CD Baby is 10 Years Old! (And The Biggest Lesson for Musicians...EVER!)

CD Baby just turned 10.  Derek Sivers has more thoughts about it on his blog...

I could go on and on about how CD Baby is great.  In my opinion, there hasn't been another site online which has come close as far as helping musicians.

Sure, there are sites like YouTube or MySpace, which help get the word out about musicians.  And there are sites, which are no longer in business, such as mp3.com, which did a good job of getting the word out about musicians.  But it's CD Baby that took the job of taking money from fans and sending them music, which has helped tens of thousands of musicians make a living as well as give them more time to do what they do best, which is make music.

I know how hard it is to run an online record store.  I had one a couple of years before CD Baby, back in 1996.  So please don't take this as an insult to CD Baby...

But from a big picture standpoint, ANYBODY can mail your music to fans. 

When it comes to making your music though, you're the only one who can do that.

Which means, you need to spend more time on tasks like making music (and other things which nobody else can do) and less on the things which can be easily hired out.

Introducing musicians to this concept, in my opinion, has been the best thing CD Baby has done for musicians.

HOW TO GET MORE DONE:

This week, write down everything that you do.  Everything.  Every 15 minutes, get our a pad and write down what you just did.  Did you buy milk?  Did you work on a new song?  Take a shower?  Write it down?

Once you've done this for seven days, go through the list and make note of all the stuff you're doing which could be done by somebody else.  Then get somebody else to do those things for you.

Obviously, there are some things you can probably outsource, which you won't because you like to do them.  But for those things you don't like, hire them out.  Stick to writing songs and doing the activities that nobody else can do.  You'll get more done and make more money.

Feel free to post thoughts, and a list of things you're going to start outsourcing (or not), below.

Comments

[stinson]

in my opinion, one of the first things any musician, producer, engineer, etc. should consider hiring out is a really tech savvy web guy who can maintain all their web sites. that's what i'm going to do as soon as i get a little breathing room to find a guy. i've been building/maintaining my own sites so far, but it's not what i'm skilled at doing. i would rather pay someone else to do it for me so i can focus on what i need to be doing.

[Chet]

s**t, why not outsource making music too? it works for Dr. Dre. just stick your head in the studio door every once in a while and say, "yeah that beat sounds good".

seriously though, outsourcing is cool if:

-you have the revenue to justify it
-you can find really good people
-you have the management skills to hire and maintain a good team

[Dani]

I wish I could hire people to take showers for me!

[Sadi]

I have to correct you on one thing about your post here... Mp3.com is not dead at all. It is still very much an alive free music download network and my band, Keygen, has around 12 songs listed there for free download. I can't speak for CD Baby cause we've never used their distribution service, though the reason would be cause they ask for money up front and for folks to send in disks that they can get charged for if they don't sell. These days there actually are plenty more distribution sites out there offering a lot more to artists for free. I know because I've got music for sale at two of those places right now and it hasn't cost us a cent to do so. Only one of those distributors asks for a percentage of our sales. The other is doing it for the love of musicians. Regardless of which distributor is a favourite or a good place to market your music, nothing beats the online presence of your own website, and for nearly $100 per year, we hope it's worth it.

[Fred]

I agree with outsourcing projects. While it's best to have your own website generating money for you. You may easily become distracted by the many tasks it takes to sell,promote and market your music on the web. Outsourcing some of my "Hate to do's" has allowed me the creative time to develop new idea's (write songs). I'll try the"HOW TO GET MORE DONE" method above. Thanks.