Real Rad Magazine : Winter 2016

III • Physical/Digital Album Sales
Believe it or not, if you were to manufacture 200 CDs today, and then sell each of
those CDs for $10 each, all within 4 weeks, you would make MORE than minimum wage
for that month ($2,000 USD; less the manufacturing fee). Physical manufacturing
is easy to find by using any search engine, and relatively affordable. When you
purchase in large quantities, the price often drops greatly for the service. One
well known company who provides great services for independent artists in
physical manufacturing is Disc Makers.
Another common method of distributing music today is digitally. Today, more
than ever, people are consuming media daily on their smartphones and laptops/
tablets. The major digital music markets have all of the major artists music
available, 24/7, as well as independent artists. If you do not have a distribution deal
with a company already, then there are several different services you can utilize
to distribute your music to those markets, often for about $40 per album/$20 per
single. One of the more popular services like this is TuneCore. Another great choice
is B andCamp, which sets you up with your own website (basically), and even garners
royalties on streams, and reports your sales to Sound Scan.
“at 1 million views on one video,
you generate about $7,600”
IV • Youtube Monetization
There is a YouTube “gamer” that I follow, named Chris Smoove. He is about the same
age as me, and all he does is play video games, all day and all night. Chris started
some years ago, posting videos of him playing games online, and started gaining a
following and impressive views. Today, one of his latest videos, posted only 3 days
ago, has more than 1 million views. The crazy part is, most of his 2,000+ individual
videos have about the same amount of average views.
He has turned something that he was both great at AND passionate about
into something he could make serious money from, and that is YouTube Monetization.
When you display ads on your videos, you make money when those advertisements
are seen, and often lead to lucrative paychecks, when your views are as high
as Smoove’s are. Google owns YouTube, and so when you e nable adsense on your
account, you will then receive a 45/55 split in ad revenue with them (you will get
55%). Currently, you will receive about $7.60 per 1,000 views on each video that
displays ads, on your channel. So, at 1 million views on one video, you generate
about $7,600. If you make interesting videos that people like to watch, or just want
to put your music where the people are at online, this is an easy and great way to
earn extra income with your music/videos.