Being An Independent Artist Just Got Easier

tunecore.com

Remember when every artist goal was to sign a record deal with a major label. Now that the technology has changed so has the music industry and the game as well.  Being an independent artist 10-15 years ago was a major struggle for the artist music to be heard outside of their community and own city.

That is no more the case with websites and services such as TuneCore. TuneCore is a digital distribution website that allows independent artist to not only distribute their own music to the public on major online stores such as iTunes, XBOX Live, Zune, and Amazon MP3. 

By giving independent artist the opportunity to put out an album, single and ringtone creates a new level playing field from being mainstream and independent as an artist. 

TuneCore acts as a distributor for independent artist. Being independent now may be easier than ever before. Not having the overhead of a record deal from one of the major record labels, can allow artist to focus on what they love and that is making music. 

Even though this is not a free service the prices are very reasonable for independent artist. Distribution cost start out at $9.99 per year for each single and ringtone and $39.99 for each album. The most important thing about TuneCore is that as an artist you keep all the rights to your music and you keep 100% of the royalties. 

With perks like that any artist that is independent should really question, should they stay an independent artist or should they be hunting that record deal that once was so important? Not to say that as an artist you should not or would not want to get that record deal, but with websites like TuneCore it makes it easier for independent artist to stay independent longer.

Learning From The Experts

One of the best ways of learning is by learn from your mistakes as well as from those within the industry and field you wish to be in. This is very essential when you are in the initial stage of creating a business plan and trying to secure funding from different types of investors. Doing research and getting key points from the experts will surely make creating a business plan much easier.

When doing my own research on business plan experts, I found a few key points that will not only assist with writing a business plan but will help become a successful business owner. One piece of advice that I have learned and every business owner that is starting out should know, you should never give away ownership when you are starting out. According to Tim Berry, Don’t save starting costs by giving the business away. A lot of time people give away percentages and when the business starts to do well they have forgotten that their business partners own a percent of the business and has not done any work to deserve the pay. Don’t Give Away Ownership As If It Were Just Credit. Please, is an blog post that is a must read.

From this blog I have made sure that if I have a business partner within my owner business the only way they would be able to get a percentage of the business is if they were going to put in the same amount of blood, sweat and tears as I would.

What I believe to be the most important section in a business plan to investors would be the marketing plan and sales strategy. An investor needs to know how people will know about your company and product(s), by having a solid marketing plan will show them just how you plan on doing so. The sales strategy will let investors know what a companies long-term goals are and what competitive advantage it will have over the existing companies in their industry.  

Business Plan Experts

Tim Berry

Tim Berry is the founder and chairman of Palo Alto Software and bplans.com as well as co-founder of Borland International. Berry received his MBA from Stanford. Married for 42 years and a father of five. Tim stated, “I believe in business planning but I don’t think a business plan is a document (Timberry.com, 2012).” Aside from being a founder, co-founder and chairman Berry is also an author, speaker, and blogger.

With a MBA degree from Stanford, Berry also graduated with honors from the University of Oregon with an MA in Journalism, and received a BA in Literature from the University of Norte Dame.

Berry has published books that help small business owners create business plans as well as help them with business startups. He has written books with titles such as The Plan-as-you-go Business Plan, Business Plan Pro, 3 Weeks to Startup, Sales and Market Forecasting for Entrepreneurs, and Hurdle: the Book on Business Planning. Tim has been very vital, as a business plan expert, Jim Blasingame, one of the most well-known small business radio talk show hosts, has referred to him as “The Father of Business Planning.”

Tim does not believe in writing business plans for business owners but instead he provides free business plan advice and coaching, through his blog. This blog has over 200 posts that contain all types of articles, videos, presentations, and even a couple of books.

 

Ellen Rohr

Ellen Rohr is the president of Bare Bones Business. Rohr teaches business basics as well as a columnist for PHC News and a writer for many business journals and trade magazines. With a college degree in Business Administration, Rohr started out running a family plumbing business which she also let belly up.

