Wisdom Wednesday feat. Mark and Sarah Tillman
Welcome to Wisdom Wednesday, a weekly series where we chat with some of our favorite artists! This week we get the chance to have an open conversation with Mark and Sarah Tillman about songwriting, building a relational network vs. a transactional one, understanding your needs as an artist, and more! You can check out Mark and Sarah’s music here.
Want to be a guest on the show or have someone you wish we’d have on? Email us at hello@marketingwithwisdom.com.
Kat:
(Singing). Welcome. Welcome. Welcome everybody to wisdom Wednesday. Oh, look, I've got an early attendee. I guess I'll invite him in. Hope you're having a great week wherever you find yourself. And if you're somewhere here in the Southeast to Midwest, you're probably experiencing snow or some random change in the weather like we are here.
Wisdom:
Is it snowing today?
Kat:
We don't have snow, but it was 32 degrees when we woke up.
Wisdom:
Oh.
Kat:
And yesterday it was 70.
Wisdom:
Yeah.
Kat:
So.
Wisdom:
Yeah, it was 30s here yesterday and it snowed like two inches.
Kat:
So terrible.
Wisdom:
But yeah, it was like middle of the night, early morning and then by afternoon all the snow was pretty much gone. So yeah, such a weird weather.
Kat:
I feel like through April, it's supposed to be over. Once we hit April, it's like, "Aren't we moving on?" Yeah.
Wisdom:
Mm-hmm (affirmative). Especially Easter. You wouldn't think there's snow after Easter.
Kat:
No, no down here in the south. Maybe if you live up north somewhere but not here. I think our guests just joined.
Wisdom:
Oh, awesome.
Kat:
Should we go ahead and bring them on?
Wisdom:
Yeah.
Kat:
Do you want to give any intro for them while I request them?
Wisdom:
Please welcome. Aaron David says he's suffering in Florida, 75 degrees. Wow. I am definitely jealous.
Kat:
The Florida and California people are always so quick to be like, "Oh, it's a tougher day here. It's 68 and sunny."
Wisdom:
Yeah. Well I'm from California. And I think I took my weather for granted when I lived there because in the summers I complained about it being hot and humid. And then there's a lot of days where it's just raining all day and I was complaining about it but now I'm like, we had it pretty good.
Kat:
Yeah.
Wisdom:
Yeah.
Kat:
But you had to put up with the traffic. We're you in LA?
Wisdom:
Yeah. I was in Silicon valley but yeah, there was a lot of traffic. Yeah. Trafficking gangs.
Kat:
Oh yeah. Oh, it's saying they're unable to join. You want to try to invite them? They might need to update their app too if it's anything like-
Wisdom:
I don't think it lets me.
Kat:
Okay. I just tried to re-add them.
Wisdom:
Yeah. Mark and Sarah, you guys may need to update your app. They rolled out some updates recently.
Kat:
We've also run into this with at least one other person before, too. So that could definitely be what it is.
Wisdom:
Yeah.
Kat:
But thanks for joining us wherever you are watching from today. I'm trying to think of a good fun fact to ask people to share.
Wisdom:
I want to ask if you guys are watching, drop in a name of somebody we should invite as a guest that's not yourself. Evidently some people will do that. Drop their name in, but yeah. If you think that we should invite somebody to this live. Also, this live goes on our IGTV section, our YouTube and our podcast. So there's a lot of ways that we distribute this content. So, if you have any folks... Zachary Ray? Actually he is coming up. He's on our calendar. He just confirmed I think today, so.
Kat:
Oh yeah. They're here. I'll try again. Yeah. I think it's been really cool to see how many people have really gotten behind this. And we've seen a lot of traction with people watching it and tuning in later to watch it. Oh, someone else. Aaron David said Zachary Ray for sure. There you go. Oh, someone loves Zachary Ray. Zachary, if you watch this afterwards, you just need to know there are people out there who really support you.
Wisdom:
Yeah. I was literally just emailing with him a few minutes ago. So yeah. We're excited to have him on in the coming weeks. But yeah, we have pretty much the next two months of people already scheduled for our Wednesday live streams so we're really excited about that. People who are artists, producers, songwriters.
Kat:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Wisdom:
So yeah.
