How Music Industry Veterans Are Creating TikTok Superstars

Founded by hit songwriters with eagle eyes for identifying and launching talent, Proof Of Concept Media has been a quiet force behind some of the most prominent viral campaigns on social media. They've launched the careers of new-media superstars like Dixie D’Amelio and Kato On The Track, and continue to represent the next crop of internet whiz kids. Tune in to hear Billy Mann and Benton James discuss their work, what it takes to find your audience on TikTok, and why achieving viral fame is more complex than people think.

 

Happy Hour Guests

• Billy Mann — Billy is co-chairman and CEO of Proof Of Concept Media and a music industry veteran with over 25 years of experience. His uber-impressive resumé includes time spent as a corporate label boss, Grammy-nominated songwriter, major-label recording artist, session vocalist/musician, bucket-list checking record producer, venture capitalist, entrepreneur, music publisher, artist manager, a digital media pioneer, and philanthropist. He has sold over 110 million albums and has written songs for countless artists, from John Legend, Johnny Mathis, and Backstreet Boys to Take That, Sheryl Crow, Cher, Kelly Rowland, Art Garfunkel, and Sting. Billy is also the longest collaborator of iconic artist P!nk, having worked with the superstar for nearly 20 years producing hits like “God Is A DJ,” “Stupid Girls,” “Dear Mr. President,” “Glitter In The Air,” and more.  
• Benton James — Benton is an American songwriter, musician, entrepreneur, and executive from Philadelphia. He is currently co-CEO of talent firm Proof Of Concept and the label icons+giants, and has worked alongside Kelly Rowland, Raekwon, Paul Wall, Jordin Sparks, and esteemed producers, Redone and Mutt Lang. Benton has signed numerous hip-hop writers/producers who have gained platinum status and Grammy nominations, including Supah Mario, Twhy Xclusive, Jordan Douglas, Kso Jaynes, and Kato On The Track. In 2021, under Benton's guidance, Supah Mario went from working as a janitor to having a global #1 Billboard hit with Drake. He has also written, recorded, and mixed music used in over 200 cable TV shows, including Keeping Up With The Kardashians, Jersey Shore, and the WWE.

The interview was conducted by Songtradr CXO, Victoria Wiltshire.

 

How Proof of Concept is Doing Things Differently.

The first topic discussed was the boutique talent development and creative media firm Billy and Benton co-chair. Billy dove straight into it, explaining that Proof of Concept Media's very essence is in its name. After explaining the nuts and bolts of the brand, he passed the baton to Benton to talk about the importance of chasing down big ideas.

"The name is precisely what it's meant to be," said Billy. "It's great to love a project, an artist, a brand initiative, but the hardest thing for anyone to do is to actually prove their case."

"Songwriters are the greatest entrepreneurs in the world for many reasons. One, we don't even realize we're the greatest entrepreneurs in the world – we're not thinking in that way. But, every day is a proof of concept moment. If we don't write a song that is commercially viable, we don't eat food. That is direct accountability, that is what entrepreneurs need to be made of. Not only that, our existence, and the health of being a songwriter, are also based on a collaborative ecosystem."

"Proof of Concept is taking that way of thinking, and then applying it either to the artists that we sign to develop, the initiatives or the activations that we try to do, or the basic soup to nuts, like Benton discovering Supah Mario working as a janitor and then him going to the top. The list is long. But there's also a long list of artists where we've tried, and it hasn't worked out," explained Billy.

"Our goal is to always prove the concept to whoever it is; the artist or the songwriter or the activation. Our way of holding ourselves accountable is by branding ourselves precisely that, and I think it's given us a lot of good discipline as we've launched."

Benton nodded in agreement, before adding that one of his favorite things has been chasing down big ideas.

"The best part about working with Billy over the years has been the ability to have a large idea and chase it down and execute against it."

"In the best way, it's not just a name," said Benton. "It's come up so many times, in meetings or when we're talking to brands or artists, or whoever we're working within the moment, the goal is to find this big idea, this thing that feels a little larger than life that scares you a little bit, and then go through a put in the executable points to make that a reality. And that is the most fun I have ever had in my life."

 

How to Go Viral on TikTok.

After a short break, our attention turned to a platform Billy and Benton know well – TikTok. Both have had a leading hand in launching the careers of numerous TikTok stars – Dixie D’Amelio and Kato On The Track among them. We asked if there are some foundational things artists can do to ensure their careers begin on the right foot. Billy shared these four tips:

• Be yourself
• Have an interesting narrative
• Know what you stand for
• Have consistency with your point of view

"People like to count on the consistency of an artist," Billy continued. "I'm a huge Sting fan, and one of the reasons I love Sting is because I've watched his musical evolution. There was a musical journey that he was taking, and he took me on it with him. Even though genre-shifts, discovering jazz, soul music, and R&B and then returning to his rock roots, his sensibility as an artist was always the throughline."

