 4 days worth of practical tips you can use to get your own gigs. It includes call scripts, copy and paste e-mail templates, and more to help you keep your gig calendar full.
Now as far as landing a booking, I do have a few tips.
Be realistic about what you can do. Don’t try to book venues that are outside of your league. Book venues that are smaller than what you think you can fill. That way the place will be packed and everyone will think you are hot. Then the next time you perform in that town you can book a venue a little bigger. Stay away from hard ticket venues if you are just starting out. These types of venues rely on you to draw people out. You will have a hard time drawing people out if no one knows about you. Try booking venues that have a built-in audience like coffee shops, bars, etc. Start booking about 3 – 4 months in advance. Most mid-sized venues are typically on a 3 month lead time. If you can’t find any shows or no one is willing to book you, think outside the box. Find open mics, apartment events, rent two parking spaces in a downtown lot during rush hour and call it a rush hour delight show, or even find a place to busk for the evening. Anytime you pull your instrument out and start performing, it’s a show. I don’t care if it’s in your grandmother’s basement, the point is you can play anywhere and if you promote it right, the people will come.
Start off small. Do a series of tours starting with a short 4-day weekend from a Thursday to Sunday in cities close to home. Then on the next tour do those cities and add on another city and keep working your way out from there. Take baby steps. My first tour was a weekend of three shows in Tennessee and Mississippi. I was so excited, I started calling myself a touring artist! You will learn a lot about touring, budgeting, risk-taking, and more on these mini-tours.
Click Here to Download our Free Tour Cost Estimator and find out just how much your next tour will cost.
Where to Get the Money From
I mentioned earlier in this post that you will need some amount of upfront money to invest in this tour. There are ways you can raise money for your music adventures online like GoFundMe and Kickstarter. Additionally, you may be able to raise the money by hosting a tour kick off party. You can host it at your house or a friend’s house and invite your closest friends and supporters. Tell them why you’re doing it and how much money you need to raise. You can do a ticketed show, a donation show, or a mixture of both. I’ve never tried this idea personally, but I saw one show where there was a white board in the front and people paid a dollar to erase the previous contents and write something new on the board. It was a lot of fun because people were writing jokes about other people in the room, so naturally the person who the joke was on wanted to get their name off the board so there was an endless supply of people paying to write something new on the board. I’ve been wanting to try this idea but never had the right environment to do so. Maybe you can try it and tell me how it goes?!?
How do you book your tours? Any tips you’d like to add?
Liked this article? Check out the Tour Series:
5 Benefits to Touring as an Independent Artist
A Sample Tour Budgeting Spreadsheet (Free Download)
A Tour Planning Checklist (Free Printable)
The Fool-Proof Guide to Filling Empty Tour Dates
How to Break Even or Turn a Profit on Your Tour
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