The DIY Tips section of KnowTheMusicBiz.com is a collection of useful information and best practices for independent artists aggregated from some of the best music business focused websites and blogs. Any community member can post DIY Tips to the site.
Below is a summary of the most read DIY Tips posts on the site during 2009.
2009 was the second full year of operations for KnowTheMusicBiz.com. We are extremely grateful to all the music business professionals and artists who shared their experience, advice and insight with our readers.Below is a summary of the most read blog posts on the site during 2009.
The goal of the Indie Artist X Project is to develop a basic, actionable music marketing plan designed around simple strategy, prioritization of tactics, easy to use tools, and a reasonable budget
that can be implemented by any artist who has the inclination to follow
it. About.com Music Careers, Artists House Music, Hypebot, KnowTheMusicBiz.com, MusicianWages.com and Revolution Number 3 have banded together to create this community based music marketing plan. We
will be working with one anonymous artist to design and implement this
music marketing plan then track and report the actual results over a
four month period.
Today
marks the wrap up date for the 4 month long Indie Artist X Project. I
posted a blog at Hypebot today with an overall IAXP wrap up and
summary.
The
majority of the inquiries and questions I received during the Indie
Artist X Project where about the identity of the anonymous artist who
was participating in the project and how that artist was selected. Now
that the project has officially wrapped up I can finally announce that
the artist who participated in the project is Austin Collins from the
band Austin Collins and The Rainbirds.
Background
I
first stumbled upon Austin and his band by accident at the 2008 South
by Southwest Festival. While I was at SXSW I attended a show case event
to see a friend of mine’s band play and Austin’s band just happened to
come on stage next. I was immediately impressed with the set Austin and
the Rainbirds performed. After the show I briefly met the band and
picked up a copy of their latest CD, Roses are Black.
Once I got home from SXSW I began listening to all the CD’s I’d brought home with me and after a few listens I decided Roses are Black was a damn fine record. After many, many more listens I decided Roses are Black was my favorite record of 2008.
At the end of the year I was one of the people who blogged about my “Five Favorite Things”in About.com’s 2008 Music Wrap Up feature. Soon afterwards Austin contacted me to say thank you for mentioning Roses are Black was my favorite release of 2008. ‘I kept Austin’s contact information but we didn’t communicate past his initial email.
SXSW 2009
Two
weeks before I was to depart for South by Southwest this past spring I
found out my housing plans had fallen through. Anyone who has been to
SXSW can tell you there are no hotel rooms available anywhere near
Austin, TX two weeks prior to the event.
In
an attempt to try and salvage my trip I pulled a list of everyone in my
contacts that lived in Austin, TX and sent out an email asking if
anyone knew a place where I might be able to crash during SXSW. Almost
immediately Austin replied back to my email saying I could stay at his
house. Problem solved!
When I arrived in town Austin and I agreed to meet up at the Guitar Town party after the day’s panels had concluded. I
learned several interesting things hanging out with Austin that first
night. He has great taste in music, a wide circle of friends, strong
interpersonal skills and a degree in Finance from the University of
Texas. When I introduced Austin to Rob Miller from Bloodshot Records
I was impressed with how easily Austin fell into my conversation with
Rob (and didn’t immediately fall all over himself pitching his band).
The Deal
Austin
was very interested in getting my take on music marketing and the music
business in general and had a lot of good questions. We found it
difficult to talk at the evening parties and showcases so we arranged
to talk over breakfast on my last day in town. At breakfast we covered
a wide range of music business related topics, online marketing,
distribution, licensing, etc. while Austin made furious notes of
everything we discussed.
I
really liked Austin’s music and found him to be very motivated and
driven so I made him a deal that morning. I told Austin I would help
him pull together a music marketing / music business plan without compensation but I would only put as much effort into building his music
career as he was. I have tried to help a few musicians with their
business / marketing efforts in the past but always grew frustrated at
their lack of follow through and execution.
We
setup a Google Docs page to help us get Austin’s marketing efforts
organized and to assign key tasks and due dates. I quickly found out
that Austin always follows though. I can’t think of a single time that
I even casually suggested an idea to Austin he didn’t have it done
before our next weekly phone call.
The IAXP is Born
I
initially thought I could pull together a fairly comprehensive outline
for a music marketing plan easily enough but found it to be a pretty
huge task. I started reaching out to other folks I know and respect to
get their input on ideas for Austin’s marketing plan.