"You could use that [same] example for Drake, who has taken his fans on a journey," Billy continued. Or P!nk, who has taken her fans along on her journey to becoming a family person and a working mom. I think those are the stories you want to believe in. And if you approach TikTok from a place that is clear, and the story and what you stand for is clear, I wouldn't veer too far off that path once you see something connect."

"I think the area where a lot of artists suffer is when they try five different things and then get frustrated because it's not connecting. You just have to keep going and push yourself to be interesting."

Billy then tossed it over to Benton, who explained that Proof of Concept has always believed it's OK to fail – provided you learn from it.

"We work with Kato On The Track, who is probably one of the most consistent social media users. When things weren't working for him he didn't stop. He would fail. He would learn. And then he would do it again."

"Kato didn't want to do TikTok. He was against it. He didn't understand the app. But he got on it, he spent a couple of weeks with it, and then he started posting. And he's had success – he continues to have things go viral. The same with Instagram. And it's really because he stays consistent. He posts on this day, he learns something from it, and then he does it again."

"A lot of people want to know the secret to his sauce – and it really is simple. He just keeps making it over and over until he gets to perfection. It's fail, learn, and then fail again until you're successful."

Presenting another example of an artist using TikTok to scale their career, Billy noted that classical pianist BlkBok went from 0 to 22K subscribers in a matter of months. "For a neo-classical pianist on TikTok, that's an outrageous [number]. We didn't pay for that; that's him putting in the work and telling his story," said Billy.

"I think it can be frustrating when people feel like it's not connecting, but sometimes you can't say it's everybody's fault. Sometimes it's you, not them, and you need to think, are my songs really that good? Is this my strength? Am I being true to myself – which, by the way, is a harder conversion. A lot of people are unknowingly derivative of people they like."

After sharing some hard truths, ground-level pointers, and philosophical ideas around creating viral content, our guests were then asked about the logistics of making a content piece work well on TikTok.

"The reality is that the stuff that really works is raw, unfiltered, and looks terrible," explained Benton. "For all the people that want to talk about the positioning of cameras and all of those things, people miss the opportunity to just put content out and not overthink it."

"There have been so many times where I've sat in a conversation and people are talking about lighting and choosing a song that's trending. All those things sound good, but honestly... as I swipe through things, what hits me in the mouth is someone that's talented and doesn't look shiny and bright like everyone else."

"Totally," replied Billy. "I've worked with Alex Aiono since he was a teenager, and he went on YouTube and invented the mash-up. And when he invented the mash-up, his set-up was a laptop, a little keyboard, a couple of KRK speakers, and he was in the living room in a little apartment where he lived with his family. He just showed up with it every week, and he was consistent. And when people saw it, they felt a sense of discovery."

"But on a practical basis," adds Billy, "sometimes someone is singing from the backseat of a car, and that's what they do on their way to school every day. That's just raw and real. But to someone that's asking, how do I catch that algorithmic wave? Some of it is just looking at what's trending. Look at the trending songs, pay attention to them, and sometimes just look at what's on the way up."

 

Advice For Emerging TikTok Entrepreneurs

Having explained that raw, authentic content is most potent across the TikTok platform, our guests then shared their best advice for emerging entrepreneurs. "Do it all," was Billy's immediate answer.

"You have got to look for who you are first. And once you've done that and want to express yourself, express yourself on all these platforms – or as many as you can stand. Forget about being an artist or a celebrity; just being a person and finding your tribe is a real quest. It's not easy. It's why kids in middle school have the toughest time because they're becoming themselves and trying to find who they are and who they connect with. I think it's the same for artists with their fans, even the musicians, the producers, the songwriters they work with – finding your tribe is hard. But if it's approached like an expedition or like it's a delicacy, the way you factor in these social platforms is going to all stem from that same point of creation which has got to be based on something real within a person." 

"There are people that just wanna be famous – they don't really care what they have to do to do it. They just want attention. That is a hole in a person's heart that will never be filled by likes, follows, money, or drugs. I pray for those people," said Billy.

"It really is about finding where the people who are passionate about you live. If they live on Instagram, go there. If they live on TikTok, go to TikTok. But you've got to try both and give it your all to see what that is.

