me and my production team are finishing the first EP for this one artist, and we're wondering which situation would be bettter, and are looking for feedback on which way would be best...

1. making 500 copies and selling them for 5$ on the streets, or for whatever in-store....

2. making 150 copies or so, and giving them away as promotion (in shows, retail stores, etc...), for the coming album for that same artist (or also collecting donations for them)

3. anything else which could be interesting to promote our production team, and the artist... any ideas ????

that's it...

ps. i didnt know where to put this topic, hope its not a problem here... as it is "work in progress"

thanx

Lets' keep the post in here till we find another home for it at a later stage.

This is a very good question in fact, my first reaction would be to ask how well known is the artist and are they popular, I mean would their disk be in demand? Do they have local support?

If so then certainly sell it at gigs, if not I can't help thinking you would benefit from freeies being available and handing them out to selective ears.

Anyone else?
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Recording Studio Suntans

Last edited by AC on Thu Jul 21, 2005 7:43 am, edited 1 time in total

well, the artist in question is new, he has done a couple shows here and there, in small lounges, and small clubs, but nothing spectacular...

his songs would make it big, if it finds the proper crowd to listen to them, and he gets positive feedback where he gets heard...

he is still small on the local scene, but like i said previously, whoever has heard him know he's heading for beyond the limits (whatever these are)...

of course, we think of marketing his EP as a demo, to shop around for a record deal for him, if possible...

anyhow, anybody else with feedback...

people love free music

that's a very interesting remark, seen as we're, engineers, producers and artists are trying to "make a living" off of music, and people would do anything to get their music for free.

i figure, it makes sense, when you start that your music be free, and still strive to make your music better, and hopefully, in the long run, people will recognize the thousands of hours we put into our music, and will end up buying it at last...

anybody else?

Blaak wrote:

that's a very interesting remark, seen as we're, engineers, producers and artists are trying to "make a living" off of music, and people would do anything to get their music for free. i figure, it makes sense, when you start that your music be free, and still strive to make your music better, and hopefully, in the long run, people will recognize the thousands of hours we put into our music, and will end up buying it at last... anybody else?

I think you could look at this from a marketing and branding angle rather than a giving away music angle.

Look to brand the product and market to a wide audience that may yeild results in the future. If you give away 5000 free copies that get listened to, I would presume it has far more market potential down the line than if only 50 people bought a copy and listened to it.
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Recording Studio Suntans

give away as many as possible. because, if the band is good, the people will come to see the band play shows, and that's where the majority of the money is made, at shows, not from cd sales. you could just put 3 from the album on a freebie give away, then sell copies of the full album for like $7-10, that way, people who liked what they heard on the freebie would want to buy the CD to hear the rest.

Remember how Skunk Anansee (please excuse spelling) started, they gave away a free single by promoting the free give away on radio etc. Everyone joined their Internet fan base to get the free single (which was a great track) next thing they were fighting off majors and the rest is history as they say. Give away one or two tracks of the artists music as a marketing excercise, but have a good marketing strategy to back up the free give away. Remember you should be in control, you choose to give away the music, most major artists dont enjoy this choice, their music is stolen and placed on the Internet for all of the parasites to download for free

Good Luck

Jules.

I agree that perhaps giving away a song or two wouldn't be terrible....I just remember reading about Green Day when they were kids....recording there own tunes in small litle studios and selling them from the stage....apparently, they sould over 150,000 copies of their demo before ever signing to the bigs....if it is good, and he can produce it live, it will sell.

I reckon people will like it a lot more if you just give it away. People will love you before they have even heard the music! Just gotta make sure it sounds decent...
Its a bummer to just see your hard work being given away, but it will reach a lot more people that way.
(just make sure you have copyrighted it somehow. Maybe send a copy to yourself and a lawyer by certified mail, and leave it sealed).

Has Amazon.com made a profit yet?

you should get the artist involved in more shows, and sell the albums there. it doesn't sound like there is a strong base to build on yet. just having a small local following and giving away cd's will not help your cause.

get some cd's to club promoters and radio/college dj's in the same genre as your artist. get feedback (and spins) from dj's, try to get the artists opening for bigger acts as they come through town. hit record stores up and give away the cd's for free with the purchase of a similar artist. hire a publicist to get a buzz going. etc.