While talking to Cameron Mizell from MusicianWages.com one day we stumbled upon the idea of blogging about the creation of Austin’s marketing plan and the results it generated. We
discussed the need for Austin’s name to be withheld so it wouldn't provide
him with free publicity during the project and in turn skew any results
he might see.
After
phone calls to some smart, forward thinking, indie focused music
business blogging peers the Indie Artist X Project was born. Hopefully
a few musicians will find the music marketing plan we created useful in developing their own plan and furthering their own music career.
What’s Next for Mr. Indie Artist X?
As the IAXP was preparing to kick off Austin won the 2009 AirPlay Direct
“All Things Americana” artist contest. Austin is using the $35,000
contest prize package to self release his third studio record, due out
in February 2010.
Moving forward you can follow Austin’s progress on his website, Facebook and / or Twitter.
The goal of the Indie Artist X Project is to develop a
basic, actionable music
marketing plan designed around simple strategy, prioritization of
tactics, easy to use tools, and a reasonable budget that can be implemented by
any artist who has the inclination to follow it. About.com Music Careers, Artists House Music, Hypebot, KnowTheMusicBiz.com, MusicianWages.com and Revolution Number 3 have banded
together to create this community based music marketing plan. We will be
working with one anonymous artist to design and implement this music marketing
plan then track and report the actual results over a four month period. To keep
up with the latest news on the IAXP follow the project on Twitter and Facebook.
Below are the Indie Artist X Project statistics for the month of September:
·Indie Artist X spent much of September in the recording
studio so they weren’t able to play many live shows. The new songs sound great but
the lack of live shows this month definitely impacted the growth of the fan
list, live show revenue and direct-to-fan sales of CD’s and merchandise.
·BMI pays! Indie Artist X received a PRO
Royalty check in September from BMI for $305.56. Finding an unexpected
check in the mailbox is always a nice surprise.
·Despite regular IAX plays and streams on
Pandora, Last.fm, MySpace, iLike and Imeem there are still no royalties
reported or paid from Soundexchange.
·The indie label that released IAX’s last two
records only pays / reports periodically. In September IAX received a check for
$1,340.61 for year to date royalties. Distribution is handled through InGrooves.
·Band Metrics measures activity across several
web properties where IAX maintains a presence including iLike, Last.fm,
MySpace, Twitter and YouTube. Band Metrics also measures terrestrial radio play
but hasn’t picked up any spins to date for IAX. The Band Metrics score for
September moved to 241 from 233 in August.
·Direct CD
and Merch sales for August were $0.00. The website ecommerce store is not yet
set up for CD and merchandise sales since IAX is still waiting on the artwork
files from the indie label that released the last two records.
The goal of the Indie Artist X Project is to develop a
basic, actionable music
marketing plan designed around simple strategy, prioritization of
tactics, easy to use tools, and a reasonable budget that can be implemented by
any artist who has the inclination to follow it. About.com Music Careers, Artists House Music, Hypebot, KnowTheMusicBiz.com, MusicianWages.com and Revolution Number 3 have banded
together to create this community based music marketing plan. We will be
working with one anonymous artist to design and implement this music marketing
plan then track and report the actual results over a four month period. To keep
up with the latest news on the IAXP follow the project on Twitter and Facebook.
Below are the Indie Artist X Project statistics for the month of August:
·Band Metrics measures activity across several
web properties where IAX maintains a presence including iLike, Last.fm, MySpace,
Twitter and YouTube. Band Metrics also measures terrestrial radio play but hasn’t
picked up any spins to date for IAX. The Band Metrics score for August moved to
233 from 183 in July.
·Direct CD
and Merch sales for August were $0.00. The website ecommerce store is not yet
set up for CD and merchandise sales since IAX is still waiting on the artwork
files from the indie label that released the last two records.
·Distribution for the indie label that released
IAX’s last two records is handled through InGrooves.
The label has agreed to allow Indie Artist X to work directly with the
distributor moving forward but that transition has not yet taken place so we don’t
yet have direct reporting access to distribution sales.
·Despite regular IAX plays and streams on
Pandora, Last.fm, MySpace, iLike and Imeem there are still no royalties
reported or paid from Soundexchange or BMI.