"If you can start off with a thousand fans that really care, you can scale. But if you try to get a whole bunch of people that just want to see you run naked through a parking lot; that trick might work for a minute, but then it's gonna be over, and who wants to stay around for that? Build with bricks and mortar, not with feathers and balsa wood thinking it will last forever. Because it won't."

Before adding his own insight, Benton noted that he doesn't particularly like pontificating about a perfect formula because it suggests there is a right answer. Instead, Benton spoke about his personal experience and relayed that it has been a very nonlinear path. "There were times when things went really well," he said. "But there were times when things went terribly. There were times when I made some really bad decisions that I thought were great decisions, or sometimes made some decisions very flippantly that ended up working out."

"The thing that has always resonated with me is the ability to continue. It's always been a goal of mine to just be heading in a direction and be doing something that I'm really passionate about day in, day out. And whatever that looked like, it was always rewarding for me."

"I don't know exactly what an entrepreneur should do, and I think if you asked successful entrepreneurs person to person, there is probably a throughline of self-discipline and sacrifice. But overall, I think the stories are very different because people are different."

"I try to remain as authentic as I can, work as hard as I can, and be grateful, and that has led me to a cool place. Maybe those three things can do the same for someone else."

 

Our Guests Answer Your Questions About TikTok

Each Happy Hour concludes with a selection of questions from our social media community. If you don't already follow us, head on over to our Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and LinkedIn pages and hit that subscribe button.

How do I get my song to trend on TikTok?

"Anybody that tells you they know the answer to that question is not being honest with you," answered Billy. "The best way is to be consistent, be yourself, and not be hard on yourself if it takes time to build a following." Billy's best advice: Google it.

"Last year, during the pandemic, Kato On The Track was convinced by myself and one of our other teammates to start posting on TikTok. So he started posting, and around Christmas, he posted a beat. A young woman named Reyanna Maria in Australia, who had just got on the app, writes a freestyle to that beat, and this song takes off like a rocket. I remember talking to Kato, and he was like, 'this young lady from Australia did this thing. It looks like it could be something.' And then, three weeks later, I am on calls all day with Australians trying to complete a deal. I would love to be able to tell you that I knew exactly how this happened, but the reality is that he just put it up."

How can I become a partner?

"We're available on social media. We have a record label with Warner Music Group called icons+giants. We get a lot of people messaging in; I can't say we look at everything, but we try. So one way to contact us is to start with icons+giants.

How has TikTok changed the music industry, and how do you see it continuing to change?

"There are a lot of people who are trying to catch lightning in a bottle on TikTok, and I think that because we were all stuck in a pandemic and everyone was trying to execute on that app and try to go viral – it feels like it's been a bit anemic to overall artist growth and more about trying to catch that moment," explained Benton.

"For a lot of us on the music industry side who hunt through and do the research, you get some of these moments, but you don't get very developed artists. That's been a challenge because you might want a song that feels like it has so much potential, but the human that's created the song has to play catch up from an artist's perspective. So in a way, I feel like it's made the artist space anemic and the single space full of sounds that have gained traction. It'll continue to change, but what's most exciting is what it'll look like when the world opens up for everyone, and there are performances and other things. Hopefully, that leads to more growth on the artist side." 

What are some of your favorite TikTok campaigns?

"The one I love is the one we did with Jasmine," answered Billy. "It was called We Win Together – it was a hashtag on TikTok – and we partnered with Grey advertising. This was done around the last presidential election when people were really divided. It wasn't meant to be for a single candidate or a single party, but it was more of a huggable moment on TikTok." 

 

Watch the full panel discussion:

 

Watch other Songtradr Happy Hour Sessions in full:

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• Meet the Team Behind the Classical Pop Covers on Bridgerton
• Reporting on Music in the Digital Age
• WeTransfer and the Intersection of Music, Business, and Tech
• The Art of Placing Music in Sports Content
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• The Power of Women in Music
• Making Music for Ads: The Do's + Don'ts
• Music Placements that Break the Mold
• Creating Killer Artist Images
• Hip Hop Deconstructed with Murs
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• Power Songwriting for Sync Placement
• Up Close and Personal with Hit Filmmaker Jon Turteltaub
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• Music for Gaming: What's Working + What's Ahead
• Balancing Branding with Artistry
• Music Through the Ages: Soundtrack or Catalyst for Change?
• How to Make Money with Your Music: Monetization Tips for Indie Artists
• Music Supervisor Roundtable: How the Music & Media Business Has Been Impacted by COVID-19 

 

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