It's been an awesomely busy September. That in itself is a great thing to realize when you're working in an artistic/creative field - some months will be feast, and some will be famine. Once again, if you're trying to make your art a full-time occupation, you're going to need to plan out which months are normally more busy/more revenue is being generated, and which ones are less busy/less revenue is generated and how to plan accordingly what to do in both those types of situations.

Revenue Streams

Chances are, if you're working from your home (or, from a Starbucks if you don't have internet currently), you are not receiving every dollar paid to you by doing just one task. Diversity in your revenue streams will quickly become your very good friend.  Here's a little breakdown of the various sources that I currently receive revenue a regular (or, at least PSEUDO-regular) basis:

Playing shows: Whether you're playing at your uncle's coffee shop, or selling out the biggest venue in your city, you need to get the word out about your music. This one is so obvious, I hate to say that some artists don't recognize that you need to do this to make money (unless you're purely a producer/songwriter). There are going to be some where fans will pay a cover at the door to come hear you play your original music, and there are going to be some where you might have to fill a 3 hour time frame with music for people who are already in a coffee shop/restaurant/bar, but the venue will give you a flat rate to play.  

Look for opportunities to play all kinds of shows in your city (those are obviously the ones that will require less travel, and less money to get there) and for opportunities in the closest bigger cities surrounding yours at first.  A great way to do that is to go on Myspace (remember that?) and to click on the "shows" tab and enter your zip code.  You will be able to find tons of places to play that ACTUALLY BOOK PEOPLE, because you'll see artists that are currently booked there. Neat, huh?

Tips/ CD Sales: If you're playing a show that's entertainment for people who are already at an establishment, you need to put out a tip jar.  The worst thing that will happen is you will get nothing, the best thing that could happen is that you will get something. Don't put out a tip jar at a concert where people have already paid money at the door - they've put in their fee to see you already. Reserve the tip jar for the 2 to 3 hour gigs where you're providing an entertaining atmosphere for everyone there. Have your CD's right next to the tip jar too so someone can grab one while you're playing and just drop the money in the jar. You might even double the amount of money you'll make in a night.

Quick Tip: Make your tip jar look cool - it will draw more attention to it :-)

Itunes/Digital Downloads: Get your music on Itunes. It's not difficult - you can go through CDBaby, or you can go through tunecore.com (or a number of other services) and upload your tracks so that people can download them (and then pay you money for the downloads!)

You have an infinite supply of your music to be downloaded, so that's a plus, and Itunes pays you $0.70 for each dollar spent on the site. That's a huge percentage - you're almost looking at a better profit margin than if you had CD's manufactured, and shipped them from your website. So, take advantage of the world's largest distributor of music. Note: Itunes will get you your money 45 days after the month is over, so you'll get January's money on March 15th, if you sold downloads in January. It's all part of the planning.

Publishing/Writing: This revenue stream will probably be the next installment of the series, but for now, we'll just say that you need to take advantage of what you're working on. Join a PRO (Performing Rights Organization), the big ones you've probably heard of are ASCAP, BMI, and SESAC.

There are so many aspects to how you can make money with the publishing and writing side of your original music that it's mind boggling - a few examples from my personal vault:

1. SESAC, my PRO, pays money to me for each time I submit my setlist from a venue that's registered with them and I play the venue. Extra money for playing shows? Yes please.

2. I've licensed numerous songs to different films to use in the soundtrack of the movie, and there are payments that come up front for that, and if they air on TV, you will get royalties on the back end. 

3. I have received royalty checks for my music being placed on playlists that play in retail stores throughout the country.

4.  I receive a mechanical royalty for my songs that are going to be released on an official CD soundtrack of a movie.

I'm sure many (if not all of those) might sound foreign to you, but I'll touch on that in my next posting.

Those are 4 revenue streams that I personally receive every month, and there are other ones out there for certain. If you're not taking advantage of at least those 4 - get on it. I'll fill you guys in on Publishing in my next post; thanks for reading in the meantime, and hope this continues to help.

-TRMJ