Top 5 Tips For Musicians To Find Success On Patreon

This blog was original published on Electric Kiwi.

In March of 2020, Patreon saw a 21% increase of new creators on their platform, their largest surge since they started in 2013. The music category specifically went up by 25% with over 3,000 new pages from musicians seeking some financial stability through the shut down of the live performance sector.

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10 Ideas To Promote Your Concert Crowdfunding Campaign

Concert crowdfunding is a great way to finance and promote your own shows, without having to wait to get booked – you plan out your campaign, calculate the budget and create promo materials, and then invite fans to preorder tickets (automatically refundable if the show does not raise enough money to be produced). And while it’s vital to make the campaign description as exciting and enticing as possible, the promotional campaign around your crowdfunded show is what is likely going to make or break your event.

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8 Music Crowdfunding Campaigns We’ve Got Our Eyes On And Why

Guest post by Jeremy Young. This article originally appeared on Soundfly’s Flypaper

It’s all about the story. Fundraising experts will say this time and time again: “People fund people, not ideas.” In other words, when asking for money, what tends to get through to your audience the most is having a compelling and personal story, and a drive to succeed, not necessarily a great business idea.

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Crowdfunding Your Album: 11 Dos & Don'ts

This post was written by Justin Ralph and originally appeared on the Bandzoogle Blog.

Over the past few posts, I’ve covered how to decide if you’re ready to record an album, tips for writing songs, and how to handle the pre-production of your recording. Today I want to talk about one of the most popular ways to fund production for your album - crowdfunding.

When I decided to record an album this year, I knew I was going to use crowdfunding to raise money. I was fairly certain I would be successful with it based on the pool of people I could reach, and I liked the idea of my fans being engaged in the entire process of recording.

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How To Sell Merch Like A Boss

Don’t get stuck with a bunch of burned disks you can’t sell. The more options you have for getting rid of merch, the more likely you are to sell stuff. Here are some easy options to help you sell merch like a boss.

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Crowdfunding the Right Way

In the past, money was a huge barrier for musicians, and one of the main reasons many were forced to tie themselves to a record label. Today, many musicians are finding their own ways to creatively fund their albums and tours, with the most popular option being crowdfunding. Crowdfunding is a huge undertaking, but, if done correctly, you can come out of it with a whole lot more than just money. It also presents dedicated and creative artists a chance to connect with their fans in a whole new way.

Learn how to run a successful crowdfunding campaign with these 5 tips

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In Defense of 1,000 True Fans - Robyn Dell'Unto's Multifaceted Approach to Fan Engagement

It’s been well over a year since our last contribution to our 1,000 True Fans series, but the ideology hasn’t aged a bit. The hustle and heart of the indie artist is still a necessity in today’s music industry, and the focus remains to have an all-encompassing view of every avenue needed to reach the widest possible audience, and tap into all possible revenue streams. Of course, there is not latter here without the former.

Cyber PR campaigns manager Andrew Salmon (@andrewgsalmon) sits down with Canadian singer-songwriter Robyn Dell’Unto to talk about Twitter, crowdfunding, user generated content, and seizing opportunities.

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Why You Should Get Partners Instead of Sponsors

When most people who want sponsorships think about their ultimate goal, it involves money. They’re looking for someone to fund their event, to pay for their tour, to raise money for their charity, and so on. When many business think about sponsoring someone, it ultimately involves money as well: even if it is an incredible cause, at the end of the day, they want to know how sponsoring will help them get more customers. Each party treats the sponsorship as a transaction. However, I believe it is important to shift the definition from “a cash and/or in-kind fee paid to a property (typically sports entertainment, non-profit event, or organization) in return for access to the exploitable, commercial potential associated with that property” (IEG, 2000) to something more equitable: a partnership.

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A Musicianʼs Mini-Guide to Crowdfunding - What Platform Is Right For You?

This article previously appeared on the Presskit.to Blog.

Written by Jem Bahaijoub

2012 was the year crowdfunding went mainstream. The success of Amanda Palmerʼs Kickstarter campaign threw the alternative fanfunding model into the limelight, and now most musicians are turning to their fans and friends for financial support pre-release. But what is the best crowdfunding platform for you? What are the advantages and disadvantages of each platform? Hereʼs a helpful chart outlining the key features of four of the top crowdfunding platforms out there.

