The Fastest Way To Flush Out Scammers

What’s up y’all, Harkos Here.

So online we always have to deal with scammers, all the time, and I have dealt with many scammers myself. But the one way I have found to not get scammed is actually pretty simple.

Now a lot of people would say, “don't click on links in messenger.”

Yeah, that's a solid one.

“If somebody hits you up and they say that they're an A&R or a record executive, through DM or through email, they’re probably bullshit.”

 Yeah. More than likely, especially if you don't have a large following.

If you have a large following, most of the time you have a manager of some kind, or you have a headline on your social that says “Email for Booking”, and then they'll actually reach out and contact you there.

A lot of scammers are even to starting to realize that and they're approaching artists that way as well. But even still, some of these scammers are getting really, really good at leading you to want to engage with them.

For instance, they'll post an intriguing comment on one of your posts. I’m not talking about the ones we all get, “DM me”  “Hello, sir. Can I help…?”. No, none of that. They'll actually post something like, “Hey, I really, really like what you're doing. This is awesome”. Then you’ll respond “Thank you”

Then they'll respond back in comments for a little bit, and they will seem like a legit person. So then you hop in DM with them, and you have a regular conversation. But then when it comes down to the dollars and cents, that's when things start getting a little wonky.

But, the fact that you have had a good, genuine conversation with them, your guard is down like crazy. So when they hit you with their scam, you're more likely to actually engage with it. It's a very common tactic in sales that a lot of people in scams use because, the fine line between scam and sales is just ethics.

So even with that, you may get to the endpoint and you may get scammed, or you may realize, “Hey, wait a second, they're running along, con man. I ain’t fucking with this.”

Those are all good ways to avoid scams. But, the one that I have found that is the most effective is to hop on a Zoom call with people.

If somebody is hitting you up on messenger or you even message them because they look like they're halfway legit. You're having a good conversation, and everything like that, things look great. You’ll think, “man, this person might be legit. They may not be a scammer.”

Hop on a zoom call with them. If they refuse to hop on a zoom call, boom, right there, you know immediately, they're not legit. They're a scammer.

There may be the very rare scams where they will hop on a Zoom call with you. But for the most part, the best, the easiest, the fastest way to tell whether somebody is legit or not, is to check them. Say, “that sounds dope. Let’s hop on a Zoom call”.

If they say no or they want to beat around the bush, delete!

But if they say, “yeah, what's a good time?”, and you book with them, then they're legit.

That's one of the things that I do whenever I'm helping out artists with marketing, I always want to hop on a zoom call with them, and I even make it a free initial, Zoom meeting.

I tell them, “Let's sit down. Let's have a conversation. I'm not going to charge you for this initial, “get to know you and and see how I can help you session”.

That's basically what it is. I just sit down with artists and get to know them. Let them get to know me, and see that I'm a legit person. I talk to them about their marketing, their goals, social media presence, do an overall audit of them as an artist.

Then we work from there on building a solid marketing plan for them. This eliminates them from thinking I'm a scam, and it helps us grow the relationship better because they see I'm a legit person. Because, I'm a real person, I'm down to earth, and I genuinely want to help people.

Everybody that I sit down with is completely happy with the marketing advice that I give them on that initial call. A lot of them even want to go further and start doing more business. But, some of them, they take that information, they go run with it and they go on about their day.

But at the end of the day, I know that I've helped them out and that I was ethical with it

So that's what I recommend every single one of you do.

Anytime somebody approaches you in the DM and says, “Hey, I wanna do business”, say, “All right, let's hop on a zoom.” This will help you quickly filter out the legit people from the scams.

If you want to sit down about your music marketing and see if I can help you out, let’s hop on a Zoom for a 100% free initial sit down. For those of you who’ve already had your free initial review, right now I’m offering 50% off my consultation services. This price was already way below industry standard, so lock in now for a discount while you can. 50% off consulting ends 3/15/24.

Book Zoom

If you’re still unsure, head over to

www.apexmusicsystem.com

You can go check out my services designed to help out artists, producers, podcasts, or whatever you're working on and need help marketing.

From website development to social media management to video editing.

Whatever it is, I can help you out, so make sure you hit me up. We'll hop on a zoom.

You know I'm legit and we can handle some of that business and get you growing. Talk to you later