The Beshers Rapport
By: Greg Beshers
My motto for the past 4 years or so has been: FREE SELLS. Why do I say this? Is it because Radiohead gave away tracks? Or NIN? Or even Coldplay? Nope, nope and nope. I say free sells because when I worked at eMusic, they had just come up with the free track icon that you could search by. So I put my own record up with a free track on it. Now this was a new record at the time (early 2005) from an unknown NYC band that played on the lower east side and in Brooklyn only. And to be fair, we did get some press locally, but nothing more outrageous than a mention in TimeOut NY or some online blogs. And as much as I would like to think that we were “on the verge” of getting known, or breaking out of the “scene” and getting a record deal of some sort, the truth of the matter was that we weren’t and we never did. Now, fast forward almost 4 years later and my record has sold consistently every quarter.
How is this possible you ask? Well of course it’s because it’s a work of staggering genius unequaled by any of his contemporaries that scintillates the……….oh wait. That’s right, it is MY record we’re talking about here. So why does it sell? It’s because of the free track. And why do I say that? Well, there’s an album, from an unknown band that has long since broken up or even played a gig, that barely has an online presence save for a MySpace page, BUT it does have a free track. So people download it because it’s free. Some people like it, some don’t, but the ones who do are the ones that download the rest of the record and keep it selling consistently for the last 4 years. (thanks people!) Now don’t get me wrong, I’m not going to be able to retire to the French Rivera anytime soon off of my eMusic royalties, but it does give me some nice mailbox money 4 times a year. So that’s pretty good.
But how does this story relate to you the label? Well in a nutshell, I’m talking about PromoTracks. Those tracks which are royalty and publishing free that are marked off in your Dashboard on the release level. Stores like eMusic and Amazon have a vibrant community of users that actively search for new music and are willing to try things out, but with a free track marked off on a release, it makes the users trying new material just a bit more easy. Having Promotracks also help out for all of the users of Promonet. You know, that big searchable website that houses IODA’s entire catalog that has podcasters, bloggers, internet radio stations, promotional websites and retailers subscribed to it that are all combing through it (even as I write this there are new songs being discovered!). And if you as a label want someone to write about your release, then tick off a PromoTrack so they can get “a little taste” of it.
So back to my original motto, Free Sells. Why? Because at the end of the day, you want to make the music fan have the easiest experience in finding, digesting and most importantly, BUYING new music. And you can’t make it any easier than giving away a free track in a retail framework that the buyer can easily purchase the rest of the record. Not everyone may like it, but those who do will buy the rest of the record.
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