Kat:
I think it'll be really cool too as it goes on for people to see like you just said, different people from the industry. A couple of the producers and stuff especially. I think that'll be really cool.
Wisdom:
Yeah.
Kat:
Okay. Mark and Sarah, it's still telling us that you are unable to join. Drop a comment and I'll try to add you that way and see if it will work. Let's see. I've requested them three or four times and it's not letting it happen but today's guest is a really exciting one. It's a husband and wife duo who are now based here in Nashville, Tennessee. They're from my great home state of North Carolina. Mm-hmm (affirmative) and really excited to talk to them. I think they've got some pretty exciting stuff coming up soon. So it'll be fun. Hopefully they'll be able to join us. Still saying waiting.
Wisdom:
All right while we're waiting, we'll do some Q&A on the spot. So if you have-
Kat:
Do it.
Wisdom:
... a question about music marketing, the Christian music industry, Spotify, any of the other digital service providers, social media. If you have any questions, this is your chance to get some free advice.
Kat:
That's right.
Wisdom:
Or you can ask us questions about Kat-
Kat:
Oh my gosh.
Wisdom:
We'll answer all your questions.
Kat:
Yeah, exactly. Something interesting we've been talking about and noticing and I'm interested to see if any of you have noticed it, is how Spotify is sort of moving into a social media platform space. In that now, in case you haven't updated your Spotify. You would now see what your friends are listening to.
Kat:
So it's pretty cool actually but also should make you a little more careful about what you're listening to because your mom can see it if she's following you on Spotify at anytime. But a lot of people are speculating that they'll continue to push more and more into that space. And it'll be really interesting.
Wisdom:
Yeah. That feature has been around I feel like forever.
Kat:
Oh really?
Wisdom:
Yeah. Where you can see what people are listening to. I turned it off long, long time ago. Yeah. It was a feature I had on several years ago and decided to turn off but you could even... I don't know if they still have this now, but you could even share your activity on your Facebook as your updates or your activity and integrate the two. But yeah, I can definitely go on Spotify. If you're following somebody and you can see what they're listening to if they allow that to show up. I personally I'm like, "I don't know if I really care what people are listening to right now." And it's just one more thing that makes the screen busy.
Kat:
Mm-hmm (affirmative) Yeah. Because now it shows up if you turn it on in the sidebar of your main screen.
Wisdom:
Mm-hmm (affirmative)
Kat:
So. I think it's interesting. I will be interested even further down the road to see if they're trying to go somewhere with that because I do think Spotify has proven over and over that they care about connecting people. Whether it be artists with their fans or fans with other fans. So it'll be interesting to see if they come up with other ways for people to connect and continue to build out a presence online, on Spotify specifically. Maybe even talk about music or if there will be forums or something like that.
Wisdom:
Yeah. I think the social aspect is definitely one with a lot of opportunity for Spotify because they could do the Clubhouse thing that even just artists do live talk shows on there. They can do the stories feature or live feature because a lot of artists already have a pretty decent following on Spotify. So yeah.
Kat:
Yeah.
Wisdom:
I feel like they already have a lot of the built-in aspects to be able to make that happen.
Kat:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Wisdom:
But yeah. So far they haven't focused a ton on the social media aspect on the actual platform itself. I love the integration between Instagram Stories and Spotify where you can share playlist or songs through your Instagram Stories. But yeah, I think there's so many other opportunities and you features.
Kat:
Oh yeah. Well, and if they really did push into that, that would really start to set them apart from any other DSP. Which I would imagine is a huge incentive for doing it. While Mark and Sarah are trying to join, trying to fix their settings, we do have a question. But it's kind of touchy. So it says, what are you guys listening to music wise? Favorite artists?
Wisdom:
Wow. You go first.
Kat:
What? No.
Wisdom:
Well, my answer would be. I actually don't tend to listen to specific artists as much as playlists. So that's my answer is, when I discover stuff, I have a private playlist I put stuff into. There's probably 800 songs in there and I just like to have it on while I'm working. So, on Spotify I have a private playlist. And I also love discovering new artists and new music. So a lot of times I'll listen to stuff that I see somebody share on Instagram or somebody talk about or something and then I'll pull that up and listen to it. One of my favorite artists right now is named Aaron David. I don't know if you've heard of him?
