Music Marketing [dot] com

The Digital Lowdown - Digital Only Releases: Pros and Cons

by Steven Corn

More often than not, a typical response from an artist is that they are planning a digital only release and then they'll see how it goes. The decision to press CDs is usually postponed until it is determined if the album sells online or not. Practically every week, there is another digital-only label popping up while all the pundits proclaim the impending death of the CD-format. 

Right now, there are probably more albums online than there are currently available as CDs. There may not be hard statistics to substantiate this observation. Yet, it certainly makes sense when you consider all the virtual compilations, back-catalog, homemade albums and other re-purposed material showing up in the digital music stores. It is easy imagine that the total tracks online will soon exceed all of the tracks that were ever released on a physical format.

So what are the benefits and flaws of doing releases for online distribution only?

The benefits are obvious:
* No CD replication costs
* No need to design a full booklet
* No expensive printing costs for the booklet
* Easy, worldwide distribution
* Digital sales count towards soundscan and other retail charts
* No marketing costs (after all, what does a link cost?)
* Instant Fame ("hey guys, my album is on iTunes!)
* No need for fancy mastering studios
* A variety of formats (e.g., singles, EPs, special editions, remixes, etc.)

...and on and on...

The flaws are numerous (and obvious, as well):
* Physical sales still are significant (how many downloads can you sell by the exit doors of your next concert?)
* CDs support digital sales and vice versa
* Booklets help build fan loyalty
* CDs sound better
* Financial investments create a commitment to the product (more on this later)
* CDs are an universal format (e.g., computers, cars, bedroom stereos, boom boxes owned by A&R execs, etc.)
* CDs last practically forever (i.e., CDs don't crash and lose files)

My company specializes in digital-only compilations. Yet, even our best efforts can be seen as throwing a large amount of darts at a tiny board. Consider, then, an individual artist who puts out 1-2 digital albums in a year or a small label that releases 10-20. It might seem that this strategy must be working if so many people are doing it.

The reality is that most artists wind up lamenting about the lack of revenue from their digital-only albums. They all hope to have the next "Crazy" and have a track from their new album becomes the next viral hit. The reality is that there are approximately 100,000 new tracks added to the online services each month. Unfortunately, there are very tracks that ever exceed 100,000 downloads...ever. Of these, practically all of them are owned, distributed or promoted by a well-established record company. (Even "Crazy", the first number, digital-only single, was backed by a major marketing campaign budget from  their label and also leveraged support from previous CD releases.)

Putting an album online in the hopes of generating enough sales to justify a physical release is merely wishful thinking. That is not to say that every artist should press up 10,000 units. But, there is an old joke about a man who prays to God every week to win the lottery. After years of this, the man shouts out to God: "Why won't you let me win the lottery?!"  God calmly replies, "Meet me halfway...buy a ticket."

Translation (for those of you who don't get my odd metaphors): Don't expect to become a hit sensation without covering all the bases. In a world where the barrier of entry for releasing albums is ridiculously low, a successful artist or label needs to take advantage of every possible revenue source. This means that it would be foolish to ignore the role that physical goods have on overall sales of your music. It would be like having a website but no email address. (Another odd metaphor, perhaps.) 

If an artist presses only 500 CDs (a reasonably small quantity) at a cost of $1.25 each and then sells them at only $10 each (also a very reasonable price point), their breakeven point is only 63 CDs. That means that the remaining 300 CDs (after you deduct the 137 freebies to family and friends) are pure profit. Selling 300 CDs is not incredibly difficult and it would net you $3000 in revenue. (Every ready should note that most of the labels that my company represents would be very, very happy to earn $3000 in digital sales.) 

If everyone is able to release an album online, then it is critical to ask yourself: how do I differentiate my releases from all the rest? The more creative the answer is, the more likely that you will be able generate the sales that everyone wants, and expects, from online services.

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Copyright © MusicDish, LLC 2008 - Republished with Permission
click here for free music content for your site or blog

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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.

