My Journey down the Master’s Road At Full Sail University

In the beginning I felt I was here to meet the man behind the curtain like on “The Wizard Of OZ,” but like Dorothy, the tin man, the cowardly lion, and the scarecrow I have found my way to the end of the journey I came to see. The skills and accomplishments that I came to learned about and achieve was on the lines of being able to create Pro Forma Financial Statements for the third time of my career, getting and maintaining a good understanding of Entertainment Branding, Publishing and Distribution, which gave me a better insight to what I had been doing since I started my business of Aicid Records and Entertainment LLC, I added on more knowledge of Digital Marketing like my teacher from my first marketing class told me before I came to Full Sail to learn more of, I gained the real understanding of legal matters as they pertain to the entertainment industry like litigation, deal making and drafting contracts, and last but not least the successful writing and presentation of a complete business plan, which gave me the outline of my fifth business and marketing plan for my entertainment company.

Media Literacy and Research Methodologies

I can’t lie the first class that I took was all about Media Literacy and Research Methodologies this class got me on track with research and how to post it in my presentations. The need for this throughout the classes were a good help especially writing in APA Format for research papers that I would be doing throughout my career.

 Executive Leadership

            The executive leadership class was taught from the greatest books known to businessmen all around the world. The books were the 48 Laws of power by Robert Green and Developing the Leader Within You by John C. Maxwell. This class gave me the view and teachings of looking at who was my example of who was close to my style of leadership and I did my report on Sean “P. Diddy” Combs and his come up from past to present. We must know these books to get the good and the bad of the industry and these books showed me so much.

Project and Team Management

            Project and team management was a good class because at the time I was putting together a karaoke night at, “Club Flirt.” This club was on the west side of Orlando Florida, which by the end of my month of this class I helped to put together a show for the Chicago rapper known as Rich Law, which went well but I feel it could of went better but, I was glad that out of all the performances I have put together this one was done on a larger level and far away from home, which allowed me to be seen by others not just my home town people.

Business Storytelling and Brand Development

            This class helped me to think on the rebranding of Aicid Records and Entertainment. LLC and learning the rules of what the colors, sizes, fonts along with learning what is considered clean and noisy in the marketing field of entertainment as well as the business industry. We must know that the brand must stand for something so that the consumer can relate to the products that company can put out and grab the audience the company would like to achieve to bring in.

Entertainment Business Finance

In this class I learned how to make and read the Pro Forma for my business. This was my fifth time doing this but it was also a good learning experience for me to get into practice for my future in finance. In my economics class this was used to do company research and also it also helped me to see what is the moneymaker of the business that I am researching. My love for this class sent me on a journey to write on the company of, Bad Boy Enterprises owned and ran by Sean “P. Diddy Combs. This class really put me on the road to what I wanted to know about being a real businessman and I would like to say that the late Professor Michael Koch will be missed and thank you for all the information in this class R.I.P to the best Finance teacher I have ever met in my walk to understanding business math for finance.

Negotiation and Deal-Making

            If you would like to know about contracts this is the class you would love to take. This class taught me so much on how to get the best contracts out of any deal and how to work toward a win-win situation for both sides. The saying is you are as good as the deal u make. I plan to be the best I can be because of what I was taught throughout this class. The class was so good that after each negotiation we were to draft out contracts to the deals. This was so intuitive that we really learned so much in knowing what was the industry standards of what is considered to be all about what can be done to give and take through these negotiations that most artist or businesses make with movie stars, event contracts, and also sponsorship packages for clients. I learned so much that I redid my company’s contracts for my artist for future business that I will be working on when I get out of school in October and I am so glad this was part of my curriculum.

Product and Artist Management

            I feel that all people that want to be in the industry that I am in should go through this course. It showed us the job description of every part of the industry as being representatives of clients that we may have to represent. The use of all that we learned was putting your client with a product that can help boost the artist or actor’s revenue and base of costumers by this method. Even though some artist does not feel this is right it is part of a revenue stream that helps the manager get a percentage and the product and the spokesperson can have a relationship and bring them both monetary pay for the help on both sides. I believe in synergy through products, artist, and other companies that are looking to find spokespeople to help spread their brands. This is the class that really allowed me to choose and pick what companies and brands my artist would like for me to strike deals with just to get them the sponsorships that they would need so I thank Full Sail for this class to the upmost.

