We’re back again for another episode of Money & Music Talks, for the fourth installment this season. In this ‘background’ episode, we’re getting to know Dev Tejwani, who is our Chief Marketing Officer here at the AFP. He’s also got a number of other intriguing titles to his name – former CEO of popular Hip Hop Blog “TeamBackPack”, principal of Tejwani Enterprises, and a partner at the company MPWR labs.

The Marketing Genius

In this episode of “Money and Music Talks”, Dev starts off by telling us about his deep connection with marketing and social media, and how he engages with his audience on the web. He’s worked with all sorts of people- musicians, influencers and businesses. Dev states that his main goal is to “create audiences that pay for shit recording artists are selling”, which sounds like a perfect goal to us.

He then goes on to discuss how the AFP is about financial empowerment and artist empowerment and how it exists for the creator’s benefit- and shares how he’s been in the same position that some of the artists working with the AFP are in. Dev talks about AFP and how it can help take an artist from a starting position and help them evolve exponentially.

What Dev Does

After being asked, by the AFP team, about what he does for the artists – Dev mentions the different resources that he utilizes for recording artists and talks about how he helps them get that boost that they may never have had, had they not been a part of Artist Financial Program.

The team then discusses the Artists Financial Program Resource Network; going over all of the benefits that AFP provides… like songwriting, producing, styling, web development, marketing and more. Dev notes how important web development is in this context, and then goes on to share his key tools and tactics for promoting artists.

The Journey

Dev is then asked how he got into this path of Marketing recording artists, to begin with. He mentions how he was learning to build websites and understand the internet, back in 2001. Dev got into hip-hop in college and identifies this as one of the most important influences in his life. The team then asks him about other companies that he’s worked for; Dev discusses all of them and talks about how the internet has been an insanely useful tool to work with.

The conversation then turns to the importance of financial empowerment and supporting creators, and Dev shares his personal experience with working for a company that did not empower him financially. It’s great to hear personal stories, especially in this sort of context, as it highlights the importance of what we’re doing here for artist empowerment at the AFP.

The future of AFP

Dev is asked where AFP will be going in the future, and mentions key artists that AFP has signed to begin with. The conversation turns to the importance of funding again, with the team discussing how succeeding as an artist really does require a day job or some sort of investment.

Dev’s call-to-action here is for artists to find one key resource to help artists get to the next level. He mentions partners, AFP and investors, then discusses how money is really the root of success in this scenario- after all, this is about artist empowerment and funding the next greatest things in music.

Making it big

Dev is asked about his previous company (Team Backpack) and the events that they used to host for artists. Dev shares his story about artists who would pay to get to the event, spending thousands to simply arrive, and would then be unable to get home due to money. He says this didn’t sit right with him, and how it inspired him to make a difference.

The topics then change to ‘making it big’ and what this really means. The team looks at the different aspects of success, including skills, attitude and funding, and Dev shares his opinion on what the most important bits are.

Dev’s Backstory

Dev is asked about his background, and shares his story about his Indian heritage. He talks about his parents immigrating