Good Day smooothmelon,
Before anyone decides to buy your CD bulk, you will need to "prove
yourself" on a few fronts. When you are attempting to sell your CD,
you are in essence looking for a customer (in this case a store) that
will purchase your work for resale. Since we find ourselves in this
position of a customer on regular basis, this is a great place to
begin: what makes a customer?
As a customer we take into consideration a lot of things when making a
decision on purchasing an item. Out of these things, there is one
major aspect, which we can relate to the customer that is a store:
value.
Since you are now the supplier, and the store is the customer, you
need to prove to your customer that your product is valuable. The only
way your product will be valuable to the store is if they can sell the
product for more than they purchase it for. This means that if you can
make the public aware of your product, and create a demand for it at
the same time, getting your CD onto the store shelves will become
quite simple.
Your next step than is to make the public aware of your music. Here
are some ways to achieve this:
Radio stations, local newspapers, local TV stations, and event
organizers are always on the look out for new talent. After all,
their job is to provide music (the radio station), arts entertainment
(newspapers, local TV stations), and organize events with someone who
is willing to perform on stage.
Through personal experience on the subject and the words of the author
of the below web site, here are some ideas on drawing attention to
your talents:
Web Site: Press Releases for Independent Country Artists Resources
URL: http://country-music-club.com/Independent-Artists/resources/press-releases.shtml
By following some of the steps mentioned in the above article, my
acquaintance has found herself on a local morning show (The Big
Breakfast), which has new local talent on every morning. She also got
a spot on stage at a local music event, and on a local radio station.
Of course, the morning show is not a prime time slot, she was not on
the front page of the newspaper, or on a Top 40 local radio station,
but nevertheless she gained a lot of exposure through these three
media venues over a span of only one month.
After approaching some local music stores with her new achievements,
some agreed to carry her music for sale. Please note that for now she
only managed to get into the locally owned stores. The big box music
stores are literary swamped with new releases every day, and they
reject 99% of them simply because they have no time to go through all
of it, and no means on finding out how well the CD would sell unless
they sit down and listen to it, gauge the response on a smaller scale,
etc, etc. If they already heard of an artist, their research on
popularity and demand now becomes much easier. These are the artists
who have the best chance.
The article at the URL provided above also explains on how to further
use the first achievements (such as a public store sale of the
product) to gain more and more public awareness of your product.
The above is more of a "do-it-yourself" approach. You might be able to
skip a lot of smaller steps if you can get a distributor:
Web site: How to get distributors
URL: http://www.knab.com/howtoget.htm
Another great web site with a wealth of ideas on getting attention of
the public (which as described above will often be a key to getting
your product onto the store shelf) is called getsigned.com
Web site: Getsigned.com
URL: http://www.getsigned.com
The web side has large sections entitled: promotion tips, recording
tips, artist interviews, music law info, and much more. There is
nothing like reading about people who did what you are trying to
accomplish.
I hope this is the information you were looking for. Your question was
very broad, so the answer is of the same nature. The resources I
provided links to should answer more specific questions. Before you
rate my answer, please consider asking for a clarification should you
feel that your money was not well spent.
Search strategy: Google search for: "cd"+"publish"+"release"+"how
to"+"music"
Thank you for your question.
Regards,
slawek-ga |
