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When it comes to starting a band, you need to have a clear picture for those people you are recruiting. With this in mind, you should be able to explain the style of music you want to play. You should have at leas t 10 songs selected that you want to play. This way people can clearly see the style of music you want to play.
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Today we have a chat with Miata Edoga the President of Abundance Bound a great website that teaches artist how to manage their money. It’s got great free resources, as well as many different packages and best of all Payment plans to make them all affordable. Unlike other “financial gurus” who provide a “one size fits all” Abundance bound features financial advice specifically for musicians/artist.
Today Miata talks about taking that first step and the thrill of discovering exactly where you are (so you can figure out how to get to “there” (financial prosperity) from where you are (not financial prosperity). She also discusses how “co mingling” your money can muddy the waters of your financial picture.
If you’re interested in their free reports like their “Five Things Every Actor Must Do: Critical Steps Towards Success” Report or webinars check out Abundance Bound.com be sure to use the coupon code cooler10 to get 10% off your purchase. They have online classes, take home studies, boot camps, and one on one coaching. One of the great things about their programs, is they have payment plans. In some cases you are done taking the classes before you’re done paying for it. That is how much they know you’re going to love the information presented. You will also find the skills you learn will more than help pay for the class.
Don’t forget to use THIS LINK, and use the coupon code cooler10 to save 10% off your order (or just check out their free reports).
Sponsors and Support
Godaddy coupon code cooler7 gets a .com domain name for $7.49
Budget.com/musician saves 30% off a weekly rental or $10 off any rental.
Buy Dave’s Book “Get your band out of the basement – and keep them out of the asylum” available at musicianlibrary.com Order now and get the bons ““10 Stupid Things That Bands Do”
Green Day just released a new album and you can purchase tracks from the album in Rock Band. This game is now seen as a way to get your music to your fans. Indies have been shut out of this service, but that will come to an end very soon.
Harmonix and MTV Games are opening access to all artists via a newly created Rock Band Network, a platform that gives musicians and record labels the ability to author their own original recordings into gameplay files and sell their music as playable Rock Band tracks through the newly-created Rock Band Network Music Store.
Artists can set their own price from 50 cents to $3 per track and rwill eceive 30% of any sales. But there enough technical hoops to jump through that most artists may want to let their distributor or other third party do the heavy lifting. The new platform will launch in open beta in late August.
Musicians/Publishers will be able to submit their tracks for playtesting and peer review via a specialized Web site, Creators.RockBand.com. You will also need (here is the catch) a membership in Microsoft’s XNA Creators Club Online in order to test and publish game content. The service will only be available to those who purchase a premium membership to Microsoft’s XNA Creators Club for four months at $49.99 or for a year at $99.99.
There is a video showing some of the tools.
The service will launch to only Xbox and PlayStation users, but other platforms are expected to be supported soon.
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I’ve known about paypal micropayments for a while, but when I first heard about it, I didn’t think you could switch from an “old” paypal account to a new micropayment. Now you can. What’s the difference?
Standard Paypal Fees
PayPal charged a minimum transaction fee of 30 cents plus 2.9%.
Paypal Micropayment Fees
The Mircopayment option raises the percentage to 5% but lowers the fee to just 5 cents . That changes the net profit on a $.99 cent direct sale to $.89 cents vs. $.66 under the old PayPal option. Sell just one hundred two or three song bundles and the total PayPal transaction costs drop from $36 to $15.
To find out more about Paypal micro payments go to https://micropayments.paypal-labs.com/
This is show #238 originating from www.musicianscooler.com
It costs you $4.95 for one CD, but if you only need a few CDs this beats ordering hundreds and turning them into coasters. If you sell your music via download they charge 15% and if you sell the Cd at amazon.com they take 45% (ouch). As some people completely trust amazon.com they may purchase off of amazon.com when they may not off a lesser known website. For more information go to www.createspace.com
Sponsors
Save on renewals and new domains at www.godaddy.com using the coupon code cooler7
Budget Rental car – www.budget.com/musician Get 30% off a weekly rental or $10 off any rental at Budget Rental Car
WaTunes has announced that it will no longer charge artists for digital distribution to iTunes and other online retailers. The company hopes to generate revenue from ads on a new music social networking site.
I’m not sure why company after company keeps going back to the free business model. Eventually if you don’t make money, you go out of business, and while advertising revnue is up for online advertising, it is still a tough road to go.
For more informattion go to http://www.watunes.com/
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Today we talk with Martin Johnson for First Choice Management and host of Christian Music Strategies Podcast.
We find out that while “secular” bands may lead with their music, a Christian band may fine more benefit in leading with their message. A pastor may be asking them to the church to inspire the congregation. Likewise their website should emphasize their message which should in turn get them booked, which should allow them to sell their CDs.
There are places to find Christian Gigs, like Churches, Coffee houses, and even clubs (as long as you bring in a crowd).
