What Apps Can I Hook Up To My Web Site To Sell Music
Every musician, professional or amateur knows the joy and the struggle of recording a track.
- What Apps Can I Hook Up To My Web Site To Sell Music Online
- What Apps Can I Hook Up To My Web Site To Sell Music Cds
- What Apps Can I Hook Up To My Web Site To Sell Music Cd
It’s all about making it sound nothing less but perfect.
Choosing the right way to sell your music is somewhat similar to finally getting that track cut—it’s about finding the perfect fit for you.
Read on and you’ll learn why it’s important to have your own website to sell music, how to build one (quick and easy), as well as get some tips on how to skyrocket your music sales.
There’s a lot of ground to cover, so let’s dive in right away.
Sell any type of digital files: ebooks, music, video, design assets, software and more. To get started just upload your product, set the price and place the “buy now” button anywhere on your website. Receive instant payment via PayPal. No more waiting around for your money to be processed or even worse - getting paid monthly. The app is compatible with Shopify as well as Shopify plus stores; Top Features of the app: 1) Enhanced Dashboard with elaborate Product Management. We have come up with easy navigation so that you can perform your task quickly in the app. Etsy Integration provides for the Bulk product upload & complete management of the products. Recycler is one of the first online classified apps. You will have the most success with this app if you are trying to sell a used car, pets, or trying to rent a house. It’s a regional selling app similar to the Thrifty Nickel newspaper that’s in your area. Most product listings are in California.
Why should you sell from your website?
Today, when streaming rules the music industry, it would seem pretty obvious to move in that direction—I’ll admit that there’s some truth to that.
The vast majority of people these days prefer to listen to their favorite tunes on the most popular streaming platforms like Spotify, Apple Music, Google Play, and Amazon Music. Especially now, when the COVID-19 outbreak has massively contributed to shaping the future of music streaming.
It means that making your music available for streaming is essential to reach your current fans, as well as expand your audience and bring you some recognition.
But the real question is:
How much money can you really earn on music streaming?
To answer this question we must look into the full breakdown of how many streams it takes to actually earn a dollar on various platforms:
As you can see, the chances of getting big payouts from streaming services are quite low. Even though the situation might change in the future, we still have a long way to go before streaming revenue replaces the money that artists used to make selling physical albums.
While music streaming platforms can put you on the map as an artist, it’s more important than ever to have your own online space for selling music directly to the fans who are willing to truly support you.
So, let me be blunt with you—if you want to sell music online, you need your own website. Here’s why:
- You have total control over the selling process;
- You can keep the profit without having to share with a streaming platform, distributor, or any other middleman;
- You get a space to showcase your brand’s unique personality;
- You can sell music and merch (both physical and digital) directly to your fans;
- You can sell all kinds of digital downloads from your website, like beats, samples, music lessons, etc.;
- You own your data. With every purchase, you collect your customer’s details, like email addresses. It allow s you to build your email list, and keep in touch with them when you release new music.
But don’t get me wrong:
Even though having a website is crucial, it doesn’t mean that you should neglect an opportunity to bring more attention or earn extra cash, whether it’s through music distribution, major streaming platforms, or making your music available elsewhere. All’s fair in love and war.
How to sell music or MP3s from your website using Sellfy?
Building a website from scratch seems like a lot of work, but it doesn’t have to be.
There’s a solution that can help you navigate the bigger chunk of the work in no time. Sellfy is a great solution for everyone who wants to sell music online but doesn’t like complicated setups.
Anyone who has internet access and a few minutes of time can build a store on Sellfy.
Here’s how:
Step 1: Set up an account.
When you start using Sellfy, all you need is a valid email address. There are four Sellfy subscription plans available, including a free one. You can start with a 14-day free trial to give Sellfy a test run before you can choose the plan that fits you best.
Step 2: Upload your music.
Once you have your account and your email address verified, you can start adding your music (or any other type of product). Just go to the Products section on your Dashboard, then to Digital products, and click on Add new product.