The goal of the Indie Artist X Project is to develop a basic, actionable music marketing plan designed around simple strategy, prioritization of tactics, easy to use tools, and a reasonable budget
that can be implemented by any artist who has the inclination to follow
it. About.com Music Careers, Artists House Music, Hypebot, KnowTheMusicBiz.com, MusicianWages.com and Revolution Number 3 have banded together to create this community based music marketing plan. We
will be working with one anonymous artist to design and implement this
music marketing plan then track and report the actual results over a
four month period. To keep up with the latest news on the IAXP follow
the project on Twitter and Facebook.
Below
are the Indie Artist X Project statistics for the month of July. Since
July is the first month of the project we plan to use these numbers as
our baseline. Now the goal is to see if we can implement marketing
strategy and tactics that will move all these metrics in a positive
direction through the remainder of the project and beyond.
Band
Metrics is a relatively new service so it’s not yet entirely clear how
to interpret the score of 183. It’s assumed that if the IAXP marketing
efforts are successful that the Band Metrics score will increase
accordingly.
Indie Artist X launched a new website on July 21st
so we only had 10 days of website traffic data to report during July.
The indie label that released IAX’s two previous records hosted and
managed the original website and didn’t provide site traffic details to
the artist.
The
Artist’s indie label also handled direct e-commerce transactions and
fulfillment from the artist website and only provided semi-annual
reporting so we don’t have any data to report for website sales during
July. The label is winding up their operations and has agreed to let
IAX handle direct website sales and fulfillment moving forward. Since
IAX is now using the Audiolife for ecommerce sales and fulfillment on their website we will have monthly sales figures to report in the upcoming months.
Distribution for the indie label is handled through InGrooves.
Again, since the label only provides semi-annual reporting we don’t
have distribution sales for report for July. The label has agreed to
allow Indie Artist X to work directly with the distributor moving
forward so we expect to have more frequent and better distribution
sales reporting available in the months ahead.
Where are the streaming and online radio royalties?
Many indie artists have long complained about not receiving PRO royalties
for terrestrial radio airplay. The census taking methodology the
Performance Royalty Organizations (ASCAP, BMI and SEASAC in the US)
have traditionally used to track terrestrial radio airplay falls well
short of capturing actual plays for individual songs. In
defense of the PRO’s, trying to track actual terrestrial radio airplay for every
individual song from every single radio station is no easy task since
up until the last few years terrestrial radio stations traditionally
used manual, hand written logs to track what songs were played. Given
that compiling aggregate terrestrial radio airplay data from hand
written logs is all but impossible the census methodology did seem
somewhat reasonable, even if it was bound to exclude plays and
ultimately royalties for many indie artists.
I am a big fan of the opportunity Internet radio provides
for indie artists. However, after reviewing the Indie Artist X
statistics from July it’s hard to comprehend why there are simply no
royalties from BMI or Soundexchange
at all. A quick check of IAX’s profile on Last.fm shows the artist is
approaching 4000 plays. I personally hear Indie Artist X’s music daily
on my Pandora
station. Despite clearly receiving Internet radio airplay, being
registered with BMI and Soundexchange and having their most recent
record posted on multiple Internet radio stations for the last two
years, Indie Artist X has never been paid any royalties for Internet
radio airplay or on-demand streaming. Yes, IAX did write the songs and
owns the copyright to all their music.
So where are the Internet radio and streaming royalties for Indie Artist X?
Is
the problem that Last.fm, Pandora, Imeem, etc. are simply not reporting
all their plays to BMI and Soundexchange? Are BMI and Soundexchange
collecting royalties from the Internet radio stations but not paying
royalties to Indie Artist X? Are the royalty organizations applying the
same dated and flawed terrestrial radio census methodology to calculate
Internet radio royalties even though the play data for each song is
captured electronically and stored in databases by the providers?
These are all troubling questions. Admittedly, I don’t know where the breakdown in this process is occurring. I’m
no copyright attorney or topic expert but I’m operating under the
assumption that the copyright law and court rulings that have set
current royalty rates are supposed to apply to all artists receiving
Internet radio airplay, not just those in the Billboard Top 200.
All
of the above mentioned organizations and companies owe their very
existence to the songwriters and musicians that create music. It’s
time they figure out how to calculate and pay royalties on a per play
basis for all artists. Even a few thousands Internet radio plays deserve compensation.
Despite the very public debate and the
tremendous amounts of time and money spent lobbying Congress and the
Copyright Royalty Board over Internet radio royalties it appears the
Internet radio providers and royalty collection organizations have left
Indie Artist X out of the equation.