Disc Makers, TAXI & Billboard are Calling All Indie Musicians

Disc Makers, the nation's leading independent CD manufacturer, is kicking off its 13th annual Independent Music World Series (IMWS), the biggest installment yet of the nation's longest running and most successful indie music showcase series. Over 5,000 bands are expected to enter the 2008 IMWS, and Disc Makers has sweetened this year's pot by elevating the total prize package to over $250,000 in cash and prizes.

The IMWS consists of four showcase events in four major U.S cities (2008 cities include New York, Los Angeles, Chicago and Atlanta). Each regional event features six acts selected as finalists by the editors of Billboard Magazine. The six finalists in each showcase compete for the grand prize in front of music industry professionals at some of the hottest live music venues in America, such as the Knitting Factory in Los Angeles and Crash Mansion in New York.

"The Independent Music World Series is all about helping artists make it on their own," commented Tony van Veen, President of Disc Makers. "We're looking for the best original artists in the U.S. Unlike other events that reward just a great voice or a good song, the IMWS is about the whole package: originality, great songwriting, and the artist's on-stage performance. Between the opportunity to network and be noticed by industry insiders and win enough gear to outfit their own home studio, the showcase slots at the IMWS offer independent artists' careers a shot in the arm like no other opportunity today."

The four regional IMWS winners will claim a grand prize package worth over $50,000 that includes world-class gear from leading manufacturers, recording time in select studios, and cash. Furthermore, each act chosen to perform at the four showcases (24 acts total) will receive $1,000 in cash and gear from selected sponsors.

This year's grand prize package features everything independent musicians need for a career boost including a complete CD manufacturing package, post-production sweetening, and promotional posters and T-shirts from Disc Makers, a Digital Studio Workstation from Zoom Audio, studio recording software from Cakewalk, professional Shure microphones, Ibanez guitars and basses, a drum kit from Tama, Electric Guitar and Electric Bass Strings from Dean Markley, Remo drumheads, a Sabian cymbal package, and a year-long membership to TAXI. Additional event partners include Samson Audio, Sonicbids, Billboard, Electronic Musician, Remix and Drum! magazine.

The IMWS is open to all musicians not currently signed to a major record label. All styles and genres of music are welcome. Past winning genres and their winners include: Singer Songwriter (Amber deLaurentis, Chinua Hawk),  Hard Rock (Dirty Power), Punk/Pop (Bang Sugar Bang), Pop Rock (Plain Jane Automobile, Rich Creamy Paint), Hip Hop (The Urban Sophisticates, BurnDown All-Stars, Dura Hale), Electronic Pop Rock (Brice Woodall), Jazz (Orbert Davis), Bluegrass Rock (Rose's Pawn Shop), Rock (Shipwreck Union), Salsa (Bio Ritmo), Country/American (Deadman), Jam (Gamble Brothers Band).

Registration is now open for this year's showcase series at www.discmakers.com/imws. 

Submissions must be postmarked by May 14th, 2008. For more information, please contact Jessica Darrican at jessicadarrican@maxborgesagency.com or 305-576-1171 X16.

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Copyright © MusicDish, LLC 2008 - Republished with Permission
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Twitter Reviewed

This thing is getting a ton of news and buzz, so I thought it would be good to post something about it here.  It can be a huge waste of time, which I imagine it is for most people, but used correctly, it's great for keeping in touch with fans.

Description: Twitter is a social networking site that helps to keep you connected with friends and family.  By using instant messaging, SMS and Web interface you can send and receive message from anyone on your list with ease.

Review: Connecting with family, friends, or fans just became easier with Twitter.  It's also a great way to talk with other acts.  Think of Twitter as a virtual watercooler.  It's nice to be able to talk to others who know how you feel and understand what you are talking about.

The best part about Twitter is that you can have the chit chat when YOU have time for it.  If you're busy working on a project and just need a break jump on Twitter and "twit" away.  When you're break is done, no problem, just sign off and come back and catch up on anything you might have missed later when you get a chance.