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How to Create a Successful Kickstarter Campaign

For many years, I’ve held some doubts about Kickstarter and crowd sourcing in general. For some artists, I thought it was a great fit for the culture of the band. However, for my personal band, I had some more reservations. I thought it could make the band look desperate or be a huge embarrassment if we ended up being pitifully distant from meeting the goal. However, we had a serious of setbacks that required large, quick funding and decided to give it a chance. Our band was able to raise $14,511 of our $10,000 goal for a new bus in 20 days. Here are some general thoughts, tips, and lessons learned:

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Musician's Arsenal: Killer Apps, Tools and Sites - GigFunder

Fan funding: it is the saving grace for the broke independent band. Where before bands couldn’t consider studio time or hiring promotional companies to support their release, with a little hard work, some social media love, and good old fashioned word of mouth spread, bands can raise the cash they need to fund their dream projects. With the big four players fairly entrenched in the field (PledgeMusic, Rockethub, KickStarter and Indie GoGo), it’s hard to imagine a new player coming into play. However, GigFunder has found a unique need to fill in the fan funding world.

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Basic Marketing Principles For Artists - Part 3 of 3: Increase the Amount of Money That You Charge

Welcome to the final segment of a 3 part series that was inspired by a mastermind program I participated in with Ali Brown who is my mentor in the world of online marketing.

Here’s the recap of what we’ve gone over thus far…

There are three ways to increase your income:

Part 1. Increase your number of clients (fans).

Part 2. Increase the frequency of purchase, how often your fans buy from you. (and you’d better have more than just music to sell).

Part 3. Increase the amount of money that you charge…

Increasing the amount of money you charge poses a problem if all you have to sell is music because music is now widely available for free, and people have proven that they are not willing to pay a premium for music.

However, fans will pay plenty of money for experiences, like a great concert or a chance to be a contribution to an artist, a special memento, or wonderful merchandise that really resonates with your fans.

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An Argument Against Fan Funding

Anyone can make a record for next to nothing these days. Almost any other hobby is more expensive: photography, mountain biking, even video gaming. When a teenager singing into a webcam gets exponentially more views on YouTube than your latest “professional” video, the answer isn’t more money.

You’re just not there yet. (hey, don’t feel bad - I’m not either) Tracking at Abbey Road Studios won’t get you there. Hiring T-Bone Burnett to mix your album won’t get you there. A full-day mastering session with Bob Ludwig won’t get you there. 10,000 pressed CDs with 18-page inserts won’t get you there. A $5,000 promotion budget won’t get you there either. No matter how much money you throw at your project, we’re all limited by a stubborn principle called free market pricing. People are only willing to pay what a product is worth to them, not what it costs to produce. The intrinsic value of music is in free fall, and people won’t pay for it if they’re just not that into you. So why are musicians flocking to fan funding (also known as “crowdfunding”) sites like Kickstarter, Sellaband, Slicethepie, PledgeMusic, and artistShare in droves? My guess is that they figure “why not give it a shot”? Well, I’ll tell you why not, and offer a better option.

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The Crowdfunding Quandry: Sales Vs. Art Vs. The Little Voice Inside Your Head

Here we are at WEEK 9(ish):  60 days in, with 15 days remaining.  Phil has $3,888 raised (39% of the $10,000 goal), and $6,112 needed to get to his goal. It’s been a journey to have a front row seat during this process.  As you may know I believe that crowd funding is a vital tool that artists will be using for the foreseeable future and I have been blogging a series here on MTT called in Defense of 1,000 True Fans, where I have been interviewing artists who are proving the model and creating sustainable livings from their music.  Phil points out that 200,000 people have been exposed in some way to his campaign and that 0.0003% people engaged.  I would like to point out a few other things.

First of all I want to commend Phil: To have 60 True Fans or “Super Fans” (the amount of people who have contributed to his campaign so far) is no mean feat.  Especially since Phil very rarely performs live and he has not had a mass exposure event (such as a placement on a major TV show).  These are two factors that seem to make major impact for artists, according to the interviews I have conducted so far.

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