Thursday, April 23, 2015

OCCUPY YOUR MUSIC – Part 5: CD BABY and THE STREAMING SITES



As my CD got done and I got all 3000 copies packed in all the drawers and storage I could find around my house, I created a CD Baby profile and sent the 5 copies of each CD release (the Serbian and English version). I signed up for hard copy as well as the digital release, and in a few days my music was all over the internet. Four years after, several online profiles later, many and many hours spent on online promotion, I only have 1 CD sold, and 3 digital copies, and several streaming of songs, all together not adding up to $50 minimum that CD Baby requires to send you a check! Sad I know.
However, even after all that discouragement, I still believe that one of the best moves in all this was actually creating a profile on CD Baby and posting my music. Why? First, because for a very modest fee per album you get it permanently (hopefully forever) online, and in their stock. Personally, that means a lot to me even if it does not sell. Second, they seem very professional, and they know what they are doing. The service is smooth, the site is with no glitches, your info and stats about your sales are easily accessible and it’s all very well organized. Another very important benefit for me personally was that soon after I had posted it on CD Baby, the Canadian Library of Archives had contacted me requesting copies of my CD for their archives. To date, this is pretty much the most valuable thing that happened to my CD not only after I posted it on CD Baby, but otherwise as well. 



A couple things I would have done differently though. First, I would seriously reconsider posting my music on Itunes (so called digital distribution). I’m still not quite sure if I would completely take it down or not post it at all. In any case, the streaming sites I would avoid completely. On CD BABY you are able to track when and who bought your music and in what form. You can also see the prices each individual paid to get or stream your song. I have my music on several streaming sites and one stream is paid $0.0004 on Spotify! Rhapsody pays $0.0091, Muve Music pays $0.00099, Xbox Music: $0.0023, Rdio: $0.008, Last.fm: $0.0005, My Space: $0.0007 etc. Deezer pays $0.3564 for a song download!
It’s not surprising the latest scandal about the mainstream artist who had his song streamed millions of times and got only $3,000 for it!
That is the very reason Taylor Swift boycotted the online streaming. Guess what: She “Occupied Her Music” and her CD sales skyrocketed!



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