Kat:
That's funny.
Wisdom:
He's got some new stuff coming up. I've been able to check out before it's released and it's super exciting.
Kat:
Yeah. That is no joke, Aaron. I don't think anyone's ready for what Aaron spouts out but I think a couple of mine are, One is Jonathan Ogden. I just discovered him, which he's been around I think for quite some time. And I think... Is he coming on here eventually? I'll have to tell him.
Wisdom:
Well, I interviewed him on my podcast recently.
Kat:
Which, funny story, I had no idea that was Wis knew him or anything, I've just become this huge fan. And so it was really cool to find that out and that we're able to support him in that way. And then secondly, this is a guy who I literally just found on the Christian music marketing Instagram but I love his song.
Kat:
His name is Cade Kellam and the song is called Lilies. And it is... I think I sent it to you Wisdom but it has this like old soul feel to it. Almost Frank Sinatra but it's all about how God cares about the lilies and takes care of them, how much more does he care for us? Anyways, it's really good. Found him on Instagram. It's a great way to connect with new people.
Wisdom:
Yeah.
Kat:
So you guys should definitely check those out. And guess what?
Wisdom:
They're here?
Kat:
They're here. I'm going to bring them on in and everyone if you would please give a warm welcome virtually to Mark and Sarah. Hopefully it will finally work. I don't know why it's being so finicky for them.
Wisdom:
Third time's a charm. Hey.
Sarah:
Hi.
Wisdom:
You made it.
Mark:
Phone trouble.
Kat:
Oh, don't worry at all about it. This has at least happened one other time so far.
Wisdom:
Yeah.
Mark:
We were doing it on my phone and then it would just keep exiting out and then we switched to Sarah's phone and it worked immediately.
Wisdom:
She has the favor from God-
Mark:
Clearly.
Wisdom:
... with her phone.
Mark:
Clearly.
Wisdom:
So yeah. Thanks for hanging in there and pushing through and [inaudible 00:14:28].
Sarah:
So sorry about that. Thank you for having us.
Mark:
Yeah, thank you for having us.
Wisdom:
Yeah. For people maybe watching that haven't heard of you guys, could you share a little bit about yourselves and some of the highlights of what you want people to know?
Mark:
Yeah. Well, I'm originally from North Carolina and Sarah is originally from Toronto, Canada.
Sarah:
Fun fact.
Mark:
And yeah, fun fact. We've been married 10 years, 10 years this past December which is awesome. And yeah, we've been writing songs and worship and all that stuff for pretty much about 10 years.
Sarah:
11.
Mark:
11?
Sarah:
Mm-hmm (affirmative)
Mark:
Yeah. Ever since we started dating back when we were young and agile before children. Yeah. And then now we live in Franklin, Nashville area. And we've been here for the past two years?
Sarah:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Mark:
So yeah.
Sarah:
Yeah. And we worship lead together. Sing, song write.
Mark:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Sarah:
So we're a duo.
Mark:
Yeah. Yeah.
Wisdom:
So I have a question, since you guys have been doing music pretty much the whole time you've been dating and married. If you couldn't do mus... Can you hear me? Okay. Now their Internet's acting up.
Kat:
I know. This is just the devil's folly. Trying to mess things up.
Wisdom:
Jeez.
Kat:
Happens. Us out here in Tennessee, we don't have great WiFi. Just kidding.
Wisdom:
Well, where you live-
Kat:
Oh my gosh.
Wisdom:
You guys use dial up?
Kat:
Oh no, they got kicked off. No, we don't use dial up and it's not that far. It's just a different side of town than where all of you people lived. Well, if they don't make it back, we should tell you to check out Mark and Sarah's stuff wherever you listen to music. They have some awesome songs out I think especially Just Jesus is the one that they're most well-known for.
Wisdom:
Yeah. Yeah. In the meantime, if you have any questions for us related to marketing, the music industry, anything about Kat you want to know?
Kat:
Oh my gosh.
Wisdom:
She has a dog. So you could ask about her dog.
Kat:
Yeah. I could show you the dog technically.
