It’s never been easier to get your music distributed to so many people so quickly. With channels like Spotify, iTunes, Amazon and Google Play, almost all of your fans have access to an online store where you can sell your music.
We thought it’d be good to share some of the top current distribution services that will help you get your music for sale to your fans. All of these services will effectively get your music on most of the main services like iTunes, Spotify, Google Play, Amazon, Beats, Rdio, Pandora and Deezer.
Distrokid
Distrokid offers a faster turnaround than any of its competitors and lets artists keep 100% of royalties from sales. For $20 per year, artists can upload unlimited songs and albums, too.
CD Baby
Though CD Baby charges more at $49 - $99 per album, they offer extra services with distribution , such as: setting up Youtube royalties; allowing sales on Facebook; licensing for film, TV and video games; and registration with collection agencies as well as ASCAP and BMI. There’s no annual fee, but they also take 9% of digital distribution sales/royalties and $4 for every physical sale. Being a larger company, CD Baby is also able to offer other services like CD printing and fulfillment and music website hosting.
If you don’t mind paying more, CD Baby is a one stop shop for publishing an album.
Loudr
Loudr uniquely offers to publish your music for no upfront cost. However, they do take 15% of your royalties for original music and 30% for covers, which they’ve made easy to get a license for. It’s not too bad of a deal if you don’t want to put any money in upfront.
Tunecore
Like Distrokid, Tunecore offers distribution services while letting artists keep 100% of royalties. Albums cost $30 each to publish the first year of membership and $50 after that. Like CD Baby, Tunecore is a larger company and is able to offer additional services like international royalties collection and Youtube publishing. You can also have you music promoted on Internet radio to get more exposure.
While each of these have been used successfully by thousands of artists, Distrokid is your best bet if you just need to get your music on the major digital stores. It’s fast, cheapest and let’s you keep 100% royalties. However, if you want some of the more advanced services along with your distributionlike registry with your BMI or ASCAP membershipTunecore seems to have everything you need for less than the cost of CD Baby’s service.
Of course, before you get there make sure your music’s been properly mixed and mastered for digital distribution.
Make Pro Songs
There are 8 unique value-points inside the Sage Audio membership, so let’s go over each one so you can decide if it’s the right fit for you.
1. 50 Free Mastered Songs Per Year
- 50 free mastered songs per year with your own dedicated professional mastering engineer so you can get all your mixes sounding like professional songs.
- You’ll get your own dedicated Sage Audio mastering engineer to create custom masters that are specific to you and sound exactly how you want.
- Unlimited revisions with your dedicated Sage Audio mastering engineer. As a standard of our service, we are not happy until you are happy with the sound of your masters.
- All masters are delivered as commercial, industry-standard high-resolution 24-bit HD WAV masters so they will sound clean and clear on every platform.
2. 1-on-1 Mentorship
- The Sage Audio 1:1 Mentorship gives you direct access to us to answer all your questions and receive unlimited advanced mixing feedback directly from us.
- Unlimited direct access to us for in-depth discussions to help you improve your mixes and masters.
- Unlimited advanced mixing feedback with detailed suggestions for improvement.
- Fast communication to answer all your questions and get tailored guidance that’s specific to your needs.
3. Unlimited Mixing Feedback
- Unlimited mixing feedback so you can improve your mixes quickly.
- This is highly valuable - giving you access to a thriving community of mixing engineers who can provide feedback about what you can improve before sending your mix to be professionally mastered.
4. Sage Audio University™ (SAU) — (Mixing and Mastering Education Platform)
- SAU is a modern audio engineering education platform that includes in-depth mixing and mastering course curriculums that match the new music industry.
- SAU is designed for every experience level, ranging from first-time mixing engineers to advanced engineers. The techniques and concepts taught can be applied to any DAW to create industry-leading mixes without expensive software or plugins - and free plugin alternatives are suggested throughout every course curriculum.
- SAU course curriculums include Start-to-Finish session walkthrough lessons for multiple genres so you can follow along with your preferred genre.
- SAU Certification Document, which can be downloaded and showcased on your website, social channels, and portfolio for as long as you remain a member.
- Get first access to all future SAU course curriculums to continually build and refine your mixing and mastering skills as the industry evolves.
5. Mixing and Mastering Competitions
- Compete in Mixing Competitions and Mastering Competitions to win prizes and connect with friends and colleagues.
- This is a great collaborative way to improve your skills alongside both aspiring engineers and seasoned industry professionals.
6. Community
- The Sage Audio community is a tight-knit community of passionate audio engineers who can provide you with real-world mixing feedback, meaningful discussions, networking, collaborations, and more.
7. 70+ GB of Curated Sage Audio Downloadable Content, Including:
- 36 multitrack sessions spanning multiple genres for mixing practice.
- 57 un-mastered mixes spanning multiple genres for mastering practice.
- 62 Recommended Free Plugins List (vetted, tested, and approved, so you don’t have to).
- 39 Recommended Paid Plugins List (vetted, tested, and approved, so you don’t have to).
- 58 Sage Audio custom plugin presets to improve your mixes and masters.
- Sage Audio Membership Badge to showcase on your website, social channels, and portfolio.
8. 700+ Video Catalog
- Access 700+ in-depth Sage Audio mixing and mastering videos - curated and organized into playlists so you can take a deep dive into all aspects of audio engineering with thousands of hours of concise, expertly crafted Sage Audio videos to continually improve your mixing and mastering skills at your own pace.
