Starting any sort of new venture can be quite stressful and time consuming let alone starting an independent record label.
If your mind is made up and you are sure about going down this path, then you must firstly be congratulated. There are not to many other businesses out there that are as difficult as trying to promote other people’s art.
Below are some tips and ideas to help you through your journey. Follow these tips and you’ll be sure not to end up like these dudes in the pic!
Keep Your Costs Down
Most successful people starting an independent record label from scratch can sometimes attribute a lot of their success to keeping their costs down and only spending on the most important things - marketing, pressing and distribution and promotion.
Don’t worry about fancy office space and employing people to do things you could do yourself. The aim of the game in the beginning is to save as much as possible, even if you’ve got a cash reserve. You’ll never know when you need it.
Treat It Like A Business
So many people out there who considering starting an independent record lable are really sometimes just doing it either be cool or look cool. It’s a pretty cool thing to say, “I run a record label” however the truth be told, it’s a damn hard job and the only successful independent labels out there are the ones that treat their label like a business and not as a way to pick up girls.
Every decision you make should be motivated by whether or not it makes business sense to do it. Not anything else.
Try Not To Pay For Recordings
It’s so important to mention this and make sure you don’t fall into this trap but when your starting out and getting your label set up, do not spend your money on paying the recordings of artists.
Firstly, you might not even like the record they make and then your stuck with a bill and the job of promoting it to get your money back, but more importantly sometimes bands don’t even ever finish recording an album on time and within the budget set aside. Make sure that you don’t ever fall into the trap of being stuck in one of these two situations.
Pull As Many Strings As Possible
This is a biggy! You thought you had to pull strings before to make things happen? That was just a warm up for the inaugural - I’m starting an independent record label and I need your help.
Whoever you know at radio stations, newspapers, magazines, reviewers, venues, booking agents or anyone else, write their names down on a piece of paper and think about how they might be able to help your cause. Getting favors and pulling strings is what small labels live off. Without millions of dollars in the bank account, it’s tips like these that help you get your artists and bands where they need to go.
Starting an independent record label is by no means an easy feet however with some careful planning and consideration the path forward might not be as hard.
Tags: Starting A Label, The Music Industry
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