You might have heard by now that Martin Atkins and partners started a school: Revolution Number Three (www.revolutionnumberthree.com). Martin Atkins is a regular guest blogger here at KnowTheMusicBiz.com and has a 30 year career in the music business that includes touring with the band s Public Image Limited, Killing Joke, Ministry, Nine Inch Nails and
Pigface, owning an independent record label celebrating its 20th anniversary with over 350 releases. He is also the author of the book Tour:Smart.
Our
friends Martin and Revolution Number Three provide five week immersion
programs where students learn IN the music business, not ABOUT the
music business. It’s hands-on, down and dirty learning in the fast
paced, continually evolving, head spinning, cross pollinated,
entrepreneurial, groovy as all hell HUB that they are.
Check out this video to get a better idea of what R3’s programs are all about:
On August 21 – August 23 r3 is hosting the Weekend Revolution which is
the five week program on speed! In just two and half days they are
going to cram your head with as much information as possible to
revolutionize the way you think about the business of your art. The
revolution weekend is limited to 30 attendees – guaranteeing hands-on
learning and one-on-one time with Martin Atkins and other speakers.
Before
you lose your ass, your mind, your relationship, your car, the reason
you started in the music biz in the first place, and thousands and
thousands of dollars, you can invest $299 on a unique two day immersion
seminar with people who have been there, done that, are still doing it,
and are teaching it!
In two days you will:
• screen print your own merchandise and promo material
• design simple graphics (logos, t-shirts, and postcards)
• write a bio other people will want to read
• engage your online community in tangible ways
• use audio and visual tools to market yourself and your stuff
• hack xboxes and traditional business models
• launch an actionable plan that you can do yourself!
Also, Indie Artist X will be participating in the Revolution Weekend! Participants in the program will have the opportunity to hang with the anonymous artist behind our group music marketing project / experiment.
Click here
to register or to learn more about Martin’s upcoming Revolution
Weekend. KnowTheMusicBiz.com readers can enter the discount code
“martinrocks” and get $50.00 off the cost of attending.
The goal of the Indie Artist X Project is to develop a basic, actionable music marketing plan designed around simple strategy, prioritization of tactics, easy to use tools, and a reasonable budget that can be implemented by any artist who has the inclination to follow it. About.com Music Careers, Artists House Music, Hypebot, KnowTheMusicBiz.com, MusicianWages.com and Revolution Number 3
have banned together to create this community based music marketing
plan. We will be working with one
anonymous artist to design and implement this music marketing plan then track
and report the actual results over a four month period.To keep up with the latest news on the IAXP follow the project on Twitter and Facebook.
When
developing the overall website strategy for the Indie Artist X Project
it became clear the artist’s existing website fell well short of the
functionality needed, let alone desired.
Website Functionality Goals
Before beginning the search for a replacement website solution for the artist we reviewed the overall website strategy
for Indie Artist X then listed out the base functionality the new
website should have a on a page by page basis. Below is a recap of the
desired features we listed for each page:
Homepage:
“About
us” artist blurb, featured streaming music, the ability to offer fans
who sign up for the email list exclusive access to free song downloads,
email list sign up, social media links, artist news.
Music:
Full
length streaming of all released music, free exclusive music downloads
(unreleased, demo, live tracks) available to fans who have signed up
for the artist email list, email list signup.
Shows:
Monthly show schedule with links to the venues and map based directions, email list signup.
Store:
The
ability to sell both albums in physical /CD and digital / MP3 format
directly from the website. The ability to sell all released songs as
individual MP3s directly from the website. The ability to sell multiple
t-shirt designs directly from the website. Accept Visa, Mastercard,
Amex and Paypal for payment. Offer free exclusive music downloads
(unreleased, demo, live tracks) available to fans who have signed up
for the artist email list, email list signup.
Artist Blog:
Include
an artist blog on the site. Use the blog for announcements, news and
general artist musings. Include commenting, bookmark and rss features
with the blog.
Video:
A page that provides streaming of multiple videos by the artist.
Press:
Include
a link to the artist’s electronic press kit (EPK), official artist bio,
high resolution press photos, press contact email address, blurbs /
quotes from artist press coverage
Contact:
Include
contact email addresses for artist press, booking and management
inquiries, links to social media sites where the artist maintains an
active presence, email list sign up.
