Simple Ways to Fund Projects

I constantly have artists walk into my office looking for me to “shop” their demos to record labels. The first question I ask them is, “Why do you want a record deal?” Not that there are not great deals that come along ever so often, but the good type of deals are only given to those who have what we lawyers call “leverage”. Leverage gives us bargaining power when we’re at the table with the big record companies or distributors.

I can never understand why an artist would want a record deal given the current state of record labels downsizing, merging, and cutting artists from their rosters. Today’s big labels are not giving out the advances that they gave 10 or 20 years ago, nor are they putting the necessary promotion and marketing dollars behind these artists that is quintessential to an artist’s development. Signing with a big record label can sometimes frustrate an artist’s career more than if they just went the indie route.

This brings me to the topic of my article, “Simple ways to fund your projects”. I can actually thank a good friend of mine, Jawar, author of the book “Music Industry Connection” (It’s a good book with a lot of helpful information. You should pick it up! Can be gotten at www.mt101.com). Whenever I attend a music conference or seminar, there is always a person that stands up and says, “I am a hot artist” or “I got a fan base, but I don’t have the resources”. After this article I don’t ever want to hear, “I don’t have the resources” again!

You have the money to fund your project! If you claim to have a fan base and you are constantly out performing, then you should have no problem selling CDs. A lot of artists think that it’s expensive to put a CD together and put it out, but it’s not! All the technology in the world has made it easier for artists to do self-manufacturing and distribution.

“So what’s my first step?” is what most artists ask. Well, here’s what you can do if you are a self promoting artists: If you have a computer which can burn CDs and a printer (or even a friend with one), go to Office Depot or OfficeMax and pick up a label making program (It kills me when artists hand me a CD that has no cover on it!) and some blank CDs with jewel cases. Wow! You just manufactured your own CD. The costs of all the above probably will run you maybe $30-$60, if that. Now that you’ve burned and labeled about 25-50 CDs, you take those to your next performance.

Now, if your music is hot, you’ll probably sell out and have people asking how they can get your CDs. MAKE SURE YOU GET THEIR CONTACT INFO, so that you can email or contact them when you have more CDs available! A lot of artists miss this one crucial step. Failure to get contact info is a missed opportunity to sell CDs! The numbers add up. Say you’re selling the CD for $10 flat. Selling 25 CDs has just netted you a profit of $2500 in ONE night! But now that you got the money don’t forget to REINVEST in more stock (i.e., more CDs).

So, now you’re performing, making money off of CD sales, building a fan base (and a database of information), and soon you’ll be able to quit that 9-5 job of yours! In addition, labels and distributors will start to take notice and start coming to you…hence LEVERAGE!! That’s when you come to see me, the Entertainment Attorney!! So now you have no reason to say I don’t have the “resources to fund my project”!