Wisdom:
Yeah. We'll be hanging out in here waiting for Mark and Sarah. So you have who knows how long but we'll answer as many questions as we can, if you can type fast. One thing that everybody knows yet is the recent numbers from Spotify that they shared is that they're getting over 60,000 new songs uploaded to their platform every single day. So if you do the math, which I'm not a math person but I did do the math on this once. It was over a million songs per month. So if you're releasing a song this month, there's over a million other songs being released in the same month.
Wisdom:
So it really does put things into perspective. And I think it is a good reminder that it is important to make sure you have a plan on how you're going to be releasing the music and how people are going to find out about it. Because the biggest challenge outside of the song itself and making sure you have a quality song is, how do you actually get it in front of people? How do people actually find out because there's so much music. So that I think is worth even spending several weeks planning things, brainstorming ideas and then being able to implement those ideas to make sure your song just doesn't get lost in all the noise.
Kat:
Mm-hmm (affirmative). Yeah. I think when you hear how many songs a day are getting uploaded, it really does put into perspective why it's so important to plan things out. Why it's important to ask people for help to get the word out about what you're doing. Because I know something we talk about a lot is you could write the best song in the world and if no one knows about it, it might still be the best song in the world but nobody's ever going to know about it.
Kat:
So, we always say marketing is stewardship and that means taking care of the thing that God's given you, which is the song. And doing everything you can from the writing, to the recording, to the releasing, to the marketing process, to steward that to the best of your ability. Because God's given that to you and if he's given it to you, it's probably meant to be shared with other people. So it is really fun to think about just how many options there are in the digital landscape for keeping it creative, keeping it interesting as you plan for a release. It feels like every day there are an endless amount of new platforms to try or different content pieces to create on already existing platforms. So pretty cool time to be alive for sure.
Wisdom:
Yeah. And I think along those lines, a lot of times it's easy to overthink content especially when it comes to social media content. And if you overthink content, then you're probably more likely to delay posting and maybe not post as frequently but I think there's definitely value in posting consistently and regularly and really as often as you can. I think there's a fine balance between too much content and too little content. With social media, people are scrolling through so quickly. You could spend an hour on a piece of content, maybe 10 people see it. Hey guys, welcome back.
Mark:
It is the-
Kat:
You're fine.
Mark:
... WiFi-
Sarah:
In our area.
Mark:
Yeah. We live a little bit outside of Franklin in a horse farm country. So our little internet tries its little hardest.
Wisdom:
I'm imagining some Antennae on a horse.
Mark:
I love it. I love it. I love it. But we're here. It feels like the signal is good.
Sarah:
We got in a good room.
Kat:
That's great, as long as the horse doesn't move.
Mark:
Exactly.
Kat:
Right? I'm just kidding. Listen, I live out here in Old Hickory, Tennessee and we have the exact same... It's strong on any given day. You never know.
Mark:
Did it snow where you're at?
Kat:
No. Did you guys get snow?
Mark:
No, but some friends of ours were like, "Did you see the forecast on the weather app? There's flurries for last night." Which is literally insane.
Wisdom:
Yeah.
Kat:
Not about it. I know Wisdom had snow yesterday.
Wisdom:
Yeah. Two inches yesterday morning.
Sarah:
No.
Mark:
That is so very Kansas city.
Wisdom:
Literally, I took out my little scraper thing. I'm like, "Why am I having to use this right now? It's almost May."
Sarah:
You're like offended.
Wisdom:
Yeah.
Sarah:
No.
Mark:
That's worse.
Sarah:
I love it.
Wisdom:
So one thing I was wanting to ask you guys, since you've been doing music together your whole married and dating lives. If let's say tomorrow, you wake up and for whatever reason you can't do music anymore. You can't write songs, you can't record. What would you guys do together? You may have different answers.
Kat:
That's a good question.
Sarah:
A really hard question.
Mark:
Well, for me I think, we both have very pastoral hearts. And obviously we love music, we love songwriting. We love all that and potentially more than all that we love the idea of mothering and fathering people in that. Because you have a lot of people swinging for the fences and either they're on their own or they don't know what to do or they don't know step A, B and C, right?