Build vs. Buy
Once
we identified all the features we desired for the artist website it was
time to explore options for the new artist site. The first decision
point was to decide if we should build a custom website to our exact
specifications or choose a pre-packaged website solution.
Since
Indie Artist X doesn’t have any web development skills building a
custom website would mean that they would either need to hire a
professional website design / development firm or find a friend or fan
who has web development skills to build the site to the specifications.
Hiring a professional web development firm to build and host the site
on a budget of $20 per month (per the budget restrictions of the IAXP)
simply isn’t a realistic option.
Finding
a friend or fan with web development skills that is willing to build a
custom site for the artist can sound like a pretty good idea at first.
However, the risk is the volunteer who builds the custom site will
eventually get hit by a bus, move to Italy with their new boyfriend /
girlfriend, begin a three year meditation retreat or have some other
seemingly unbelievable reason why they can suddenly no longer support
or update the website they built the artist.
Given
that Indie Artist X doesn’t have the budget to hire a web design /
development firm or web development skills to build the site themselves
we decided to pursue a pre-packaged website solution that would meet
our requirements.
The Website Solution
Ultimately, it was determined that the new joint artist website offering from Bandzoogle and Reverbnation
would be the best overall fit for the site requirements we had
identified. Indie Artist X was already a Reverbnation user and found
that many of their widgets would help meet the specific functionality
goals we set out for the website. The RN “Exclusive Downloads” widget
that allows access to exclusive free song downloads for fans that sign
up for the email list was very high on the list of desired website
features (and for the overall fan development and commerce strategy for
IAX).
The
cost of the Bandzoogle / Reverbnation artist website solution is $17.95
per month and includes hosting, email, website traffic reporting and
technical product support.
Audiolife
was selected to power the ecommerce store on the IAX website. There are
several good ecommerce engines that meet the requirements for selling
CD’s, MP3’s and merchandise directly from an artist’s website but
Audiolife’s on-demand production and fulfillment capabilities set it
apart. Indie Artist X has engaged a few local artists in their
community to create multiple custom t-shirts designs. These custom
t-shirts can now be featured and sold on the website without any
upfront manufacturing costs.
There
are no upfront or monthly fees for the Audiolife ecommerce solution.
Per transaction fees vary by type of transaction (physical CD, MP3
download, ringtone, merchandise) and by whether they on-demand produce
products or warehouse existing inventory.
The Outcome vs. Goals
Overall
the Bandzoogle / Reverbnation / Audiolife solution met almost all of
the desired functional goals for the website. Technical support and
service from all three organizations exceeded expectations during the
implementation by a non-technical person.
A few short-comings of the selected solution include:
1.While
Bandzoogle does have many artist website templates to choose from we
never found one that looked great while allowing the homepage features
we desired at the same time. We had to choose between “look” desired
and the “end user functionality” desired. End user functionality did
(and should!) win out in the end.
2.The
integration between the Bandzoogle and Reverbnation products still
needs work. Adding the Reverbnation widgets into the Bandzoogle site
builder often caused formatting / page layout problems that required
help from tech support to resolve.
3.Audiolife
does not yet accept Paypal as an ecommerce payment option or allow
multi product bundling (buy a CD get a free t-shirt for example).
4.The
$17.95 per month price point was quite a jump from Indie Artist X’s
previous Wordpress based site that cost virtually nothing to host.
The
new Indie Artist X website isn’t the most beautiful artist site out
there but it does meet our primary goal of providing fans that visit it
with plenty of options for finding music and videos, free downloads,
artist news, tour dates, links to the social media sites and an overall
easy to use experience. I will be sure to post a link to Indie Artist X's website once the project wraps up and the actual artist's name is made public.
The
next step in the Indie Artist X Project is to develop a solid website
strategy for encouraging fans to visit the site on a regular basis.
The goal of the Indie Artist X Project is to develop a basic, actionable music marketing plan designed around simple strategy, prioritization of tactics, tools and a reasonable budget that can be implemented by any indie artist who has the inclination to follow it. A group of like minded
people interested in helping foster the success of independent
musicians have banded together to create this community based music
marketing plan. It’s our hope that any hard working, talented musician
can utilize this plan to grow their fan base and help lay the
foundation for a sustainable career in music. We will be working with
one anonymous artist to design and implement this music marketing plan
then track and report the actual results over a four month period. All
the details of the plan are publicly available at:
Each of the sponsors for the Indie Artist X Project have taken on the
responsibility for developing the strategy, prioritizing tactics and
identifying the best tools for a specific music marketing “channel”.
