The Disc Makers YouTube Channel has a new series of videos, called “The Indie Music Minute,” featuring Tony van Veen (CEO of Disc Makers) distributing bite-sized nuggets of actionable information to help you make the most of your career as an indie music artist. Read the post.
I Fight Dragons has been selling music on custom USB drives for years with notable success. Here are some tips from Brian Mazzaferri on how to make the most of the venture. Read the post.
While CDs and vinyl records are a major revenue source for indie musicians, custom USB drives are the latest merch table draw when it comes to physical product music sales. Read the post.
As the music industry continues to evolve, I’ve identified three music trends to keep an eye on in 2018 that are helping to reshape popular music. Read More.
Indie artist Megan Slankard is finding success in the new music economy through the fan-support platform of Patreon – reducing risk and rewarding trust among her steadily growing fan base. Read More.
From playing shows to selling CDs and merch to finding time for self care, life on the road requires a balance between your personal, public, and business life. The Accidentals share some #TourLife hacks with us. Read More.
Not all music purchases are motivated by low price. Blue Coast Records’ development of Extended Sound Environment recording has created a new niche for the audiophile market through high-res audio streams and CDs. Read More.
Success comes from the flow between your different music promotion strategies. Your social media growth, your live performances, your YouTube videos, your email list, your music sales – they all funnel into and loop back to one another. Read more.
A big part of the revenue blurriness in music streaming is because many record deals were made before the advent of music streaming, using a model of selling a physical product. It’s time to tackle the job of drafting contracts to account for the fact that there are no manufacturing costs with streaming or download sales. Read more.
2015 was marked by a number of high-profile artists continuing to speak out against the music streaming business model while excluding their music from providers like Pandora, Spotify, Apple Music, Tidal, and many more. Mainstream artists have challenged whether streaming can ever be profitable for artists. Read more.
Live shows are an opportunity to make music merch sales that you can’t pass up, and having a strategy is the best way to maximize those sales. Here are five points to keep in mind when stocking your merch booth. After all, if you’re creating awesome merch, you can sell it at a 150% or even 200% mark up with no one batting an eye! Read more.
Apple Music is live and streaming, and for independent musicians who want in on the service, CD Baby is the go-to source to make music available on the platform. In addition to being an Apple approved aggregator, the editors at CD Baby’s The DIY Musician blog have embarked on a series of posts covering Apple Music. Read more.
When it comes to sales, sometimes the very best technique is the most direct. Ask plainly for the sale. If your fan or customer really wants to buy from you, you’re doing him or her a favor by making the process streamlined and easy. If your fan or customer is unsure, you’re not helping the cause by being ambiguous. Read more.
Sales promotions are short-term incentives intended to stimulate a quick buying response in your target customer. Music sales promotions can be applied to selling CDs, merch, concert tickets, and so much more. You must use these promotions strategically, and these tips can help build more sales when you do. Read more.
Based on these facts, it would seem unwise for most artists – independent or otherwise – to follow Swift’s lead and dismiss offering some or all of their music in an intelligent and well-thought out way through select streaming services. Studies show worldwide paid subscribers on the leading streaming services and the growth in streaming earnings are up. Clearly, streaming has become a substantial part of the revenue pie and appears poised to continue steady growth. Read more.