Mark:
They know what it looks like to be at K and H but they don't know those beginning steps which obviously y'all are a epic resource for those A-B-C-D-E steps. But all that to say we both have big hearts to help lead those coming behind us along. Give what you never got type scenario. I don't necessarily mean a church sense, like pastor. But just some type of shepherd and uncle, father figure. Whatever you want to call it for younger artists. We're not necessarily super old but we're not necessarily some insanely talented 17 year old kid who's got all the talent in the universe but they don't necessarily know where to go. So some sense of pastoring, coach, shepherd thing.
Wisdom:
I feel like Sarah's answer is going to be like skydiving.
Sarah:
That was really beautiful and powerful and moving. I was going to simplify a little and say, We're like the [type 00:25:56] communicators. Very big verbal processors. We have a lot to say. We have a lot of thoughts. I'm thinking like some podcast or-
Kat:
Ooh.
Wisdom:
Ooh.
Sarah:
I don't know-
Mark:
Yeah we both love-
Sarah:
Lot's of writing, books. I don't know, speaking. We have a lot to say. We talk each other's faces off, so yeah. Something to do with [inaudible 00:26:19].
Mark:
Right. Yeah.
Wisdom:
So my question would be, why not do that now?
Mark:
That's a great-
Sarah:
We've actually been thinking about that.
Mark:
We have been thinking about that and just the whole... to your point, you're like, "Why not do that now?" We're literally on a tool that you could do it very easily obviously. Both the phone and obviously what we're literally doing right now. So the answer is yes. Because honestly, it all goes together. It's never just about the music, just about the songs. That's this amount of the greater reason for being in all of it, so.
Kat:
Now let me ask you, weren't you playing a lot? Touring and all that pre COVID?
Mark:
Yeah, we were super, very involved in our church back in North Carolina and then we moved to Nashville. We were in that whole, writing a ton, putting together a project phase, all of that. And then obviously COVID happens, everything shuts down but people kept on making music of course.
Kat:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Mark:
We were talking with our friend at a writing thing two nights ago. And he was saying how... he's like, "You write all this music. These songs are going to expire when you would tour them." Or whatever. So he's like, "They're just floating out in the ether." But so the answer is yes. But things are coming around I feel like, so.
Kat:
[crosstalk 00:28:24]
Wisdom:
Would you say?... Oh, sorry. What would you say each of your strengths are when it comes to songwriting?
Sarah:
I would say I'm more of the lyricist and I find the melody really quickly.
Mark:
So She does it all. Lyrics, melody. She does it all. I'm just in the background.
Sarah:
So Mark called it The Faucet. It was like a window where when the creativity is flowing it's like a faucet and I just have to catch it. So I'll be in the zone where I'm writing, writing, writing, writing. I'll have to catch it and do a quick voice memo, voice memo. Or sharing with him and he has to keep up. So that's me, but he is-
Mark:
She's very much a writer, if she wasn't doing songwriting. She's a very active dreamer. So she has dreams every night, pages and pages, writes them all down every morning type of thing. So she's very much a writer even outside of music. And so she typically already has some form of idea in terms of lyrics. And then I typically, I gravitate towards find a melody on a piano or guitar. And then we just go from there. It does happen other ways sometimes but that's the most natural way, but yeah.
Sarah:
[inaudible 00:30:11]
Kat:
That totally makes sense. Do you guys ever feel like... I've heard other people describe it. Writing songs is sometimes like all of a sudden you know something you didn't know before. It's just poof all of a sudden there's this whole thing and you're like, "Wow, I didn't know that I knew this." And it's just all coming out. Does that make sense?
Sarah:
Totally.
Mark:
Yeah.
Sarah:
Sometimes you have to work for it but not all the time. Sometimes it's just intuitive, spontaneous, download of a song idea or sometimes it can be like, you're driving somewhere and you see a word or whatever and that's highlighted. So it happens in different ways but you always have that sense in your spirit of like, "oh, I need to go after this." And then that's when it starts flowing. At least for me.
Mark:
The best moments though are just like, it's been five minutes and you just have a song and there's no way to try it. You can't try to do that. It doesn't exist to try to do that. Just one of those things that happens every once in a while. And you're just like, "Oh, This is done. It's been like 10 minutes." Or whatever. Yeah. It is a really awesome feeling but it's more of that miraculous feeling than it is a muscle that you can exercise. You're just like, "This came out of absolutely nowhere." But.