Again, maybe not the highest and best use of your time, but it's a great way to keep people thinking about you...

The best thing about Twitter, in my opinion, is that It's a great way to market yourself and let your fans know when you've made a new post to your blog, added a new song, or posted photos from your last gig on your website.  Stick to this and you'll be fine.  But get caught up in the socializing and you may not get anything else done.

Free Conference Call on Music Business Success

I'm getting together with Julie Blake of GetMusicSuccess.com and Bob Baker, author of Guerrilla Music Marketing, to do a free conference call on the "inner game" of music business success.  If you've ever wondered why some musicians fail while others succeed, seemingly effortlessly, this call will help to show you.

Why Some Musicians Fail While Others Succeed is a content driven hour of information that will give clear insights and strategies to show musicians how to make money and music. It can, and will, change the way you view marketing your music forever by showing you how to transpose your passion for music into a passion for selling it as well!   

Participants will learn the top 3 reasons why musicians experience poverty instead of prosperity, how to sell out shows without selling out your musical soul, how to blast through the myths that are blocking your music success and the ultimate secret to music career success.

This session is ideal for seasoned artists, newer artists, managers, web masters and anyone involved in marketing your music.

For more information and to register go to www.GetMusicSuccess.com/TeleConf.html.

How to Move a Blogger Hosted Blog to Its Own Domain

I talked yesterday about why you want to have a blog on your own domain.  Had some people email me about blogs they had on Blogger.com, so here is some info on how to swap those to a domain you own.

Blogger makes it easy to present your blog on its own domain without blogger.com in your URL.  Here's how to do it:

Step 1.  If you don't already have a domain name, like www.myblog.com, you'll need to get one and register it.  It can be a .com, .net, .org or any legitimate address.  Note: you do not need to pay for hosting services, only purchase a domain name.

Step 2.  Now you need to create a CNAME record for your domain with the DNS, Domain Name Server, associating your domain with ghs.google.com.  Each domain registration service has their own instructions on how to do this.  Blogger.com lists directions for changing your CNAME for several domain registrars like, so look there for specifics.  If your domain registration service isn't listed at Blogger, contact your registrar to find out how to do it.  It's normally a fairly straightforward process.

Step 3. Change your blog settings.  Now you will need to get into your blog's settings and change them so that the correct blog shows up when people visit your site.  Get into your blog's dashboard and click on "Settings."  On the toolbar across the top you'll see several tabs.  One of them is labeled "Publishing."  Click on that. 

Now you'll see it says "You're publishing on blogspot.com" and below that it says "Switch to custom domain."  Click on that. 

Enter the domain you registered and you're good to go.  Sometimes it takes a little while for the redirect to kick in so give it a day or two.  If it still isn't working, make sure you entered your DNS changes correctly.

Your Band Needs a Blog - How to Put One Up Tonight

You need a blog to promote your music and you need it to have its own domain, so you'll be able to redirect the traffic somewhere else should the blogging company go out of business.  The only domains you should ever promote are ones you own.  This means no myspace.com, no blogspot.com, and no blogger.com.

WordPress is a free blog hosting service.  If you want to have your blog hosted on its own domain, you will need to first purchase a domain and then give Wordpress a few bucks to use that domain on its system.

Total cost will be around $20.

Step 1.  Buy your domain name if you don't already have one. 

Step 2.  You will need to change your DNS settings to redirect it to WordPress.  Visit your registrar and change your settings to the following:

ns1.wordpress.com
ns2.wordpress.com
ns3.wordpress.com

If your registrar needs the IP addresses:

72.232.101.25
208.69.182.198
72.233.2.19

Step 3.  Wait.  It can take up to three days for the mapping to go into effect.  You can check the status by visiting dnsstuff.com.  In the top right you'll see the DNS Lookup box.  Enter your domain name. If it says wordpress.com nameservers then you're ready for the next step.  If it doesn't, check back later. 

