"Becoming a Doro MegaSuperStar: Image is everything"

Becoming a successful musician is very alluring; celebrity status, special treatment, lucrative deals and international travel amongst other perks. However, the journey to the top is a little less straight forward.

Joining the rank of the A-listers like Tuface, Wizkid, Davido, Psquare etc is one of the most elusive endeavours. It’s usually a blend of two things; hit songs and a vibrant image, especially a vibrant image.

For you to be considered a great musician you actually have to have the music, and there are many examples of artistes who their sheer music prowess has catapulted them to fame viz: 9ice, Flavour, Adekunle Gold, Sean Tizzle, Yemi Alade etc. These musicians didn’t sign mega deals at established labels or get featured by A-listers. Their songs just filtered through and everyone fell in love. Their art made a way for them. However, music alone is not enough, if you search in the undergrounds and you will see many talented artistes who unfortunately will never see the light of day.

If we consider that the basic requirement for becoming a successful musician is talent, then the single most important factor is image (or brand, or popularity or whatever else you choose to call it). Many musicians had big first songs but tailed off after that because they couldn’t sustain it. At the Headies in 2014, Slyde and Reekado Banks were going head to head for Rookie of the year which Reekado won even though “Banana” was more popular than “Chop Am” at the time. 10 months later, and it turns out to be spot on. Slyde has roughly about 10k followers on Instagram and Twitter while Reekado has 320k on both platforms. Also this year, Reekado has dropped Katapult and signed a glo endorsement deal amongst other things just to put things in perspective.

Having a vibrant image will help you do these amongst other things:

GET SHOWS

When your image is really strong, it will help you generate a lot of demand. Your teeming fanbase will want to connect with you physically. Also, the more your popularity, the more the value you can place on yourself when charging for shows.

PUT YOU ON THE MAP

Record sales are no longer major revenue drivers for Nigerian muisicians. Brand affiliation, ambassadorship etc are the new cool and since brands leverage on the popularity of these stars, you won’t get a shout till you reach a certain awareness level.

HELP WITH PROMOTION OF NEW SONGS

Previously, musicians had to seek favour from radio stations, TV stations, DJs and the entire ecosystem but gradually the musicians are becoming major forces in the dissemination of their own content thanks to Twitter, Instagram, Youtube Channels etc. Godwin became popular in a week as a result of lip syncing and viral sharing which was featured in the video of the song.

MAKE YOUR MORE FAMOUS

As a popular artiste, other (established and upcoming) artistes will look to leverage on your brand by featuring you and this will further increase your popularity.

Don Jazzy paid a lot of attention to his image even back when D’banj was the star of the show. He put in a lot of work on social media and now he’s not only the Don of Mavin but arguably the Nigerian music space. In a recent interview with Tech Cabal, he buttressed how important social media is and detailed how it has catapulted him to the heights he has reached.

Falz had no established platform to rely on and was and was doing a unique genre. His adept use of social media however, has propelled him to stardom. He grew his Instagram following by 1000% since December 2014, going from 15k to 150k on in just over 9 months and with it has come many other things; fashion lines, BBM stickers and he’s brand ambassador of two technology companies. His image is definitely paying off.

So dear upcoming artist, in all you’re getting, get famous. Put in work on your image.