Advanced Entertainment Law

            If you ever want to get to the ingredients of intellectual properties and knowing what they are then this is the class for you. I learned more on what it takes to stay out of court for our work as musicians and producers of the music industry and not to mention how to get royalties and payouts for everyone that I am and will be doing business with. We must know these things while moving forward into our fields of expertise in the entertainment business. We had to make an intellectual work like a song, video, or commercial then copyright it and publish the work for credit. I loved that this was what I was here for to know exactly what, how, and when to do the procedures of pay, paperwork, and the companies to put all rights under for the law to stand to cover all works done from our artist and myself as a music writer.

Entertainment Media Publishing and Distribution

            This part of the business classes were to put together a real project and distribute it through real time efforts of publishing through ASCAP, BMI, or music publishing houses to get the intellectual properties placed to be sold or downloaded even counted for music plays or sales through the Harry Fox Agency/Sound Exchange. I learned more about Amazon and how the company was one of the biggest companies to help agent free artist, writers, and game makers to get their content out to the masses. We want to be able to gain our clients by knowing the how and this class shows us that. We are the future of this industry and if we can’t get into the fields that we want to be in then we are able to build our clientele by learning and knowing these things. This class was a blast and I hope to all that read this could understand that this class can make you to be the best in media publishing and distribution by doing it ourselves.

Digital Marketing – Lecture

            This lecture class showed us Photo Shop, how we can calculate the outcome of different campaigns,  and Internet counts of whom checks the websites by using tools like Google Analytics and Mail Chimp, which are used for email marketing. The class was very needed so we could understand how to use the Web to market for different companies wanting different results for their company. To me it was more of an introduction to apart of marketing that I was not really showed in other marketing classes that I have taken. We work with Festivals of Speed to consult them on their marketing campaign for their upcoming show in November and December of this year.

This consulting opportunity gave my team and I a chance to put something together that was real and could be done if the Festivals of Speed uses our recommendations.

Business Plan Development

            The Business Plan class was exciting as my entrepreneur class back in my Bachelors Degree Program at Elizabeth State University back in North Carolina. The difference in this last class then any other that I have taken is that the Investors of this time like less paper to tell what you want from them then a 92 page business plan for funding. My class and I learned how to write our plans out to get what we asked for with a direct approach to Angle Investors, private funding groups, and even Crowd funding groups as well. This class was the best because I was able to use all my classes to come up with the last project of my business plan so I can get funding for my work as an entertainment business owner. I also learned in this course how to look for jobs that were in good interest to me just incase I don’t end up in the industry that I love to be in.

Conclusion

            The aim was met by my journey and even though I was suppose to make this out to look and be different I am only a businessman. I don’t know all the input to be that creative, but I do know how to write and tell my readers how I can help them. This is for the consulting firm of my business so if you want to check out my blog spots on http://advanceintelligence.blogspot.com and http://theblockizhot.blogspot.com These are my sites dedicated to get my readers into wanting to know the real way of building and getting into the Entertainment industry without being taking advantaged of so even though this is written I hope that all that is read will show and touch you to know that through it all you too can be the man/woman controlling things behind the curtain.

           

The summary of the “Experts” Of Business planning

The first blog that I was ran to read when I fnally found the topic,”10 Top Business Plan Mistakes.” By Andrew Clarke the CEO of Ground Floor Partners the company is a consulting firm that helps early stage, smaill and middle-market business growth through design and execution of sound business strategies. This blog was very informative to me because it reinforced the critic of going over your work. You would want to have all your paperwork right the first time so that there is a complete understaning to your investors that you are about your business and would like to be respected through my work not just for the business itself. The part of the blog that realy caught my attention was,”#5. The plan is too detailed.” He spoke on not being too vagued in the earlier numbers before. I felt he was quoting to me in general because we know that the investor needs to know our ideas but a straight 92 page paper will not be good for humorist reading. He made a formula that has three steps to execute this area of a good business plan. He stated this, “plan into three parts: a two- to three-page executive summary, a 10- to 20-page business plan and an appendex that includes as many pages as needed to make it clear that you know what you’re doing. This way, anyone reading the plan can get the amount of detail he or she wants.” Andrew Clark, Starting a Business (2011) retrieved 8/2/14 from http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/81188.