Step 4.  Once your nameservers have been changed, get into your blog's dashboard.  Click on "Options" and then get into "Domains."  Place your domain name in the box and click, "add domain to blog."  Now you will see an option that says "Put Blog Here."  Go ahead and click that and you are done!

Hosting your WordPress blog on your own domain is a great way to add value to your site and give it a professional custom appearance.  It takes a little bit of time and patience, however once your blog is up and running all you have to do is add content to it.

Music Talk Session Wrap Up

by David Knight

Recording artists new to the Music Talks community, the session wrap up is an overview of previous sessions. In the wrap-ups I highlight what took place during the sessions along with initial information about the sessions. Video footage of the sessions will be released in the coming weeks. Let's jump into the wrap-ups!

Listen 2 Ya Mix launched New York and Los Angeles February sessions. The recording engineers Peter Barker, Keith Wechsler and Drew Daniels really got into listening to the music and providing the creative and technical feedback to artists. All recording engineers in NY and LA got up from the dais and went to the back of the room to have a more accurate listening position, treating Listen 2 Ya Mix as they would any professional critical listening situation. As a whole many of the songs we listened to were pretty well recorded. I believe it's a sign that recording artists are starting to embrace the recording process. While we don't strive to be recording engineers, it's a big plus when you're working with engineers to be able to communicate effectively. This can only be accomplished by understanding recording terms and language coupled by some level of experience in the recording process.

What I found interesting was that many of the comments were about production, or should I say the lack of production, better ways to approach a song vocally, drums not being tuned properly or at all. That's a point that came up in NY and LA! Musicianship not tight, using certain instruments that are used as staples in certain styles of music, like don't use a banjo in funk music, the creative aspect of that is great, but somehow or another, it just does not work! An interesting question came up during the LA Listen 2 Ya Mix. The question was asked, "when do you know that you have a perfect mix?" Recording engineer Drew Daniels gave a good basic answer, which I felt, was something we non-engineers could practice. He said, "When you hear the music and not the mix, that's a good indication that you have a good mix." However, recording engineer Keith Wechsler said that did not work for him. Keith gives his reasons why and you can check that out and all of the other valuable Listen 2 Ya Mix info on the up coming Podcast!

I have to admit that when Maggie asked everyone during "The Balancing Act" to share some of their problems in life and career I was just as uncomfortable as everyone else in the room. It was clear to see that we as people don't speak openly about our "personal" problems. The room was so quite when the question to share "openly" was asked ­ this happened in NY and LA ­ Maggie had to assure everyone that anything that was said would stay in the room. Knowing that, how do I write about it? Well, I'll keep it short! Once everyone started to open up and talk about his or her personal concerns and problems, the ball started rolling. What Maggie and I both knew was that many artists would answer the question and speak on problems in their professional life. However, she was looking for problems and issues in their personal life that may have stopped their growth in their professional life. No one was suspecting this! Everyone had some type of goal in his or her professional life. No one had goals for their personal life. Everyone had a clear picture of seeing their success in their professional life, no one thought that they needed a picture in their personal life. When asked who's having fun? No one answered; oh wait one artist in LA said I'm having fun today at the session! Maggie's introduction to the Balancing Act" during these sessions is only the beginning of the program. There's a whole lot more to it! It runs deep and it produces results to those who participate. Most of all it's easy to understand and practice. We are making the program a founding part of Music Talks' Personal Development discipline and encourage you all to take advantage of its teachings. "The Balancing Act" was born out of pain, hurt, confusion, disconnection, abuse, unconscious thinking, healing, happiness and finally peace!

Eric De Fontenay, using a case study of the band he manages Kobo Town, explained the importance of team building during the NY session. Eric explained that "DIY" is good when you're first getting started but soon after artists must realize that putting together a team to handle tasks that you "the artist" really should not be doing should be of great importance to you and your career. Further he talked about building relationships and identifying potential team members within those relationships. He explained that when he and his partners started to build musicdish.com that they had certain levels of experience among the founders. He himself coming from a magazine and marketing background was of tremendous help. Still sales, accounting, legal issues and systems had to all be put in place and many of those skills and experience were missing.