In 1995 Rohr started Bare Bones Biz, a venture capital and consulting company. Over the next 17 years she made many contributions to numerous of company, Office Depot and American Express Open Forum just to name a couple.

Rohr has a seminar entitled, "Business Planning made EASY: A simple strategy for a powerful business plan that will DRIVE you in the direction of your GOALS."

In this seminar she makes six points that you should follow when creating your business plan.

·      Setting Sight.  What do you want your business to BE?  How will you know when you have “made it?”

·      Building the Team.  Who does what?  Why, how and when?

·      Making Money.  Learn the bare bones basics for building a budget, keeping score and bringing in the bucks.

·      Getting it Sold.  How to create a sales-focused culture…without insulting your soul.

·      Getting it Done.  Developing sure-fire systems for doing things the first time, every time.

·      Making Sure.  Are you on the right track?  How do you get back on track?  It’s all about asking and answering the right questions.   

For more of Rohr’s business planning insight you can visit her website How To Grow A Small Business...Into Freedom!

Be Seen

As the Internet has grown over the past 15-20 years, we have seen a change in how people interact with each other. We have come a long way from just using email to chat rooms to now having social media and blogs. Social networks such as Facebook and Twitter have become greatly popular for companies and artist for promotion and being able to interact with their fans and customers first hand.

One entertainer that has seemed to use social media to their advantage is none other than Sean “Diddy” Combs. Diddy has his hands in just about every aspect of the entertainment business. From music, appeal, fragrances, TV reality shows, to beverages, you name it Diddy has done it.

Diddy uses his social networks to keep up with his fans as well as interact with them. On Twitter Diddy has over 5.5 million followers, over 80 pictures and 20K plus tweets it is safe to say that Diddy keeps up with his fans through his twitter. He is so interactive with his social networks Diddy has his Facebook site link on his twitter page.

Diddy’s Facebook page is more fan interactive than his Twitter account. On his Facebook page he gives his 1.2 million Facebook fans more of the inside look of Diddy. With 8 different photo albums, music and music videos us as fans are able to get more on a personal level with Diddy.

Diddy has the impact on the entertainment industry that what he says goes and when he speaks people listen. Make sure that you go follow him on Twitter or add his as your friend on Facebook. I guarantee he will keep you entertained and up to date on all the need to know in the entertainment business.  He is a major trendsetter, not only will he be heard but he will always be seen.

Look Who is Changing the Music Game

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There is no secret that the music industry is one of the most fast paced industries within the entertainment business. As an artist you can be hot one day and known as a one-hit wonder the next. The music industry has changed greatly over the past five years and we see more indie artist putting out their music now more than even before.  ReverbNation is a site that is designed to help indie artist gain more exposure and an outlet to being heard worldwide. When looking at ReverbNation it puts you in a mind frame of a “Facebook” for artist.

Look Who's Back

After Jay-Z and Dame Dash departed ways and their record label Roc-A-Fella dissolved artist like Kanye West followed Jay-Z and others like Beanie Sigel were left in between a rock and a hard place not knowing who, what, when or where their careers were heading.  No longer does Beanie have to ask that questions, after being missing from the rap scene for three years we can say “Welcome Back”!

The Philadelphia native has signed a new EMI distribution deal under Chris Schwartz. With his State Property crew under his wings this may be the break that not only him but also his crew needed. We can say that it has been a long time coming and the wait is over for all of the Beanie Sigel and State Property fans.

Sigel stated,  “If you’ve been through what I’ve been through in my career, you wouldn’t trust no one. You’ll fourth guess everything. What made me do the deal with Chris Schwartz was actually to get the deal together for State Property.” 

With all of this being said we wish Beanie nothing but the best and we know that he will continue to put out great music and State Property will bring Philly back in the mentions of hip-hop.  Sigel plans on dropping an album in this summer entitled, The Classic. All the Sigel fans be on the look out for this album and we are sure that it will be more music out leading up to the release of the album.

New Face of Hip-Hop

We all know that the cornerstone of hip-hop music started on the East Coast in the Bronx neighborhood of New York City in the 70s. From then own it seems like each region of the United States has seen its presence in hip-hop.