The way that most of us think is that the investor doesn’t want to be to informed because you don’t want to bore them. This states that you can not be too clear to get what you want them to read out of your business plan. Just like in the blog on tips that are posted on their blog spot www.angleinvestorfunding.com where they state that, “You should create a business plan that emphasizes your sustainable competitive advantage.” This is for them to know that the entry way into the industry that you are trying to get into. The way that the investor feels comfortable enough to know okay this is how we can break into the industry and start to make the money for more capitol to keep the business moving. Retrived 8/9/14 fron

http://www.angelinvestorfunding.com/tentips.htm.

 I agree with these concepts because of everyone wants to tell you, “aint nobody going to give you money off of an idea.” The thing people fail to understand that is their job. Our job as enterpenuers is to put the dream out there shoing the concepts and the budgets that can show a profit for the idea.  We have to do the work of research and emplymenting what work or have worked in the past. If the cart aint broke then don’t fix it you have to add to it to make it better but with your own formula to show gain. These Blogs give me more knowledge how to deal with these organizations and how to be the better business man now that I know the people and how they want their business plans to be for easy reading.

I just looked at a feature on wsj.com youtube page where they ere doing a segment on 50 Cents and SMS Headphones this was a wake up call because they also talked about new products and plans for better headphones and other ventures that they will be putting out. They spoke on how he does all of this new product line and do acting, music, and other ventures and he said, “good business venture teams.” This is why I found this blog article that  asks, “Should start-up Founders Forget About Business Plans?” With this blog it hit close to home how the operation of wanting to get in the marketing software field is very locrative being that Hubspot landed a $16 million dollar deal. This is before it was even put up to market for any investors.

Brian Halligan the Hubspot Chief Executive and founder said, “there are three documents that start-ups need when raising venture capital for the time. A PowerPoint presentation that is ten slides long, a one-page executive summary, and a “fictitious” pro forma income statement. This is better than a business plan because not one venture group asked him for a business plan.” I always though this way but there are so many firms that still believe in this form of getting to know the plans for the company that they might want to invest into. Retrived 8/9/14 from

http://blogs.wsj.com/venturecapital/2009/12/13/should-start-up-founders-forget-about-business-plans/.

I feel that this is not absolutely true but if you can get the meeting with a good investment group then it would be better this way instead of setting in front of someone hopeing to read all the pages for the business plan that may be very long in length. The investors that I have seen only skim through the business plan and when they get to the numbers they tend to ask questions about the executive summary so that they can put together what the numbers are for and what exactly you are going to do if you get their investment. I know that the world of business is changing but if getting the funding you need is needed to be that simple than the future should be very good for me because I have been in the business of writing business plans for a long time now and to get one finally approved this could be the starting of a new and geood career for me in general.

In all nature I am considering using the first two for school purposes but for ral life I would use the secondary wave of putting together the PowerPoint slides and a true Pro forma of an income statement and answer questions to the investors. These three blogs were what I needed to know and I feel the last blog was ment for more real time use but it all depends on the Investment company and how they like their formats of business plans. With all honesty though I would love to use the steps  of Brian Halligan the Hubspot Chief Executive and founder.

My training from the Experts

I started my month hungry and eager to learn how to distribute and market all the intellectual products that can help my musical team, record label and my consulting clients. My expectations were that I would gain the knowledge to know the next steps to get my foot in the door of the music industry and be strongly educated in the companies to work with, the procedures used by the industry, and how to work the product through my growing company as well.

When I looked at my class I looked at it as being taught by the best chefs in the business of cooking. Now that the class is coming to an end I feel that the process has been helped by the break down of learning there is more than one way to sale products, and help place CD’s/DVD’s, written music, radio spins and movies. The knowledge of knowing marketing and promoting on a do-it-yourself basis was also a good learning experience from this class as well.