Sarah:
I think for example we had a song last week that, it was just the chorus idea that I had written years ago.
Mark:
Right. Years.
Sarah:
And so that was dating for years and then we were working on steps together and it came back up and I'm like, "Why don't we try working on this?" And then we finally finished the song.
Mark:
Right.
Sarah:
It had been a whole six years between the chorus and the verse and the bridge, but.
Mark:
Those aren't the fun ones.
Sarah:
Yeah. There's the miracle moments in songwriting, miracle songs.
Mark:
Right.
Sarah:
But most of them are muscle kind of developed.
Mark:
It's true.
Sarah:
But it's fun.
Wisdom:
So you guys have released a lot of music compared to other independent artists and I think you guys have multiple millions of combined streams with your music. What are some tips that you might share with an up-and-coming artist and songwriter trying to do this and maybe they're getting ready to release their first single this year?
Mark:
Well, I would say to figure out how to get in touch with you. I'm kidding.
Wisdom:
That's easy.
Mark:
Yeah. Yeah. Send Wisdom an email, send him a message on Instagram. No, I'm joking but also very serious. We haven't been in this seat since the beginning of that kind of... it's so big. There's a billion songs released a day on 17 million different platforms. That overwhelmed thing. Just like, "This is so big. My song is probably not going to get heard by anyone besides my mom and my great aunt." Whatever. But thinking back to that I think, one.
Mark:
Having a plan, even if it's three bullet points, three bullet points is better than no bullet points. So, definitely having a plan. Also, I'm a big... both of us are, but ever since moving to Nashville which is a very... you think, "Oh, it's music industry capital especially in people who love Jesus world." And it is and we've met some of the most friendly kind-hearted, who are like in the thick of the industry, all these things. Big machine companies and they're all so kind and sweet. And I would say one of the biggest things is just reaching out for help. I think as artists sometimes we think we need to do it on our own which is hilarious. But-
Sarah:
Artists are so used to having to do it.
Mark:
Right, right. Typically, in the beginning someone doesn't find you and champions you. It just doesn't really happen that way. Eventually I believe that can happen to anyone but I'm a huge proponent of if you see someone or are hearing someone that you're admiring or whatever, reach out. There's no time wasted in sending an email and sending a message over Instagram just like you said. Even you guys would be someone to be on the receiving end of this but also it could be someone who they like their producing or someone who works for this company.
Mark:
Like, "Hey, I've got a song. I want to release it. Do you have any advice? The likelihood that someone's going to be like, "No, I don't have time to talk." It's literally like this. At least what we found living here, maybe they don't have a lot of time but people are so sweet and so willing to share out of the capacity they have. So I would say step one, have a quiet and step two, definitely don't rush into it because that's not helpful for anyone. That's not helpful for you or your listeners. And reaching out to people that could maybe help you or point you in the direction of someone who could help you. What do you think?
Sarah:
Yeah. I'd say the whole knowing your need and asking for help with that need. I think that's been an area where we've had to really learn how to do that. Especially since moving into more of a creative hub and city. So even though we've been with people who can help, when they've asked, "What do you need?" Often we didn't even really know how to answer that. So actually it's familiarizing yourself with what you actually need as an artist, as a creative, about what resources you need and then yeah, growing the confidence and honestly the humility to ask for help with that need. That's been the hardest thing for us and we are still learning how to move through that.
Mark:
Right. Right. Because when you meet people that could help you and they're like, "So what do you guys need?" Having some answers is obviously somewhat helpful. But-
Sarah:
Yeah.
Mark:
... Yeah.
Sarah:
Pieces of our journey
Mark:
And it's all relationship. Whether it's about a song you're releasing your first single or writing or anything. The whole like, "Oh, quantity isn't a big deal." But at the same time, quantity can be relationships. Amounts of relationships, the degree of those relationships. No one can become your champion unless you meet them first, right?
Kat:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Mark:
So people are everything. Yeah.
Kat:
And also relational always comes before transactional, at least for us. It's been a big-
Wisdom:
Preach it.