Upload your songs, albums, beats, samples, music video-lessons, or whatever you want to sell. Add product images and some info in the Product description section, so that your customers know what exactly they’re buying. Once you’re finished, hit Save product, and it’s done!
Step 3: Customize your store.
Naturally, since you’re creating your own store you’ll also want to make it look unique. You can easily do that by browsing through the visual editor. Make the appearance of your store match your brand so that it looks exactly the way YOU want it to.
What Apps Can I Hook Up To My Web Site To Sell Music Online
You can customize everything—from text color to the shape of Buy now buttons. You can also choose the layout style of your store page, the number of products per page, and oh-so-much more.
That’s it! Your product is now available for sale.
Step 4: Add payment options.
Now, before you start promoting your listing, you must first make sure that you can actually get paid for your products.
With Sellfy, you’ll be able to easily accept payments from all over the world in a variety of currencies. There are two options available: PayPal and Stripe (for card payments.)
- To accept payments through PayPal, just go to Payment options and type in the email address you use for PayPal.
- To accept card payments, you’ll need to have a Stripe account first, and then connect it to your Sellfy store. You can find out more about how to create a Stripe account and get API keys for your Sellfy shop here.
Bonus: How to skyrocket your music sales
1. Add links to your SoundCloud profile
Without a doubt, SoundCloud is a world champion in free music streaming. Especially if you like the idea of fans and fellow musicians sharing their opinion about your music.
SoundCloud is one of the biggest music hosting platforms and has become an industry standard. With its huge user base (70+ million users) and over 175 million monthly unique visitors, it’s a great place to host your music and build a community.
The service has a subtle design and you’ll find it very user-friendly. You’ll not only be able to share and monetize your music, but you’ll also be able to get access to statistics on your plays, likes, comments, downloads, and other useful features.
Here are some tips on how to sell your music on SoundCloud.
It all comes down to persuading your fans to actually buy from you. There are three different ways to do that:
- Placing the link in your bio
- Placing a buy link
- Linking separate tracks in the track description
Coal Harrison aka The Kount is a successful instrumentalist and a beatmaker with 25k+ followers on SoundCloud.
He does an amazing job of promoting his Sellfy store by heavily linking it to his SoundCloud page, thus boosting his music sales.
You can get more useful tips on how to make money on SoundCloud in this article.
2. Add links to YouTube
YouTube gives you another incredible opportunity to promote your music and drive more sales.
Well, you can’t exactly sell anything directly from your YouTube channel. But, what you can do is get people interested in your product by creating quality content and driving traffic to your site.
Today, we won’t talk about creating compelling videos (there’s a ton of resources out there on creating great video content). We’ll stick to the technical implementation of driving traffic to your online store, which is an art form all on its own.
Just take a look at the way faraitheproducer takes advantage of his YouTube channel. On an example of his YouTube channel we can actually see how he drives traffic to his store by placing:
- Links in description
- Custom link on profile banners
- YouTube end screen
You can learn more about the ways to promote your music on YouTube here.
3. Pay-what-you-want pricing
Offering some of your freshest arrivals with the pay-what-you-want pricing model is another way to promote your music. Of course, there will always be people that will take advantage of that model without giving you anything back. But, you’ll also get some hardcore fans who are ready to pay more—so let them!
By the way, there’s a pay-what-you-want pricing feature available in every Sellfy store. You can easily let your fans buy your music on their own terms and even set a minimum price.
4. Upselling
Everyone wants to make as much money as possible.
However, trying to persuade your customers to choose a more expensive option so you can make more money is simply unethical. It’s, of course, not the same thing as making your customers choose the more expensive option because YOU personally believe they’ll be happy about it.
That’s what upselling is for.
It’s up to you to offer an upgrade to an existing product, but it’s up to your customers to decide if they actually want to buy it.
So what is upselling and how can it help you boost your sales?
Upselling is a sales tactic where the customer is persuaded to buy an additional item to the one already in their cart. For example, if a customer buys one single from your album, you can offer to buy another one from the same album (or the whole album).
