Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Christopher Davis. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Christopher, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. We’d love to start by getting your thoughts on what you are seeing as some the biggest trends emerging in your industry.

To start my name is Chris Davis and I serve as a manager of product strategy for Dreamville records. Before that, I worked at Def Jam recordings and I’ve had my ear to the streets in terms of music for as long as I can remember.

However, music isn’t the same, or shall I say we don’t consume music the same way. Long gone are the days of CDs or cassette tapes. In fact 97% of cars made after 2008 don’t contain CD players. We essentially “lease” the music that we consume, and how that music gets to us is entirely different. If 100,000 songs get uploaded to streaming platforms each day. The real question becomes “how can we get the song to its intended audience”

We believed it was a lack of attention spans, but we series like love island and streamers captivating audiences for hours on end, we know that can’t be the case. The opportunity is there. Continually bridging the gap between music and streaming is essential moving into this new era.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

I currently serve as the manager of Product and Strategy for Dreamville Records. Before that I was a product manager for Def Jam, and before that? I was working at a middle school, planning field trips, taking attendance, helping kids with homework, and more. Lol

My path is different, but it allows me to meet people where they are. It took a ton of networking and I finally got that call for an executive assistant position in 2019. That was my first PAID position in the music industry. Most of us had to grind to get in position.

At both Dreamville and my consulting company (CGD consulting) it is my job to increase the exposure of my artist through various means. Creating marketing drivers, leveraging brands, and more absolutely helps.

I’m most proud of the work I’ve done at Dreamville Festival, but also being apart of artist campaigns for some of the top artists out there. J.Cole, Kanye, Justin Bieber, Big Sean, Jhene Aiko, Teyana Taylor, Coming 2 America, Creed 3 and more.

Something that I’d like potential artists to know is that your first job is to not be discouraged with slow growth. The people you know or even in your home town will not be your first fans…research. Lol But if you stick with it, you can be successful. Use music as exposure, while you venture into other things you’re passionate about.

How do you keep in touch with clients and foster brand loyalty?

Honestly, we’ve become so transactional that we’ve missed the importance of human interaction. Most of the brands or deals that I’ve garnered in the past few years is not because the marketing deck was so good or the pitch was outstanding. I got to know the people, see how they’re doing, talk to them at times we had nothing going on at the label. Eventually, when the time came, I didn’t have to pull any teeth.

Can you share your view on NFTs? (Note: this is for education/entertainment purposes only, readers should not construe this as advice)

I see it as digital art. There are plenty pictures of the Mona Lisa. However, it only exists in one place. That’s what an NFT is to me. You have the original source code, and everything else is just un original. I’ve seen musicians make money off of it, but I don’t think there’s any information on how to do it successfully.

It’ll take sometime before it’s widely accepted, much like anything else.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: imchrisdavis93
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/chrisdavismba/