Sarah:
Because when you work with other creative, that tends to be the temptation is to make it more transactional. Not to say that business stuff doesn't happen. It does, but there's just an order of importance in our opinion. And the relational always trumps over the transactional for us. And honestly, we've seen so many times where you meet with someone and it's really relational but there's barely any transactional in terms of a business exchange. But then somehow since you pursue the relationship, the Lord really honors that and it comes full circle down the road.
Mark:
Oh totally.
Sarah:
Or they're like, "I know someone who actually can help them in this way." And so building a relational network instead of just a business.
Mark:
Absolutely. Well, the relational is the fuel. It's fuel to everything else. It's such a long-winded answer to your question.
Sarah:
But yeah.
Mark:
Yeah.
Sarah:
That's us.
Mark:
Yeah.
Kat:
I think all of that is great advice especially what you said, Sarah though. Knowing what you need. I think maybe especially for most artists who are just getting started that's the biggest real hurdle. It's like, "I don't know how to distribute my music. I don't know who to work with as a producer." You just don't know. And so the more that you can connect with other creatives and other people, they can help you and fill the gaps and help you see what you don't know.
Mark:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Sarah:
Mm-hmm (affirmative). Yeah. It's like growing your voice as an artist, as a person. That's how you grow into knowing your need and it's taken us a while and we're still learning that.
Mark:
Yeah. And it takes some of that healthy boldness of like asking the questions, even if you're like, "I don't know how their response is going to be." But.
Kat:
Mm-hmm (affirmative) which really does require humility. It's so funny that those two things go hand in hand. Being bold, it has to come with the humility of being willing to be crushed by somebody else.
Mark:
Correct.
Kat:
Just some people aren't ready to take on but it's a part you got to grow into. Tell people where they can find you and about something that you're excited about that you have coming up or whatever.
Mark:
Well pretty much everything we do is our names. Just Mark and Sarah Tillman. We're in all the places, all the things.
Wisdom:
Are you on TikTok?
Mark:
What?
Wisdom:
Are you on TikTok?
Mark:
Okay. We're both 31. So in TikTok world, we're like 85, right? Our kids who are five... he's basically six. Our son is literally closer to TikTok relevant than we are, right? Which is scary. As in like he would do it sooner than we would do it backwards you know what I mean? Matt. Anyways we recently actually got one and our-
Sarah:
We're going to do some dancing.
Mark:
... fumbling our way through it. But I think the thing with content, I think one of the biggest things you can do is just not think too hard about it. Have a little bit of an idea but with the way these platforms are now, if you overthink you're probably just not going to send it out there. And you just never know how much it can bless someone or whatever. So not overthinking it, not that you asked that. But we are on TikTok.
Wisdom:
Actually, when you guys were trying to connect that's exactly what we were talking about, is don't overthink content. Yeah. And I think also if you look back at Facebook. Facebook people thought, "Oh, it's only for college students." And now everybody and their mom and grandmother and great-grandmother is on it.
Mark:
Great-grandmother. It is so true.
Sarah:
We've got things coming up.
Mark:
Things coming up, things coming up. So in two weeks? Two and a half weeks? Three weeks.
Sarah:
Mm-hmm (affirmative)
Mark:
It's almost Friday. So two weeks, a friend of ours named Ben Thompson, who also goes by Neon Feather.
Wisdom:
Oh, yeah.
Mark:
We did a collaboration on one of our songs. Our recently, our songs that we released last year and it is very fun, very-
Sarah:
It's very TikTok worthy.
Mark:
It's very TikTok worthy. It's one of those things where you're almost like dating yourself. Not dating like, husband and wife date. But I mean you're like... anyways. We're excited about it. It comes out in either two or three weeks. But that's super fun.
Wisdom:
Awesome.
Mark:
And then yeah, we're basically writing a ton right now for next project. So we are in that lovely, lovely stage
Sarah:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Mark:
So yeah.
Wisdom:
Very cool. Yeah, you guys can find their music on all the streaming platforms under Mark and Sarah Tillman. We had the privilege of working with them on a few of their songs and their music is awesome but more importantly their heart is awesome and their passion for Jesus I think is very contagious. So follow them on Instagram and TikTok and Spotify. Cool. Any last word of encouragement you want to share?
