I'm tired of getting kickstarter campaigns for singer songwriters saying they need $10k+ for a CD. Who buys CDs anymore? Just record your 3 best songs! I know lots of professional studios in San Diego and top notch session musicians. You need about $500 per song MAX to get a killer recording done. If these musicians were paying with their own money they'd spend the money smarter.
regards
Cliff Keller
_________________________________________
Benji is an incredible person and businessman. We sell PledgeMusic campaigns to our clients as a Phase 1 (pre-order, funding), then build their web presence with Topspin as a Phase 2 (direct to fan e-commerce).
The beauty of PledgeMusic over Kickstarter is that Pledge actually gives customers their data (email addresses) so we can directly import to Topspin and continue marketing to the same folks who funded the first campaign. F**k Kickstarter for keeping their customer's data.
Jacob
Jacob Tell - CEO, Creative Lead
Oniracom Corp.
_________________________________________
Just a small FYI ... Kickstarter forces you to run through Amazon Payments ... so it's not just "credit card fees" (usually 2-5%) ... it's actually Amazon Payments fees ... and it's like 6-8% ... so that makes it about parity vs this other 15% option.
Just saying.
The first campaign I ran for Panacea's "12 Step Program" was pretty much a WASH once all the payment fees and shipping totaled up. In fact, K-Murdock might have even had to dish money out of his pocket for FedEx'ing vinyl master/plates back and forth for approvals when it was all said and done. But obviously there was still a LOT of value in building that relationship, for no significant "dollar" cost, wish the most dedicated fans that wanted their music on vinyl (and the other cool backer awards).
@JeremyCee
http://about.me/JeremyCee
_________________________________________
IndieGoGo seems to be run by hucksters. I funded a smartphone case last Spring that I believed in and was IMMEDIATELY inundated with emails to fund other, dissimilar, projects from IndieGoGo. Spammed because I believed in something? With no way to opt out? When I blasted IndieGoGo via email and asked to be removed from their spam list, they did, but they also removed me from the email list for the project I supported before passing the list onto the folks I invested in (by adding "donotemail" to my email address on the email list causing bounce backs). This left me in ex-communicated limbo for 6 months after giving them $500... all because I complained about them spamming me with other non-sensical projects. I had to research and find the original company I supported via google and reach out directly to the smartphone case owner. I got what I invested in last month, but every time I think of IndieGoGo I spit up in my mouth a little.
Summary: IndieGoGo is a douchebag company.
Wendy Day
_________________________________________
Bob,I am the manager of protest the hero and I was at your panel yesterday.a few points:while I agree that only existing fans contributed,the press coverage and word of mouth was incredible and probably made non fans of the band aware of protest the hero.time will tell if they convert to real fans.regarding fulfillment,we set up a system before the program commenced to guarantee 100 percent fulfillment.getting people what they paid for in a timely manner is our #1 priority.also you mention the pizza party,that was one of 15 perks that were offered for donations.the bigger issue I have is with your opening statement yesterday that crowdfunding was in its final days.on that you are 100 percent wrong.here is where it is going.in the next few years,every label will be offering joint venture deals with bands and will be using these platforms to raise every dime of recording costs,promotion and marketing costs,video and tour support.its already starting.once again the system will co opt a great idea and use it as a way to reduce their overheads.during the protest campaign,numerous labels called me asking questions and I could see the wheels turning in their heads.this is the door that amanda palmer,protest the hero and others have opened.watch every label run right in.
entserv
_________________________________________
Benji Rogers is the real deal.
Two years ago Benji and Pledge Music were working with a band called Madina Lake from Chicago. Matthew Leone, the bass player of the band had been severely beaten while coming to the aid of a woman being assaulted. His injuries were horrific and Matthew required multiple cranial surgeries and a lengthy rehab.
Benji contacted me, connected us with Matthew's family, manager, band and a dozen other key people to coordinate an emergency health fund (Matthew , like many musicians was uninsured). Over $200,000 was raised to cover medical expenses, living expenses and other urgent items. I was amazed at the time and energy Benji Rogers gave to help his artist. There was no business to this and he had only just started their Pledge Campaign. I can't say enough about Benji's heart and character. We need more like him in the music biz.
Regards,
Rob
Rob Max
Executive Director
Sweet Relief Musicians Fund
_________________________________________
Thanks, Bob, for your review of Benji Rogers' Pledge Music vis-a-vis the other crowdfunding sites.