While there may not be room on the radio for an indie band, you can definitely get some “podplay” on podcasts. You need to be using the Internet, You Tube (check out www.animimoto.com to make a video from pictures).
I just did a podcast about how you should own everything (like your domain name, e-mail list, etc). Today I tried to sign into my gmail account (that I’ve had for years) and the password was sent to someone that was not me. I’ve been hijacked. I should’ve been telling people my email was contact “at” musicianscooler.com (or something). Instead I put my faith in Google. I mean, they are GOOGLE. Well now I’ve lost all my contacts, and my fate lies in the hands of the Google staff, and who knows what is happening to my email addresses.
If I had used the email that comes with my domain, I could retrieve it with Gmail, abd if Gmail goes down, I could retrieve it in Outlook. I control it. I don’t control (especially now) what happens with my Gmail account.
If you’re trying to get in touch with me, the best way is 888-563-3228
Dave
I just found out about a new tool called Corner Stay Ads. This tool can sit in any corner of your website. You have access to tons of images to get people’s attention. Then when people put their mouse on that image you can do ANYTHING. Anything? Yes Anything. So here are some ideas I thought of.
Buy My CD Button or a link to your CDBaby page.
Audio Player
Sign up form form for your newsletter
Special promotion for your next gig
ANYTHING you are promoting for your band (your myspace, your facebook, your reverb nation page, your OurStage page).
The best thing is it’s only $37 bucks and it’s super easy to install on your website.
I was curious as to why it s was so cheap and yet so powerful. I found out why. When you buy the software they try to get you to sign up for some 4 minute money making membership site. Well you can do what I did and take the Corner Stay Ads script and pass on the membership site.
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I just found out about a new service. It’s called Our Stage. It’s kind of a Sonicbids (as you get a FREE EPK, and the ability to get gigs) meets Garageband (as you get reviewed by industry types) meets MySpace (as you can have friends). Meets American Idol (as you can enter and win monthly prizes of $5,000. There are also “Channel” prizes where you can win $100. Here is some text I copied from the website.
As an artist, your first step is to upload your music or video and decide which channel competition to enter. Then, fans judge the work side by side with the work of others. Our unique judging capability (called Peer Relative Ranking, but don’t worry about that) makes sure that each piece is judged fairly by the real audience- with no rigging, no cheating, and no celebrity judges. At the end of each month, the top 20 and the top 10 in each channel go head-to-head in a special judging channel to determine the winner of that channel, and then a site-wide judging contest to determine our Grand Prize winner. For more information about that, see the Judging section below! As a fan, all you have to do is listen to some great music and give feedback about just how great you think it is. Find your favorite artists and follow them as they grow!
The ranking or judging is done via two patent pending algorithms that serve up top ranking, middle ranking and relatively new uploaded material in a channel in “somewhat” random fashion for someone to judge.
When we say somewhat, we mean that we take care of serving up the material in a fair and unbiased fashion. We are watching very carefully to make sure that each item in the channel gets equal exposure–we guarantee that. Whether that happens in a particular judging session, though, is another matter.
Depending on how much our users like something (rank it favorably), and how long they want to keep on ranking, the ranking engine will try to get the user to discriminate how much more an item is liked over other ranked items, and thus, the reason why users may see what appears to them as the same item coming up during several battles.
Our site users who judge cannot request what material they will be served to judge. During judging they have to view or play the material served, and at a minimum, they have to screen an item for 15 seconds each before they can rank one item over another.
Then, all of the rankings from all of the users are taken together and the ranking engine bubbles up the best items to the top!
TWO (2) GRAND PRIZES, one for Music and one for Video, for each Contest Period, a check payable to the Music winner in the amount of $5,000, and a check payable to the Video winner in the amount of $1,000.
ONE (1) FIRST PRIZE FOR EACH CHANNEL on the site (one for each Channel winner who is not selected as a Grand Prize winner for each Contest Period): a $100 Online Gift Card. Gift card is subject to the terms and conditions stated thereon. Approximate retail value (“ARV”) of each First Prize is $100.
What is a Mojo rating?
Every artist gets a Mojo rating based primarily on where the fans rank them in our Channels. Other factors that figure into the Mojo rating are: number of Fans, number of Friends and number of media uploads as well as EPK completeness. On Marketplace, venues can use the Mojo rating to help them identify artists with a proven ability to draw a crowd.
To get a Mojo rating, register on OurStage and activate your account using the link we email you. From there, all you have to do is create a free EPK from your profile page and activate it. To get a positive Mojo rating, just click “View My EPK” from your profile and click the “Activate My EPK” link.
