Cultivate your songwriting talent. Listen to music and lyrics you enjoy and study why you like them. Your own musical tastes will likely dictate the genre or genres you write in. Then, write about things you know, or that are dear to your heart, like love, relationships, family, or other interesting stories about your life or the people and places around you. You should also have a basic idea about musical composition, as actually arranging songs is a more complicated process than just jotting down verses. The more knowledge you have, the better.
Find a musician or composer to work with. Record companies seldom if ever look at lyrics submitted in the mail. The Artists and Repertoire people in charge of spotting talent for these companies need to be able to hear the lyrics in songs to get a feel for whether or not it would be something for their label. If you’re not friends with any musicians, and would not feel comfortable performing demos yourself, you can probably find musicians-for-hire by way of a simple internet search. From there you’ll need to carefully vet performers to make sure you get someone stylistically compatible with your genre and lyrics. You’ll also probably have to pay for recording studio time and music production, unless you’re working with an aspiring musician who may be willing to share in the risk for a chance at reward.
Make friends with local or unsigned musical talent. Up-and-coming musicians are likely to be more interested in a collaborative relationship with an up-and-coming lyricist than will some record execs or established acts. This might allow you to get in on the ground floor and build a profitable long-term relationship, in the manner of Elton John and Bernie Taupin. Just make sure that before you do anything you’ve clearly spelled out who gets credit for what. You wouldn’t want to risk the musician taking credit for lyrics that he or she didn’t write. If you can afford it, a meeting with an entertainment or intellectual property attorney might be a good idea, so as to completely, officially, and precisely establish your relationship with the musical collaborator. If you can’t afford an attorney, you should at least draw up a contract and have it notarized.
Enter songwriting contests. Many of these can be located by way of a simple Internet search. Winning—or placing high on the scoreboard—in one of these competitions might earn you a chance to talk with musicians or producers, and would give you some degree of leverage in your future musical ventures.