When should artists say yes to an unpaid gig?
Playing for exposure isn’t automatically a bad deal.
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Let’s dive into today’s topic:
When should artists say yes to an unpaid gig?
Early-phase acts get this email constantly: Come perform for beers and for the exposure, because our audience is huge and it’ll be so good for you. Exposure is not a currency, and most of these offers deserve a straightforward no. But not all of them.
Why it matters
My starting point for this edition was an early draft titled “never play for free”. But that blanket advice is too simple. It lets artists off the hook from figuring out what their time is worth.
Nobody would turn down an underpaid Super Bowl halftime slot. That level of exposure is invaluable, and not a single artist would turn it down for lack of monetary reward. Artists shouldn’t refuse every unpaid offer on principle. Instead, it’s valuable to understand the difference between an offer that’s genuinely below market value and one that only looks that way because you haven’t defined your market value yet.
How it works
Every offer an artist receives is a trade. Venue promoters aren’t guessing what to offer you. As with every product or service people buy, they’re pattern-matching to what they believe you’re worth. Artists can teach the market to expect.
The reward doesn’t have to be cash. What matters is that the artist names the reward honestly and weighs it against what they believe they’re currently worth. Market value is a claim an artist makes about themselves, and every accepted offer either confirms or resets that claim:
Free beers signal “hobby,” not “career”. It’s fine for acts who genuinely see themselves that way.
Exposure to a genuinely bigger audience can move a career forward, but the promoter is pricing your market value at €0,00.
A €10 door fee, a €500 guarantee, a €10k festival fee: all legitimate, depending entirely on where you actually are right now.
Whatever you accept becomes the number the next promoter starts from. Say yes to €150 because a friend was promoting, and the next offer is €150 too, they’ve no reason to offer more.
Yes, but..
None of this means saying no to every unpaid offer on principle. Sometimes the point is getting into a room you can’t otherwise reach. A support slot for an artist whose fans should become your fans can be worth more than the €200 a random Tuesday show would pay.
Avoid turning down every early opportunity while waiting for an offer that matches a market value you haven’t yet built. Before you have a track record, the honest answer to “what am I worth” is sometimes just: “not much yet”, and that’s fine.
Take action now
Artists can pick one number today (a minimum guarantee, a minimum door fee, a minimum audience size) and hold it for the next show request that lands in their inbox.
Your thoughts
Further reading
Market value is the music industry’s hidden currency (The Fanbase Builder)
Why your live show should be more than just your album played loud (The Fanbase Builder)
What do you sell as an artist? (The Fanbase Builder)
The limits of business logic in music (The Fanbase Builder)