Dawn Mitschele, whom I manage, chose Pledge Music to fund her next EP for precisely the same reasons you state - they're music specific, they walk you through the process, and if you don't make your goal, the money goes back, which seemed like the fair thing to do. These reasons to go with the Pledge campaign far outweighed the 15% in her mind. And when you go over your goal, a percentage of the extra goes to the charity or non-profit of your choice. Dawn chose the Matt Wadleigh LoVE Foundation, an organization she has supported from its inception.
Dawn's Pledge campaign just went up last week and it's already close to half of her goal figure. She's now out on a tour of the Northeast and Midwest performing her new songs live and encouraging her audience to participate in her Pledge outreach. She has no doubt that this will be successful and allow her to record her songs the way she hears them and release them independently so that she, as you point out, keeps her copyrights.
And thanks once again for cutting through the jibberish and getting to the reality of the music biz today.
Larry Butler
_________________________________________
Hi Bob
I have been writing, recording and performing music with my band for the last 15 years or so and we have managed to fund all of our endeavors with our own money. It pisses me off when my twitter feed/FB timeline/email box is full of other bands asking me for $!!!! The main writing core of the band pays for our s**t the old fashion way. We gig and we run an interior/exterior painting company. My advice to everyone who thinks they are entitled to free money is go get a gig or a job. We have all put in way over our 10,000 hours and there is no end in sight. Since we run our own company we make our own schedule, pay our own bills and support our selves. We are living the dream. No one controls our music and we keep getting better. At this point we are on a mission to make some classic recordings and let them shine for the ages. It's not about whether we ever "break" or not, it's about making art.
Andy Salge
_________________________________________
I manage Autumn Owls from Dublin, Ireland and we were approached by PledgeMusic A&R Mike Fordham when we were working on their debut LP with Brian Deck in Chicago last year. He made a strong case for why we should work with them instead of their competition and most importantly, we knew that because he approached us we would probably have a lot of support. And we were right. They were amazing to work with and really helped us finish the album and press it to vinyl. They also offered plenty of motivation to communicate with fans and keep momentum moving forward. Mike even came out and saw us at CMJ and last week at SXSW - months after the campaign was over and checks were cashed. Not sure anyone else would give us that kind of personal attention.
www.autumnowls.bandcamp.com
Cheers!
Brian
Brian McKinney
Crooked House Management
_________________________________________
Just today I saw on my Facebook that George Benson is using PledgeMusic. So my business friends tell me it is just a vehicle to raise awareness and reward his fans. Various percs include a Skype guitar lesson.
Jonathan Schneider
_________________________________________
Bob--
I'm in the middle of my second crowd source funding campaign. My first, done privately through my website fan base raised about $100,000 in 2009. This was before kickstarter and pledgemusic existed. I am currently doing my second campaign thru Nimbit, who simply records purchases and processes cc accounts for a small percentage. I also use my management for follow up and donor support. A lot of new bands don't have that luxury.
I chose not to use kickstarter and pledgemusic because their platform was limiting to me as an already established artist. First of all, the time constraints. It takes me eight months to cover the country playing shows and talking to audiences in person about my next project--- every weekend I pull in a few thousand extra in contributions. Two or three months for a time line is too small-- I don't think a third of my audience would even be aware of the campaign no matter what the noise was on the Internet regarding it. In person, I can speak about the project passionately and take questions with everyone who cares enough to come to shows. They can make out contributions in person or over the web.
I don't like putting a price goal on the fundraising. We like to tell people we are raising as much as we can for eight months. The economy had collapsed at the time, so any amount sounded ludacris. Regardless, i have an audience that trusts my overall artistic goals, so it didnt matter that i didn't define my financial ones. My unspoken goal for the first campaign was $80,000, based on what my friend Jill Sobule had raised, in thinking my audience was about the same size and age group. We eventually raised $102,000 with 252 contributors. Our only definition of timeline and goals was eight months. (there were three $10,000 donors). There was no failure because there was no limiting factors of time and money.
I'm an established touring artist, with 22 years on the road. None of the extra perks from these fundraising sites seemed to warrant as large of a commission as they were asking -- I have management to do donor follow up, And would these sites truly bring in donations from strangers to my music that warranted their commission? I didn't think so. It wasnt right for me, but it could work well for newer bands who need extra hands.
I had been on a label, Rounder Records for seven album cycles, and I'm pretty sure this was far more money than they ever invested in me. Owning the masters is very important for me, because of my placement history, and I doubt I will ever give them up again.