This held true for the new band he is managing as well as Kobo Town. As their manager once again he had marketing experience and industry contacts. However, he knew having gone through the process with musicdish.com that a team was going to be needed once he brings them to the next level. I find this to be a problem with so many artists. We have to begin to realize that no one walking the earth who has achieved any level of success has done it alone! No one in any industry has become successful by themselves. Just because the internet, recording technology and digital downloads has made it possible for today's recording artists to create, market and distribute their music without a record company does not mean that they should. I know just dealing with marketing by itself, is a task that takes a team! My dad often said to me as I was growing up, "David, if you want to live your life going around fooling and playing games with other people's minds, I don't recommend it, but it's your life. However David, don't play games and fool yourself!" I took his advice! This simply means don't fool yourself into thinking that you don't need a team. You really do now, or you will soon.

Sheena Metal, or as I now call her Mama Metal delighted everyone in LA with her wealth of knowledge in marketing and promotions. I won't even go into all that she said because no one can say it better than Sheena. Once the videos are released you will see her in action, but to give you an idea I listed below five bullet points from her over 20 point list that she pulled off the top of her head, out of her pockets and magic bag. I recommend any artist who attended the NY session and those who are in other countries to become a part of Sheena's circle. If you ever had fun in high school learning from a teacher, you will once again enjoy that experience with Sheena!

1. Take interest in what others are doing
2. Be on everyone's list
3. You don't need an album!
4. Carry Business cards
5. Keep website and Myspace pages easy to load

Esession.com Co-founders Gina Fant-Saez and recording engineer Kevin Killen along with recording engineer Marc Urselli introduced esession.com. They took us through a complete tour as to how esession.com works, its power and many advantages. Esession makes it easy for recording artists all around the world to record music and exchange an entire production with other musicians regardless of the digital audio workstation that's being used. One of the most useful features of Esession is the glass window plug-in. It mirrors recording studios by allowing users to be able to see each other during the online sessions.

File management was a concern to artists. Gina explained that Esession is the perfect tool to use for managing your recorded songs files. It also provides a safe heaven for your audio files. In the event your local hard drive crashes, you still have the files on the Esession servers! Having so many features and benefits, it's hard to imagine anyone not using esession.com for managing files, communications file protection but most of all incorporating the creative process between yourself and other musicians. We have become too focused on doing it all ourselves, now with esessions.com, you can search talent on their website or provide your talent to others and make money!

Round Table
The Los Angeles round table was wonderful. Studio owner, engineer and artist John M, Tony Adams of audioMIDI.com and engineer, Drew Daniels of Sound Path recording and mastering rounded up the day. We were all tired by the time this segment started. Running an hour behind schedule because the previous segments were so informative. The round table's focus was in providing artists with the information needed to build a home working environment around their specific needs and their level of recording. It also focused on recording vocals. Almost immediately what was discovered was an interest in better understanding microphones and microphone recording techniques. Many artists seem to turn a knob or push a button on a compressor or eq, when in fact just changing the mic position could potentially get you the results you're looking for.

Further, being able to identify the proper mic for the job at hand is also of great importance! John M mentioned, if you have limited funds as you are building your studio, workstation or project, "invest in a good mic". As the general manager of audioMIDI.com, Tony Adams made note, the quality line in mics is starting to turn gray. Meaning, you can now purchase a microphone for $300 and it sounds very close to a $2,000 mic! There is much truth to this; however, high-end mics still have the overall edge. Needless to say, you have to contact recording engineers, retailers and other artists to get some feedback on all that's going on out there when purchasing a mic or any gear for that matter. It was suggested during the round table to rent the microphone or gear that you are interested in purchasing. This allows you to "test drive" the product before laying down the Benjamin's or plastic!

Register for the Los Angeles March 30th Music Talks Session now. It's the last session for 2008!

For more information visit us at: www.musictalkssessions.com.

