Turning unreleased music into revenue
It is always great to receive unreleased music from artists and record labels, at least that’s what we think at the Signalfire headquarters. A lot of this music can be catalogued as ‘quality music’ and has the potential to grow out to something very interesting, valuable and even profitable when released.
While standing with one foot in sound system culture through our passion project FatKidOnFire, we believe that music is there for people to listen, meditate and vibe to. However, an industry as large as the music industry doesn’t purely exist for (free) music consumption, but also for profit generation.
Trust us; there’s a lot of good music out there that deserves to be bought. Obviously, some of it sounds better than others, and it is for you to decide what to release, whether you’re a record label or musician. There are a few selling points that might influence how well your release sells — here’s our short break-down:
- Music quality: Depth of the music, present dynamics inside the music, personal & forward-thinking touches to a style — make sure to stay creative. Decide whether it should be a short EP, album or single-track release.
- Mixing & mastering: Finalising your music for release allows buyers and listeners the best playback possible, whatever system they listen it on. Make sure to find a reliable mastering facility that tailors to your needs.
- Music, record label & distribution: Finding a label or music that fits your needs is important; one that shares your vision, values, vibes and ‘just feels right’ to you. Also look at the label’s past successes, ways of dealing with artist & repertoire — and what kind of release format they deal with. Use the right distributor / ask what distributor the label uses, what main store pushes their music and how often you’ll receive payment per year.
- Artwork design: Giving your work a visual representation helps, whether this is a face of the artist or an actual art piece, it will make your release come to life. Designs don’t have to cost a fortune, look around and find the right designer.
- Publishing: After you’ve set up distribution, attained the ISRC-codes to track your music repertoire world-wide, you might want to invest in music publishing. Get in touch with such professional that ensures musicians and labels receive payment when their compositions are used commercially. Get the music plugged, traced and create an extra revenue stream!
- Marketing & promotion: Whether you’re a record label or musician, to market and promo your music is important to reach a wider audience. The best way is to send artists your music or label catalogue in physical and digital form, spread it through a mailing list, mouth-to-mouth communication or by creating a hype. PR companies can help give a push to a release, this might cost you some money
Knowing where and how to cater your sound will help you to induce more sales. But, if you’re a musician or record label that just wants to make and/or release music and don’t want to deal with all the hassle, make sure you find the right outlets to help you.
Signalfire is an outlet that helps you convert unreleased music into the revenue, within any chain of the break-down provided above. In need of more tips, advice or help? Make sure to get in touch via social media or via our contact page.
Thanks for reading!
Signalfire.
