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So this was our mission. With all of the online services for independent artists we set out to determine which services combine to deliver the most marketing bang for our $50 per month budget. With 5 peeps in the band this shakes out to just $10 each. A painless budget we have agreed that we can all afford.We embarked on this mission with a set of clearly defined objectives. We weren’t sure if our goals were realistic but we wanted to:
• Make it easier for fans to connect with our band online and in the clubs
• Be efficient and present offers to fans more often
• Make Facebook work better for us
• Increase accessibility to our music
• Play more shows that move our careers
• Find our way into TV, Film and Gaming
• Be able to measure and consistently monitor the effectiveness of each serviceThis was no easy feat. There are so many fly by night services out there that it was overwhelming but here’s what we chose after researching and deciding as a band what made most sense for us and kept us within our budget while moving our music forward and making it more accessible. FanBridge.com is a great service that has helped us manage our email addresses of fans. This site works great. We are able to create small offers and email them to our fans directly. We use this service to send out offers in the $1 to $3 range. We have about 1000 fans on our list and we usually make a few hundred bucks every time we send an offer out. Cost $9 per month. Our next service of choice is TuneCore.com. We have been able to get our EP on iTunes, Amazon, Shockhound and a ton of others. You can sell your album, music singles and ringtones from your social media sites with their widget. Each month we can get a report of all of our sales through each place. These guys keep us on a retail roll. We tried for a long time to get on iTunes before we found TuneCore. Cost $49, or about $4 per month on average. We knew we weren’t going to be able to get radio airplay on conventional radio. I mean who listens to radio anyway. We did stumble on to the next best thing with Jango.com. It’s a web based station of 7,000,000 million listeners that pairs your music with bands that are well known. We’ve been paired with bands like Cage the Elephant, Godsmack and Chevelle. It’s pretty simple and we have gained a nice group of new monthly fans from it. Cost $10 for 250 plays. Musicati.com is a sweet service. We really wanted our music accessible more than just online. Our EP is now on 20,000 broadband connected commercial jukeboxes monitored by AC Neilson in bars all over the country. We earn royalties each time our songs get played. Their site has tools to help promote our music in the bars, a locator that tells us & fans where all the jukeboxes with our music are at here in town and gives our band a shot at playing their showcases at festivals like CMJ, SXSW and other events they support. We couldn’t find anything else remotely similar to Musicati. Cost $16 per month on average. Musicxray.com is a relatively new matching service that helps us get hooked up with opportunities. What’s cool is that it isn’t flooded like Sonicbids is. There seems to be a lot more proven music industry professionals looking at this site versus promoters trying to fleece a band for a shot at playing a gig or getting on a project. Building a profile is free and you only pay a few bucks if and when an opportunity makes sense for the band, a great alternative to plunking down $300 with Taxi (although Taxi is cool – our budget couldn’t afford it). Cost about $2 or $3 per opportunity. Rootmusic.com offers an essential service that powers your bands’ Facebook profile. It’s everything MySpace used to be living on a band tab within your profile. Hosts music, video and bio information and let’s fans buy or share your music on FB. Fan numbers rise pretty steadily. Cost $2 per month plus a percentage of what you sell. Really cool service, PledgeMusic.com. These guys help us crowd source to garner support from our friends & fans via our social network hookups to help fund recordings, tour and invest in merchandise. The big idea, give us $5 now and we will gladly send you a CD when they are pressed! Cost, 15% of funds collected So there you have it!
• Make it easier for fans to connect with our band online and in the clubs
• Be efficient and present offers to fans more often
• Make Facebook work better for us
• Increase accessibility to our music
• Play more shows that move our careers
• Find our way into TV, Film and Gaming
• Be able to measure and consistently monitor the effectiveness of each serviceThis was no easy feat. There are so many fly by night services out there that it was overwhelming but here’s what we chose after researching and deciding as a band what made most sense for us and kept us within our budget while moving our music forward and making it more accessible. FanBridge.com is a great service that has helped us manage our email addresses of fans. This site works great. We are able to create small offers and email them to our fans directly. We use this service to send out offers in the $1 to $3 range. We have about 1000 fans on our list and we usually make a few hundred bucks every time we send an offer out. Cost $9 per month. Our next service of choice is TuneCore.com. We have been able to get our EP on iTunes, Amazon, Shockhound and a ton of others. You can sell your album, music singles and ringtones from your social media sites with their widget. Each month we can get a report of all of our sales through each place. These guys keep us on a retail roll. We tried for a long time to get on iTunes before we found TuneCore. Cost $49, or about $4 per month on average. We knew we weren’t going to be able to get radio airplay on conventional radio. I mean who listens to radio anyway. We did stumble on to the next best thing with Jango.com. It’s a web based station of 7,000,000 million listeners that pairs your music with bands that are well known. We’ve been paired with bands like Cage the Elephant, Godsmack and Chevelle. It’s pretty simple and we have gained a nice group of new monthly fans from it. Cost $10 for 250 plays. Musicati.com is a sweet service. We really wanted our music accessible more than just online. Our EP is now on 20,000 broadband connected commercial jukeboxes monitored by AC Neilson in bars all over the country. We earn royalties each time our songs get played. Their site has tools to help promote our music in the bars, a locator that tells us & fans where all the jukeboxes with our music are at here in town and gives our band a shot at playing their showcases at festivals like CMJ, SXSW and other events they support. We couldn’t find anything else remotely similar to Musicati. Cost $16 per month on average. Musicxray.com is a relatively new matching service that helps us get hooked up with opportunities. What’s cool is that it isn’t flooded like Sonicbids is. There seems to be a lot more proven music industry professionals looking at this site versus promoters trying to fleece a band for a shot at playing a gig or getting on a project. Building a profile is free and you only pay a few bucks if and when an opportunity makes sense for the band, a great alternative to plunking down $300 with Taxi (although Taxi is cool – our budget couldn’t afford it). Cost about $2 or $3 per opportunity. Rootmusic.com offers an essential service that powers your bands’ Facebook profile. It’s everything MySpace used to be living on a band tab within your profile. Hosts music, video and bio information and let’s fans buy or share your music on FB. Fan numbers rise pretty steadily. Cost $2 per month plus a percentage of what you sell. Really cool service, PledgeMusic.com. These guys help us crowd source to garner support from our friends & fans via our social network hookups to help fund recordings, tour and invest in merchandise. The big idea, give us $5 now and we will gladly send you a CD when they are pressed! Cost, 15% of funds collected So there you have it!
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