Sarah:
Yeah, Mark and I have been processing, talking a lot about how especially like on Instagram, social media worlds. You want to share stuff but you don't want it to feel slimy. At least that's for me as someone who... Mark has a little less harder of a time with it. I think I'm way more emotionally attached to everything which can be good and harsh. But how to put yourself out there... or not even yourself out there, but what the world is giving you out there without it feeling forced or contrived or inauthentic.
Sarah:
And yes, there's something that's really helped me. I think that sometimes can be artists' challenge. It's like I want to share what the Lord is giving me but I don't want this to feel inauthentic. It's the heart of what he's given me, is that the Lord's really spoken to us. It's not about platform, it's about an altar that we're building. It's about an altar. And yeah, when you have that mindset, you're definitely more protective of that altar that you've built for the Lord. And there's some things that are private that don't always have to be shared for sure.
Sarah:
There's some private encounter moments with the Lord but other things are a deposit that you had to release of your altar with the Lord for other people to intend to have. And so I feel like the Lord's just challenged me specifically and us to not always withhold those encounter moments out of fear of it feeling inauthentic or disingenuous. Actually there's so many people, especially now in this season where there's just been so much turbulent transition on every level and layer of life and the world. Nationally, globally that people are literally just dying, are hungering so intently for an encounter with the Lord. So to not withhold that. And yet it's not so much about platform it's about an altar that we are building and that you get to invite other people into that encounter with the Lord.
Mark:
And when you have that shift, when it's not a platform it really takes the pressure off. Because when it's a platform, all of a sudden you're entertaining. There's nothing wrong with entertainment. I love entertainment. That's great. If you're not trying to entertain and you're just trying to share what the Lord has been speaking to you in whatever form. Song, encouraging word, whatever. I wouldn't say a platform is the best way to release that but when you have that, that's not entertainment to me. So when you have that shift of like, "Oh man, this is just an altar and I want people to be transformed through him and me saying yes to this." It really takes the pressure off which is beautiful.
Sarah:
So yeah, we've come to that place or we're coming to that place more and more. So, yeah. [inaudible 00:48:13]
Kat:
Oh, ending with a bang. That's really cool. Yeah. I love that. I think that's what I'm going to title this afterwards because I think for any artist, what you're saying. That switch in perspective is everything because it also goes from being focused on other people to being focused on directly, like a vertical relationship with God. And even just the word platform is literally about other people being elevated above others versus an altar being pointing strictly towards something else. So, even that imagery is just so good. Thanks for sharing that.
Sarah:
Of course. The effort of Mark and I, the vehicle of worship of what we create, what we write. It's just that, it's a vehicle and it's always driving the heart of the Lord to people and it's this back and forth, ebb and flow between the presence of God and people. But that's the hardest thing, to keep it a vehicle. Honestly. But once you can see it like that, it definitely takes the performance pressure off and that re-orders the priorities, why we're doing what we're doing.
Mark:
And then the sky's the limit, honestly. Because it's about, you're just putting all out there in a different way.
Sarah:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Kat:
Mm-hmm (affirmative) Wow. Well, thank you both so much for taking the time to talk to us today. It was so cool to hear from you guys and to hear more about what you're doing together and in Tennessee and just the next season that you're stepping into. And we can't wait to see and hear what you put out next. You said two weeks from now?
Mark:
Two or three, I guess it's two and a half since it would be a Friday, so.
Kat:
Okay, cool. So what is that? May 7th?
Mark:
Or the 14th?
Kat:
14th.
Mark:
I'll let you know.
Kat:
Okay. Cool. Yeah, let us know so that we can promote it for you.
Mark:
I'll let you know.
Kat:
But yeah. Thank you guys. It's been awesome talking to you, hearing more about you, your stories.
Wisdom:
Yeah. Great to see you guys.
Sarah:
Thank you so much for having us and being so gracious about our technical difficulties.
Kat:
That's the world we live in man. One day, it all works great. The next day when you actually need it, nothing.
Wisdom:
The horse moves and it doesn't work. Yeah.
Kat:
Yeah. Have a great day. Thank you all so much for watching. If you've got a project coming out and you want some help growing your impact and influence integrity, we'd love to talk to you. You can send us the DM here on Instagram. Bye everybody.
Sarah:
Bye.
Mark:
Bye.
Wisdom:
See you.