With me being the President and owner of my own entertainment company I have the knowledge to apply the materials I have learned for my own personal music and videos that I have accumulated over time. My personal work will be able to be placed in different genre of music fields, commercial placements, and leased for others that may want to perform them rather than any of my clients’ works. On the professional side of things I received the very knowledge I was seeking to know how to use my two publishing houses to gain avenues for the intellectual products of my clients that write music, do voice-overs, and for performing rights.

With all of this knowledge learned, the goals left I feel will be met in the next classes that will help me and my company become one of the best entertainment moguls built for the people and by the people. Aicid Records and Entertainment LLC will know the industry and know how to get the job done.

My consulting career & Learning how to build it

I know that most of my readers are here to learn about the business that is very saturated and you are looking to be guided to success. This month in my class Entertainment Media Publishing and Distribution I learned how to prepare a true blue print of avenues to gain the most out of making money with the Intellectual property that artists and companies make after their copyrights are summited and also published through publishing houses. Wouldn’t you wonder how it works and works the right way so you can save money and also make your path to success a stable one? It is about the numbers and we need to understand that without the numbers to the industry you are just the next person working and hoping to make it to the point that your work pays off.

The cycle that has been showed to artist is making the music copyright the music and join ASCAP, BMI, or SEASAC Publishing houses. This is true but how do you get your music out there? Did someone say get it on the radio air waves, post it on Sound Cloud, burn mix CD’s and give them away or even put the music on ITunes? Well, all these can be done but do you know the mathematics to how doing all this is missing two things in order to make you more money than just being famous? To answer these questions you can stop making more mix tape music that can land you in court and start making more original music that brings me to the point to tell you that no matter where you put your music if no one knows you and no one is moving your project as a solicited work the big entertainment companies are not interested in you or your music. Most companies do not deal with unsolicited music, which means you just are just sending in work for nothing. Joining or finding the right type of agent is needed for the roles you need done. As an artist you need to know that marketing and representation is needed and the way to get paid from more than putting music in the internet base stores or shelves of the brick and mortar stores like mom and pop stores or wholesalers to get your project on the market.

With the next blogs that will becoming out the treatment for any obstacle that you may encounter the company that we can send you to can be found at www.aicidrecords.com and the consulting email address is info@aicidrecords.com for all your questions and answers to how you can get more out of your Intellectual products like licensing for movies, games, and commercials. You can also find consulting for the main companies to deal with for major distribution aggregators and companies that can solicit your music to major labels and all you need to know is the industry standard for music and video work, and percentages that are paid for their services. With this knowledge you can plan and succeed in this business but with no plan you will be eaten alive and the sharks will not have mercy to help you gain if it doesn’t make a gain for them as well.

This blog should of helped you readers to understand that the internet isn’t anything but a tool and if you depend on it instead of gaining the knowledge you need to make it to the level you want to be at then save your time and money and get a career in anything else but music. Build relationships, teams, and a plan with a budget.

My law course this month

This month law course touched on every aspect of why I wanted to be here for my learning adventure. Advance Entertainment Law showed me the legal obligations from a business-to-business and business-to-consumer standpoint. The learning of safeguarding your intellectual property the right way is a must in this industry. Most artist and new comers think that it is all about making the music and it is not just about the music.

This month of learning taught me answers to: How would you get paid for what you made in the studio? What channels are you trying to take your career down? How do you get placement in movies and commercials? How can you use sampled music without being sued? These are some main questions that I was confronted with and now I found my answers. This month has also helped me find my way to become narrow minded to how to get where I want to go successfully. The education that I obtained as of entertainment contracts, management contracts, intellectual auditing, and licensing for product use was just what I wanted to learn.

The concepts I learned can be used to offer good service to any artist that would like a well-informed manager to look after them. Also, the lessons will be able to help me shop their music, videos, or other intellectual property that would find them work or sale from the artist.

Now that the information has been shown to me on how to license, publish, trademark, correctly copyright lyrics, and the real extinct of the law of intellectual property infringement, I feel that I know that the upper hand has been passed to me, and the future that has been in my mind all these years can now be brought to life.