I learned a lot from the process, we aren't a perfectly functioning record label yet, or fundraisers-- we made some mistakes and we did some things right.
Here's the breakdown---
Hope it will be useful to your readers if you choose to run it....
252 donors totaling $102,000
I can't remember all the perks.... But something like this:
$15 level: 111.... Preorders, signed
$100: 71......plus demos, out takes
$250: 34....... Handwritten lyrics, free shows
$500: 20........plus Liner note mentions
$1000: 4 .... dinner, Video clips of recording
$2500: 5...... Guitars
$5000: 4 ...... house concerts
$10000: 3 ..... lifetime passes, songs written for you or your business, a studio invite-- sing on the cd
Some stuff fell through the cracks but overall people seemed to be truly happy with being a part of the process...
How the $102,000 was spent:
$36,000 for recording
$21,000 in promotion/media print/web
$9,000 in various radio promotion
$2,500 in cd art design/photography
$9,000 in manufacturing
$2,000 in video contest pay out
$3,000 in ad purchases
$6,000 in management maintenance
$1,000 in guitars
$2,500 mastering
$3,000 in recording equipment
$1,000 posters
$5,000 in additional manufacturing
The album, The Day After Everything Changed, sold as many as I would have on Rounder-- mainly to my established fan base. It was used as the score to the Farrelly Brothers 'Hall Pass' and I'm still out here selling it from the back of my crv.
And we have started the next campaign--- it's a different world financially this time. The economy has plateaued to a new reality.
We are setting a goal of 1,000 donors and are half way there, if we dont make it-- we still move on. We have four $5,000 donors, and it seems more people are giving, but in smaller sums.
We've raised over $80,000 with two months left. I'm halfway thru the recording project, it's being produced by Brandon and Kristian Bush of Sugarland in Atlanta with members of the band. It's a folk rock record.
I have to explain to fans that there will be delays-- I have some vocal issues and which has postponed the release date. But people are along for the ride.
I feel like $100,000 is a great budget for where my needs fall as an artist. I do 175 shows a year, with one or two side guys or solo. Its the folk curcuit--- clubs, colleges, festivals and a few churches. I'd love to see where Amanda Palmer uses her million. I know I'd have a better car/bus/plane!! with that in the tank. Comfort makes for better shows-- but that's not in my budget.
I'm lucky and grateful to have a community of supporters around me.
Thanks Bob-- always enjoy reading you-
Ellis Paul
Www.ellispaul.com
_________________________________________
It's nice when other people recognize the good guys.
Pledge music held my hand while my fans gave me mouth to mouth. Been wanting to send this to you for a while but... I've been making music.
I had the typical major label debacle. Nothing original there. But after asking to be let go, everything just fell into place. It started with a mission statement to fans in January: http://willdailey.com/2013/01/mission-for-2013/
Since then pledge held my hand through the process of bringing in my fans. Something a label doesn't know how to do.
I got lucky in the "business" a few times (albeit at my own speed) but it is only because bread and water are ok to live on if I'm making music. It is because of good friends, family and fans. If you're in it to actually create, and work harder than you think you can, then luck will find you.
Yes, with PledgeMusic I got the money I need. Yes my base is galvanized. But I feel more connected! Less alone and out to sea.
We are led to believe we are more connected than ever with our phones but that is a mirage. Typically in the studio you are locked up with you "team". Everyone there thinks it's going well but you never know who's going to be there for that music when it is done.
I know pledge will be there to help it be successful but I also got 600 fans (so far) that will be there too.
W;ll
http://www.pledgemusic.com/projects/willdailey
_________________________________________
Bob,
Let me tell you about Pledge Music. I am small beans- a big fish in a small town 10 years ago who still has some people who care about his music. I lead a very successful wedding/function band in Boston, I pay my mortgage by playing popular dance music and not succumbing to lounge-lizard syndrome. I REALLY sincerely enjoy playing songs that make civilians yell "woooo!" Sue me, I like my day job.
My band played at the wedding of Jayce Vardin, the co- founder of PLedge Music and he and and Benji sat in on a few songs and it was great. This was a few years ago and they told me all about this crazy business idea they had. It sounded pretty abstract at the time, but I just a had a gut feeling that those two were clever enough to make a go of it.