The sponsors are allowed to offer suggestions, advice and guidance to
the artist but are not permitted to do any actual work on the artist’s
behalf.
This music marketing plan is designed to be a community based project. Each
of the sponsors will be soliciting ideas, best practices and advice
from those interested in providing suggestions. It’s expected that the
plan document itself will evolve and change over the next few months as
the sponsors receive community input. If you have any suggestions for a
music marketing channel please forward your ideas to the appropriate
channel sponsor. Your participation in this project would be much
appreciated and hopefully benefit the greater independent artist
community!
The artist participating in the Indie Artist X Project is a talented, hard
working independent musician who has had two previous records released
by a small independent record label. He is currently not signed to a
record label, does not have a booking agent or manager. He has a day
job and is married. His goal is to make music his full time career. We
will share the name of the Indie Artist X artist once the project is
wrapped up at the end of October.
The Artist Website Channel
Artist Website Strategy
The artist website will be the focal point for engaging fans online and the
primary place on the web to find artist news, music and tour dates.
Since we want to engage music fans music will be heavily featured on
the website. All released songs will be available for full length
streaming and purchase, in both CD and MP3 format. Featured unreleased
tracks and demos from the upcoming new release will be available to
download in MP3 format for fans who have signed up for the artist's
email list. The website will be the central place for developing fan
relationships and will encourage fans to sign up for the artist mailing
list on several pages. Fans that sign up for the artist mailing list
will have exclusive access to download free unreleased tracks and demo
version of new songs plus qualify for monthly fan relationship programs
and giveaways.
Artist Website Tactics / Priorities
Music - Make available full length streams of both released albums, make both released albums available for purchase in both CD and MP3 format, make available all released individual tracks available for purchase in MP3 format and feature the artist's most popular songs for streaming on every page of the website. Feature one unreleased track or demo of a new song every 30 days (each song is only available for 30 days) - these tracks will be available for free download exclusively to fans who subscribe to the artist's mailing list.
Fan Development - Encourage fans to sign up for the artist's mailing list on multiple pages of the website. Feature the mailing list sign up prominently on the homepage. Offer fans that sign up for the artist's mailing list exclusive access to free downloads of unreleased demo or live tracks (one exclusive track each month). Feature links to the social networks where the artist maintains a presence so fans can connect with or follow the artist on their favorite social networks.
Basic Search Engine Optimization (SEO) - Link back to the artist's website from each social media or music related site where the artist has a profile. Promote and link back to the fan exclusive free downloads on the artist's website from social media and music related sites where the artist has a profile. Link back to the artist's website in all artist email newsletters. Regularly update the news section of the artist website with new, key word heavy (artist name and genre) content. Updated news will be featured on the site homepage. Provide a RSS feed on the website to follow artist news and announcements.
Artist News - Provide regular (weekly if possible) updates to the news section of the website. Updates can potentially include: promoting upcoming live shows, recaps / thanks for recent live shows, announcing the monthly fan contest winner, announcing / promoting the monthly fan exclusive free download, encouraging fans to sign up for the email list, encouraging fans to connect on a specific social network of music related site, promoting new videos, mentions of other live shows or music the artist enjoyed, tour related tales / updates, lyrics to new songs. Always keep the news and comments positive. Provide a RSS feed for following the artist's news section.
Contact - Always reply to any fan inquiries from the website contact form within 24 hours. Direct contact and discussions with fans is critical. Include all active social media links in the contact section to make it easy for fans to connect with / follow the artist on their favorite social media sites.
Commerce - Make the website store the primary place to direct fans for purchases (not iTunes, Amazon, etc.). Directing fans to the website store will help increase overall site traffic and provide the opportunity to promote upcoming live shows, encourage visitors to sign up for the fan list and promote fan exclusive downloads. The website store should be the exclusive place to purchase any new songs or full releases for at least 30 days before making them available through other sites or via distribution. Implement a pricing strategy that ensures fans will always find the lower prices on music and merchandise on the artist's website store than what's available through online retailers (via distribution).
We would love to hear your suggestions for the Indie Artist X Project artist website channel. There is a community suggestions section setup in the KnowTheMusicBiz.com forums. Click here to contribute to the project and share your ideas about ways we can optimize the artist’s website!