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Content provided by the
Copyright © MusicDish, LLC 2008 - Republished with Permission
click here for free music content for your site or blog

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The Evolution of P2P & Music: From Enemy to Business Partner

Presented by DCIA at the Digital Music and Media Summit, Canadian Music Week 2008
by Marty Lafferty

Moderator: Marty Lafferty, CO, DCIA
Panelists included Eric Garland, CEO, BigChampagne; Benjamin Masse, President & Founder, DoubleV3; Chris Gillis, Manager, Business Development, MediaDefender; Eric de Fontenay, Founder, MusicDish Network; David Hughes, Senior Vice President, Technology, RIAA; and Gary Greenstein, Attorney, Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati.

The core question we addressed was whether P2P software programs, and in particular file-sharing applications, considered by some to have been "yesterday's enemy," can now be viewed as "today's out-of-the-box opportunity - and tomorrow's music industry savior."

Do P2P file-sharing technologies hold exponentially more potential for business traffic than other digital networks? At the end of the proverbial rainbow, will there be a robust new P2P marketplace for licensed music distribution?

Is now the time for songwriters, artists, and other rights-holders to step up and embrace a community of users who are actively looking for new music?

Eric Garland outlined the advancements of BigChampagne as an industry data resource and summarized current P2P usage statistics in the US market as having steadily grown to approximately 55 million regular file sharers distributing 1.1 billion files monthly, which is an exponentially higher number of tracks being distributed on P2P than via iTunes. On a per capita basis, Canada is among the top three territories in the world for P2P music file sharing.

While industry observers tend to view P2P in terms of its technical characteristics as a protocol, users don't care - they just want music; and ISPs need to be able to satisfy users' demand. People are not going to stop finding music with or without authorization; and it should be clear that a litigation strategy will not stop them from doing it. Even when discussing the matter privately, however, music industry leaders say they would not have done anything differently to this point.

Benjamin Masse described DoubleV3's dual thrust as a discovery-and-recommendation engine and monitoring / leveraging service actively working with some P2P companies. Advantages of P2P networks include viral marketing, ease-of-creation, and ability to generate real-time data on consumption of music. Canada has relatively fewer licensed outlets for online music than in the US, and licensing is extremely complicated.

Chris Gillis noted that MediaDefender has evolved from a strictly P2P anti-piracy services firm, which represented a cost center for its record label clients, in part, into an advertising revenue-generating company. P2P has never been an evil technology; abuses of it for infringement have been the problem.

Chris does not believe that ad-supported MP3s (or the like) delivered via P2P alone will make up for revenue lost from CD sales declines.

Nor does he agree that P2P is inherently superior to other distribution technologies for music. Listeners just want free, un-traceable music, without pop-ups; how it is delivered is of little concern.

MediaDefender sees the demographics of P2P users expanding, as well as overall usage. Users are now younger (pre-teen) and also older (baby boomers), expanding significantly beyond the entrenched core (18-24) and fringe (13-35) base.

Eric de Fontenay opined from his perspective as an online music publishing and artist management company that P2P has long served a useful purpose to help up-and-coming artists find their audience and develop their fan base. There are models that can be borrowed from other networked entertainment systems that can be applied to P2P to provide consumers with transparency while also generating revenue for music rights-holders.

Suing consumers is not a viable long-term strategy, according to Eric, and artists do not want to be put in a position that is negative towards their listeners. The industry must recognize that sharing music is unstoppable and get past the current phase and come up with a new business model or models. The Songwriters Association of Canada proposal of a modest monthly charge to be billed and collected by ISPs for P2P music consumers deserves serious exploration.

David Hughes quipped that the RIAA has been known for two things, granting platinum records and suing file sharers (from kids to grandmothers), but would have continued to be more closely associated with the former had it not been for the advent of P2P. He said that there is no question that P2P has proven itself to be very effective for distribution, especially for large files, but not for monetization. And in the case of relatively small files like music tracks, the verdict is out on whether the bandwidth savings is sufficient to offset the challenges of securely managing micro-payments.

