It’s tough to sell 100,000 albums these days.  I’ve worked with artists who have had #1 hits on Triple A radio and still didn’t move 100,000 units.  There is a lot of speculation about the future of recorded music as a commodity.  One thing I know for certain is that people still love recorded music and it is an important part of many people’s lives.  As a touring artist or manager you know that your music is important to your fan community.  You also know that getting a great recording into their hands is important as a revenue stream (especially if you’ve self released) and as a way of spreading your music and culture.  With all of that in mind, here is a great story about how to sell 100,000 copies of your recording.

Randy Reed is a manager at Red Light.  He manages several DJs including Sasha, UNKLE, James Zabiela, James Lavelle and Pretty Lights.  Over breakfast this weekend we got a preview listen to the new James Zabiela (UK based artist) album coming out in April (awesome album by the way).  In conversation Randy told us that generally electronic artists don’t sell many albums – the sales figures are much lower than rock bands of equivalent size.  Another thing you need to know is that electronica artists are paid in guarantees normally, hardly ever in door deals.  Unlike rock shows, generally when these DJs play a venue, the merch sales aren’t significant even if there is a new album out.

Randy and his team decided that they could solve all of these issues by giving an album away to each audience member on their way into the show.  This way, they get to distribute 100,000 copies of the album across the whole tour (way more than they could sell otherwise) directly into the hands of fans (no distribution fees).  Behind the scenes they are making it work to their advantage as well by increasing the guarantee for the show to include the cost of an album (plus a small profit) for each ticket.  In effect they are “selling” a higher volume of albums at a smaller margin compared to potential merch table sales.  Lastly, they benefit by getting recorded music into the hands of hard core fans who will be excited for the free gift and will spread it to more friends.  Everyone wins.

What I realized as I sat with this idea for a few days is that recorded music doesn’t need to be viewed as a stand alone business, especially to the artist.  If you open your mind to it, it could be that giving an album or a download card is part of the live show experience, part of the price of the ticket.  In this way, the expense of the albums is just part of doing business on the road (like gas or hotels).  The main difference of course is that it’s actually an investment, not an expense, because it keeps giving back through the fan/artist relationship.  Think about it and let me know if you give it a try.