Fast forward a few years and I have recorded my latest batch of songs- not on my laptop on my bedroom, I drained my savings and recorded at Abbey F**king Road. I spent every penny I had to finish the record on tape, even bought a state of the art (1981) MCI 1" 8 track reel to reel machine to finish the album in Boston. I flew to LA and had it mastered by Grammy and Academy award winning mastering engineer Gavin Lurrsen (who does all T Bone Burnett's stuff and knows from analog- and who I went to college with). Not because I thought there was ever a chance in hell I'd sell enough CDs or downloads for this to make sense, but because I believe in the songs enough to record them the way they should sound.
The album came out great, but I spent ALL my money and really wanted to do a small vinyl run for the geeks. I had coffee with Jayce and he told me I could do it. I said "Jayce, c'mon, I'm not Amanda, how does crowd sourcing work for someone with not much of a crowd?" and "What if only my Mom pledges? I'll look like a jerkoff." Jacye said I could do it. He said I have a story and people can relate to someone doing something that makes no sense financially because they believe in it artistically. That's the beauty of the new music business, he said. Not everything needs to be giant, small stories matter, too. AND Jayce said I could donate some of the money to Boston Children's Hospital where my 12 year old niece had heart surgery a couple of years ago and they saved her life.
Now, mind you this is no huge deal. My goal was merely to raise enough dough to do a quality vinyl issue of the album, but look:
http://www.pledgemusic.com/projects/corinashley
People got behind me enough to make this work. My friend Kay Hanley who used to sing for the biggest local band, Letters To Cleo, wrote this blog about her struggles with addiction and how working on my album helped her:
http://iamkayhanley.tumblr.com/post/42025230874/new-lion-terraces-my-friend-corin-ashley-called
And people responded. Jayce and Benji created a platform that is not just designed for big projects and that is part of the beauty of Pledge.
Corin Ashley
www.corinashley.com
_________________________________________
Hey Bob,
My name is Andrew Pressman. I'm a bass player from Austin, TX. I love the letters. Keep them coming.
I am so stoked you're writing about Pledgemusic. They are building what I believe to be the best channel for independent musicians to fund projects and connect with audiences. Independent artists need to learn about their service. It needs to become the new model.
I recently designed a kickstarter campaign with Raina Rose for her next album, Caldera. She's my beautiful wife. Music is our family's main revenue stream. After what I thought was enough research, we decided Kickstarter was the best option.
We built a Kickstarter campaign, which launched in October. It was very successful. We had 644 pre-sales through Kickstarter, with all contributions lower then $600. It felt great. I was and am very happy with how it went down. Fulfilling it is a bit of an undertaking. But it's coming together.
I'm not disappointed with my Kickstarter experience. But they definitely didn't hit a homerun. We essentially paid them $2k for their brand name, hosting a video & project description, keeping track of the project backers and handling the credit card transactions. That's a pretty big chunk of cash. It would be nice if it included great customer service and some do's and don't's. Customer service isn't really a component of their model, as far as I can tell. We had trouble uploading our video. We reached out for assistance and got no help. He had to figure it out ourselves. That took us 3 days to do.
Why should a crowdfunding service be any different than any other business? Customer service and experience is key.
Customer service is where Pledgemusic kills it.
I met Benji at the Folk Alliance in Toronto. We were on a crowdfunding panel together. Almost all of the hurdles I brought up for the audience to take into consideration when building their campaigns, Benji and Pledgemusic had a solution for. And they are still developing, studying and refining their processes. They are a game-changer.
Here are just a few of Pledgemusic's advantages over other crowdfunding services:
1) They have project managers with experience running campaigns. They know what works and what doesn't.
2) They can look at your email list, twitter followers and Facebook likes and give you an extremely close estimate to the amount you'll raise.
3) If you hit your goal, when the campaign ends, the campaign remains active and is the channel for presales. YOUR FANS CAN STILL PLEDGE AND BUY THE RECORD up until it's release. This is huge. Benji kept saying something like "if you run a 30 day crowd funding campaign, what happens on day 31? People missed out. Let them pledge." This is brilliant. This allows for so much more revenue PLUS all of your campaign backers and album presales are grouped together. If raina and I were still capturing presales through our Kickstarter campaign, I bet we'd have 50%-100% more presales and who knows how much more cash.
4) They have built an infrastructure for fulfillment and distribution both for digital and physical orders. They report sales to Soundscan.
5) Pledgemusic.com has music players on the profiles of the bands who are on Pledgemusic. People can scroll through and listen to new bands. If they like the music, they can preorder the album.
