Here is a scenario to think about.
Madonna releases her latest album and 2 million people go online to their favorite bit torrent or P2P program to find a free copy. The record label is on the warpath from lost revenue, piracy is killing the music industry, etc, etc.
What the record label is forgetting is that in fact these 2 million people will review the album and tell 2 or 3 people each (probably more), post comments about it online, play it with their friends and advertise the product for free. .
If even half of the people they tell buy a legitimate copy, based on each person telling 2 people about it, they would get back every free copy that was downloaded.
Would you say no to so many people loving and talking about your music? Established stars attract because everyone knows them and there is a market demand for their music and people actively seek it out.
That’s why the independent artist has to use their brawn with a push mentality. Their only goal should be to get his music to as many places as they can within his control and budget. That’s also why independent artists should focus on promotion above all else.
You’d guarantee more people access to your music if you gave it away for free, but hey, that defies logic, it hurts sales, and you’re not making that many sales right now, so you can’t bear to give your music away. free right?
Independent dance music act ‘Kandystand’ released their first single ‘Everybody’ from their debut album, and couldn’t figure out why sales were slow.
After a few months, they decided that maybe their fans didn’t like the song, so they started working on a new track that might work better. Because of this, they made the decision not to seek revenue from ‘Everybody’ and quickly made all mixes of the song available as free downloads on Reverbnation.
Within weeks, the track had been downloaded thousands of times, appeared on P2P networks, bit torrent sites, all the usual Russian MP3 services… What happened then was amazing.
Their fan list grew every day, their CDBaby sales grew at an incredible rate, their online sales skyrocketed, and they started making money every month from the online sales of ‘Everybody’ and their debut album. People who bought ‘Everybody’ also viewed its album while online and around 50% of them also bought a copy of the album…
So it’s time to take a tip from the major label hoopla about piracy and think again… Revisit the stage with Madonna’s album again, turn it upside down and apply it to your music.
Scenario 2.
Your band releases a song, puts it on iTunes, CDBaby, Feiyr, Tunecore, etc, etc. and post links to buy the track on their website. His band immediately gives away the track for free on all available sources including bit torrent and P2P EXCEPT his website where it is for sale.
Your band hosts a contest on your website that gives away a free pack of your songs every month to 1 lucky fan chosen from all fan registrations on the website that month. His band gives the tip to all available online blogs and asks them to make it available for download in its entirety at the highest quality.
What’s happening here is that you’re advertising your track where music buyers congregate. Now let’s do the math:
Assume that 1,000 people a month download your track for free. They visit your website to learn more about you, sign up as one of your fans, and tell someone else about your music.
That person also visits your site and signs up as a fan. That’s 2,000 people who know about you now and are on your mailing list ready to receive feedback on every future song you release and play.
Let’s be conservative and say that only 25% of the people who are told by the original downloader buy one of your tracks legitimately from an online store.
That’s 250 sales a month at the rate of 50 cents from your online dealer which is $500 a month.
Are you making $500 a month from your music? If not, you’d better use the major label’s ‘piracy is bad’ secret marketing trick and get it free on the net ASAP.