OurStage is still a free site for all the services you have right now It’s free to join, free to enter competitions, and free to be ranked. The only part of OurStage that will be costing any money is Marketplace, our new site feature for finding gigs around the USA. OurStage Marketplace will be free until Labor Day 2008, and then it will still only cost a small monthly fee, about the cost of buying lunch. So don’t worry! You aren’t losing any features. The only change is that you can now opt to pay a small monthly fee to access and apply to gigs on the OurStage Marketplace.
While I hate things like “It costs as much a lunch” comments this site seems to have alot of potential. The great thing about new sites with competition is it doesnt’ take much to be a big fish in a small pond, and when they are handing out prizes I say its worth a shot. If you’re using the service I would love some feedback, and if you’re not you can sign up at ourstage.com
Cheyrl Crow’s got a Christmas CD that available at Hallmark stores. Inside the CD you get a code to download an extra song. Now this create a sense of urgency. I HAD to buy this CD at THIS store. The fact that there was an additional song adds more value to the purchase.
Why not have business cards set up with a special link on your website where they can download the extra song. They only get the code if they buy your CD at the show. This way at a gig, if someone is on the fence, you can say “if you buy this CD now you will get an additional downloadable song.” When they purchase, you hand them a business card with the URL to your song, and you spent 10 cents on business cards, and the customer spent 10 dollars on your new CD. I use Vita Print for my business cards.
I just found out about a new service. It’s called Our Stage. It’s kind of a Sonicbids (as you get a FREE EPK, and the ability to get gigs) meets Garageband (as you get reviewed by industry types) meets MySpace (as you can have friends). Meets American Idol (as you can enter and win monthly prizes of $5,000. There are also “Channel” prizes where you can win $100. Here is some text I copied from the website.
As an artist, your first step is to upload your music or video and decide which channel competition to enter. Then, fans judge the work side by side with the work of others. Our unique judging capability (called Peer Relative Ranking, but don’t worry about that) makes sure that each piece is judged fairly by the real audience- with no rigging, no cheating, and no celebrity judges. At the end of each month, the top 20 and the top 10 in each channel go head-to-head in a special judging channel to determine the winner of that channel, and then a site-wide judging contest to determine our Grand Prize winner. For more information about that, see the Judging section below! As a fan, all you have to do is listen to some great music and give feedback about just how great you think it is. Find your favorite artists and follow them as they grow!
The ranking or judging is done via two patent pending algorithms that serve up top ranking, middle ranking and relatively new uploaded material in a channel in “somewhat” random fashion for someone to judge.
When we say somewhat, we mean that we take care of serving up the material in a fair and unbiased fashion. We are watching very carefully to make sure that each item in the channel gets equal exposure–we guarantee that. Whether that happens in a particular judging session, though, is another matter.
Depending on how much our users like something (rank it favorably), and how long they want to keep on ranking, the ranking engine will try to get the user to discriminate how much more an item is liked over other ranked items, and thus, the reason why users may see what appears to them as the same item coming up during several battles.
Our site users who judge cannot request what material they will be served to judge. During judging they have to view or play the material served, and at a minimum, they have to screen an item for 15 seconds each before they can rank one item over another.
Then, all of the rankings from all of the users are taken together and the ranking engine bubbles up the best items to the top!
TWO (2) GRAND PRIZES, one for Music and one for Video, for each Contest Period, a check payable to the Music winner in the amount of $5,000, and a check payable to the Video winner in the amount of $1,000.
ONE (1) FIRST PRIZE FOR EACH CHANNEL on the site (one for each Channel winner who is not selected as a Grand Prize winner for each Contest Period): a $100 Online Gift Card. Gift card is subject to the terms and conditions stated thereon. Approximate retail value (“ARV”) of each First Prize is $100.
What is a Mojo rating?
Every artist gets a Mojo rating based primarily on where the fans rank them in our Channels. Other factors that figure into the Mojo rating are: number of Fans, number of Friends and number of media uploads as well as EPK completeness. On Marketplace, venues can use the Mojo rating to help them identify artists with a proven ability to draw a crowd.
(return to top)
To get a Mojo rating, register on OurStage and activate your account using the link we email you. From there, all you have to do is create a free EPK from your profile page and activate it. To get a positive Mojo rating, just click “View My EPK” from your profile and click the “Activate My EPK” link.
OurStage is still a free site for all the services you have right now It’s free to join, free to enter competitions, and free to be ranked. The only part of OurStage that will be costing any money is Marketplace, our new site feature for finding gigs around the USA. OurStage Marketplace will be free until Labor Day 2008, and then it will still only cost a small monthly fee, about the cost of buying lunch. So don’t worry! You aren’t losing any features. The only change is that you can now opt to pay a small monthly fee to access and apply to gigs on the OurStage Marketplace.
While I hate things like “It costs as much a lunch” comments this site seems to have alot of potential. The great thing about new sites with competition is it doesnt’ take much to be a big fish in a small pond, and when they are handing out prizes I say its worth a shot. If you’re using the service I would love some feedback, and if you’re not you can sign up at ourstage.com