The most basic and effective upsell involves offering an additional product as soon as they add one to the cart.
Studies show that upselling (selling additional products to existing customers) works in 60-70% of cases.
It’s definitely worth a try.
If you’re looking for some more info on how you can use the built-in upselling feature in your Sellfy store, you should check out this article.
5. Email marketing
Yes, it might sound a bit old school, but driving sales through your email list can be very powerful. You can use it as an effective way to promote your brand, announce new releases, tour dates, merch, music videos, and other important news.
Emails give you direct access to your audience, which isn’t always possible to reach through social media. There you’re always fighting for the attention of your follower against hundreds of other accounts they’re following.
At the same time, most people check and read their email every day. If they’ve opted into your list, whether it’s to receive news or to download your music, there’s a pretty good chance they would also welcome an opportunity to support you again.
So I strongly suggest that you start building your email list as soon as possible.
One of the easiest ways to do it is to ask for an email address in exchange for an exclusive incentive, such as a free music download, discount on merch, access to early releases, or anything else you feel your audience might find attractive.
What Apps Can I Hook Up To My Web Site To Sell Music Cds
And, of course, you absolutely should announce your newest release through a dedicated email blast sent to your fan list.
With Sellfy, you won’t have to look for any external services—there’s a great email marketing tool available right in your store’s dashboard.
You can take full advantage of it and send custom emails with links, product announcements, and updates to your selected audience. You can also target specific product buyers or send emails to all buyers and subscribers.
Final thoughts
It’s great to have so many opportunities at hand to help you promote and sell your music. But the key here is to find a careful balance so you don’t overwhelm your audience with the relentless promotion of your music.
What Apps Can I Hook Up To My Web Site To Sell Music Cd
Keep on working to find interesting angles to present your work and improve your marketing strategy. If you stick to a plan and stay consistent, it’ll strengthen the relationship with your fans, drive more sales, and earn you enough money to keep on creating music.
For anyone that has worked in the wedding industry, either as a vendor, or in my case as a web designer that works with people in the wedding industry, pretty soon you will come across someone that has, or wants to add background music to your website. We understand why you want music on your website. You are trying to invoke emotion, where people can envision themselves using your services. But, that being said, there are several reasons why you may not want to use background music on your website. I go over this in the video below and even offer an alternative to background music on your website.
Reasons not to have Background Music on your Website
Music that autoplays can be a bad form for many reasons. If someone comes to your site at work and all of sudden has music playing, everyone around them, including their boss now knows they aren’t working. More often then not, web browsers will close the page instead of trying to find the on/off button for music, that is even assuming you have one. Many sites have no way of turning off music. For mobile users which could be up to 60% of your users, you should never have auto-play music. You don’t know if they are already listening to music which you are interrupting, plus its another thing to load on mobile, which reduced load times, and finally, bandwidth. I know I only buy a certain bandwidth package and I hate sites that autoplay because it is using my bandwidth for music I don’t want to listen to.
- Higher Bounce Rates
- Slower Load Times
- Less Shares
- Less time on site
A better alternative to background music
A better alternative to having music on your website is instead do a slide show video. If you are a flower shop, do a slideshow video with pictures of all your bouquets and then overlay music, upload it to Youtube and then embed the video on your website. This works from a ton of reasons.
- Won’t autoplay on mobile devices
- Give a more visual element with music. Better display of what you do.
- With the proper description that Youtube video can act as a great SEO tool for ranking and marketing.
Copyright of Music
One thing to be careful about is not just using any old music. You can’t just rip a CD and play it on your website. Instead you need to have a license to use that music. Most people use what is called Royalty Free Music. As an example, the most popular music, assuming you can get a license, might require a yearly fee, or a “Royalty” per 1000 plays or even in some cases, a percentage of revenue! Instead, find royalty free music you can buy with a one time fee.
Too many Options to use Background Music
I hope this gives you a better alternative to using background music that also helps your customers and you. Leave a comment below if you want another video using something like iMovie to create a slide show video. Or, if you create a video using the above method, share your site so we can check it out!