I’m a firm believer that the longer an artist can manage themselves the better off they will be in the long run. I wrote a blog post last year titled “Build It and The Music Biz Will Come ” I encourage artists to read before rushing out to find a music management “team” early in their career. Once an artist has done all the hard work
required to build a dedicated fan base they may want to consider hiring
management to help grow and manage their business. Below is an overview
of some of the traditional management roles in the music business.
Manager
Traditionally,
managers have spent much of their time getting their clients signed to
a record label deal then working with their client’s record labels to coordinate publicity, radio promotions and retail marketing budgets and programs.
Today, the desirable skills for a manager in the music industry have
changed fairly significantly. Managers need to be specialist in direct
to fan relationships, social media, online marketing, licensing and
sponsorships. They should be generally knowledgeable in ways artists
can be successful with and without a record label.
Managers
should handle all the artist’s personnel issues with the band and crew
members and work with the rest of their management team including the
attorney, booking agent, business manager and tour manager as needed.
Managers
are typically paid 15% to 20% of the artist’s gross earnings. That
means they get paid their percentage on all the artist’s earnings
including, royalties, publishing, touring, merchandise, orsponsorships
before the artist gets paid. Some managers have multi-year contracts
(that can be quite complicated) with the artists they represent and
some just work on a handshake.
Attorney
Given the uniqueness and complexities of recording contracts, management agreements, publishing deals, sponsorship or licensing agreements and
the various other music business related agreements attorneys can
play a critical role in protecting the interests of the artists they
represent. The most important thing to look for in an attorney is
experience in the music business. Just because someone has a
law degree (even from a top school) does not qualify them to adequately
represent artists in the music business.
A
good attorney with experience in the music business can keep you from
making contractual mistakes they have seen that have happen to other
artists. Attorneys usually charge by the hour or by retainer (a set
monthly fee) and in the music business it’s fairly common for them to
charge well established artists a percentage of gross earnings, 5% is
typical.
Business Manager
A business manager is the person or firm that collects monies owned to the artist from royalties, publishing, touringand merchandisesales,
pays the bills, band and crew, invests the profits and files the tax
returns. They handle the artist’s general accounting related needs,
royalty collection & auditing and tour budgeting & reporting.
Many good business managers are either CPA’s or employ CPA’s on their
staff due to the complexities of the music business accounting and the
challenges of dealing with multiple state and international tax
jurisdictions that come into play when an artist is on tour. They also
handle all financial aspects of the artist’s personal life including
insurance, loans, mortgages, investments and estate planning.
Business
managers typically charge 5% of the artists gross earnings in the music
business but some an hourly rate or flat monthly fee.
Booking Agent
Booking
Agents play an important role in the success of the artists they
represent by planning and booking their tours with promoters and
venues. They will make sure you are playing in venues that are known
for your genre of music or booked as an opening act for bigger band.
Booking agents negotiate the fee structure (guarantee,%
of the door, meals, etc.), determine ticket prices and ticket
availability in the market. Thoughtful route planning is critical to
the financial success of a tour and a good booking agent should make
sure you are not playing in Atlanta one night, Chicago the following
night and Jacksonville the next.Route planning can be a
challenge for even a seasoned booking agent due to the large number of
competing tours and the limited availability of quality venues in
highly desirable markets.
Booking
agents typically collect a 50% deposit on the show guarantee from the
promoter once the show is booked. They usually charge 10% of the money
the band gets paid for the show for their services. For example if the
booking agent negotiates a $2000 guarantee for a show, they would
collect a $1000 deposit, keep $200 (10% of $2000) then send the band
$800. The band or their manager / road manager would collect the
balance ($1000 in this example) from the promoter or venue after the
show.
Tour Manager
The
Tour Manager handles all the details of life on the road for the artist
during a tour. They will arrange transportation, hotels and meals for
each stop, make sure the equipment is accounted for and maintained plus
manage the crew. The tour manager makes sure the venue has the stage,
sound and lighting set up as requested and that the band is paid per
the terms arranged with the booking agent. They manage
and safeguard the cash collected while on the road. The Tour Manager
will work with the tour publicist to make sure the artist shows up on
time for scheduled interviews, appearances and promotions in each
market. It’s the tour manager who puts out all the inevitable fires
that come up at each stop during the tour.
The
tour manager is also responsible for maintaining the tour plan and
budget set up by the manager, business manager and booking agent. They
are typically paid a salary, per diem or a set amount per tour.