These 5 things put their service in a league of its own. Kickstarter provides none of these things. I would happily pay a higher percentage to them simply for handling the fulfillment and distribution, let alone everything else I mentioned.
Pledgemusic is figuring out how to handle crowdfunding. They are building the best full-service infrastructure for music project funding and album presales. They seem to be adapting their service constantly as new projects start and complete. They're on the right track.
My peers need to know about this service. Pledgemusic let's artists give fans the option to contribute whatever they want to a project. It's the perfect tool for smaller, new artists to connect with an audience, nurture the relationship and fund projects. It's an even better tool for bigger bands with large audiences to get funding for mind-blowing art pieces that their core audience is hungry for.
Spread the word. This is an amazing tool.
Andrew Pressman
rainarose.com
_________________________________________
Bob-
Appreciate your comments on crowd funding. I have supported projects on Kickstarter, Pledge, and Indiegogo.
I can tell you what I don't like about Pledge.
The goal is not transparent. Unlike Kickstarter, which shows the pledgers that "X" is trying to raise a certain dollar amount, Pledge just shows a "percentage of goal reached". Maybe it's just me, but I'd like to know how ambitious the project is to start.
The "charity" component seemed to me to be a bit of a gimmick to compete with Kickstarter...
Additionally, it sure seems like at least in one project I pledged, the completion date was extended, (maybe even twice?) until it was reached. Not surprisingly, this is an album project.... first offered up in Sep 2011, and is STILL yet to complete.
And take a look at the letter the artist (who has toured internationally as a vocalist for a legend) sent out. She decided she couldn't fulfill some interesting pledges and asked pledgers to take signed CD's instead. To her credit, she offered refunds for those wanting out...
I have pledged on two tech projects..one a unique turntable by Orbit, and the other the NiftyMini-drive for mac. Both on Kickstarter.
Neither has quite reached production or shipping, but the communication and detail has been highly appreciated.
Dear Friends....
18:34 19 September, 2012
I'm writing to thank you so much for your support. It's time I let you know how it's going with this new album and I'd like to take the opportunity to ask a couple of questions about your pledge to me.
This has been a wonderful year. I've been playing out a lot with the band & solo; workshopping the music. I joined forces with friend, Tal Wilkenfeld, on the west coast to collaborate with her on her first record. We had some great shows in L.A. with an amazing band and head to Japan in October.
Meanwhile, back in Brooklyn my own recording sessions didn't yield the results I'd hoped for. I believe when one is honest as an artist, sometimes you don't exactly know what you're going after till you hit the nail on the head. All the mucking around in-between informs the swing of the hammer, but may not be the hit. I want this to be my best album yet - every song its own story - I have not yet hit the nail on the head, which means standing against the pressure to produce something right now, and listening to my head telling me the work's not done. I'm going back to the writing. It's going to take a few more months of tunesmithing and more recording, before I get every song on the album the way it's yearning to be.
So here are my humble requests. When my new album is ready, I'd like to honor all pledges for 1) a digital download of the new album, 2) a hand signed thank you postcard, 3) a CD and hand signed thank you postcard, and 4) a signed copy of the new CD. For all those folks, that means a bit of a wait, and I hope that's okay. (Please let me know - plus, I truly just love to hear from you.)
I'm also still offering pledgers the ability to book private house concerts.
Because I've got my hands full with the writing and buying recording time, I don't think I will be able to fulfill the other, more complicated exclusives (the lessons, the handmade bags, the mystery boxes etc). (The amount raised through PledgeMusic was $11,000 - an incredible show of generosity from friends, family, and fans I don't know personally - but it wasn't quite enough to record the whole album.) For those who did pledge for these exclusives, what I can send to you guys is a signed copy - or a few signed copies if you want to give some to your friends - of the CD when it comes out, plus the digital download of it. I hope you'll see that that'll be the best thing I have. I'll have poured my soul into the music and it'll come to you with enormous gratitude.
Are you guys who pledged for those exclusives okay with that? If not, please let me know some time this month, so I can refund your pledge. This is no trouble - I get it that money is tight for everyone and that I'm changing the deal. All you have to do is head to this link and say you'd like a total or partial refund:www.pledgemusic.com/pledges
To all of you, I just want to say that I'm lifted constantly by your support for me and for my work. It makes the hard parts easier and the easy parts a real pleasure.
Here is a demo I recorded when I spent time alone out on the Cape this winter.
Enjoy. These songs that are for you.
With love,
Sonya
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