It is clear that audiences just want free music and in greater quantities than in pre-digital times. People like to walk around with 4,000 songs on their iPods, of which 30 may have been purchased from iTunes, 600 transferred from their CD collections, and the remainder from unlicensed sources.

David projects that over the next twenty-four months, ISPs and universities will dramatically step up enforcement. This will be driven by their self interests, but also will provide an environment for legitimate digital distribution models to flourish. Canada used to represent 1/10th the amount of CD sales as the US; but now, due to rampant file-sharing infringement in Canada, has precipitously dropped to 1/45th. It is imperative that the "hassle factor" be raised to discourage this behavior.

Gary Greenstein cited his extensive legal background representing content rights holders initially and now digital distribution interests, and said that the music industry really should find a P2P business model that works. He doesn't believe it will be primarily subscription, citing low US take rates to date (3 million).

He sees that P2P offers great merchandising potential, however, because of the active screen-time users invest in searching for specific P2P downloads versus setting up Internet radio to play in the background, for example. P2P volume is enormous; micro-transactions can indeed be tracked.

It should be clear now that, by any standard of measurement, litigation has not been an effective strategy; with the usage of P2P increasing in numbers and expanding in demographic reach, Gary's view is that the music industry should try to do things differently.

During the Q&A, panelists further discussed bandwidth consumption, driven by increasing consumer appetites for greater quantities of richer and higher-definition (HD) media, and alternative business models which the industry could adopt for P2P music distribution. Share wisely, and take care.

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Content provided by the
Copyright © MusicDish, LLC 2008 - Republished with Permission
click here for free music content for your site or blog

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Why You Should Have Free Music on Your Website

It's human nature.  Everyone loves getting something for free.  Musicians and record labels can use this behavioral truth to increase traffic to their websites and generate qualified leads.

Not everyone who visits a website is ready to make a purchase.  In many cases, people are just browsing.  So even if the website is the main portal through which customers buy your music (or other merchandise), an equally important purpose of the website is to generate leads. 

Creating an ezine or newsletter is a common "freebie."  It certainly works on this site.

Subscribers opt in, which means they provide minimal personal information in order to receive the newsletter.  Each new subscriber becomes another lead.  The result over time is a large mailing list of qualified prospects.  In addition to the newsletter, business owners email announcements of new products or services to this custom-made pool of potential buyers.

But you're a musician or doing something involving the music business, right?  If you have music you can give away, that may be even more powerful to get people to sign up for your mailing list.

Another benefit of offering "freebies" is the valuable market information it will provide for you.  A significant response to an offer suggests the item is a hot topic among qualified buyers.  Such data can be useful in driving new product development for the business.  Remixes, live recordings, etc.

Marketing experts have noted one downside of the free offer, the possibility of attracting people who solely want the "freebie" but are not interested in purchasing anything in the future.  One way to decrease the likelihood of this is to make the free offer enticing to those in the market for the products and services offered for sale, but unappealing to others.  A direct seller, for example, could offer a free item to anyone who buys a t-shirt (or other merchandise).

But it's just a download with no physical cost, so who cares?  Give it away and don't worry about it.

A growing internet trend is to offer visitors a free membership to the website's online community.  Membership entitles the user to access restricted areas of the site, publish a profile, and interact with other members of the community.  Usually only a basic amount of information is required to join, such as name and email address.

This is great for acts with an already established following.  Have a section where fans can interact, trade recordings, share photos from gigs, etc.

Industry estimates show that response rates triple when a "freebie" is offered as incentive for prompt action, effectively lowering the business owner's cost per lead substantially.  Even if the free gift increases the total expense of the campaign, the higher volume of qualified leads will result in higher sales volume, thus offsetting the additional expense.

But as I said above-- just give away a music download.  It's more or less free for you to do that, so don't get caught up with what you're "losing."  Think about what you're gaining by getting more people on your mailing list and more people signed up to your online community.