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15. Marketing and selling your CD

Along with the initial funding and budgeting for the project, good marketing and sales strategies are an important part of ensuring the album becomes a profitable fund-raising venture for your band. So it's important to think about how you can market and sell your album and whether it might be worth approaching a third-party distributor.

The vast majority of private recordings are sold exclusively on a private basis and never reach a major distribution company or high street chain. Although this might seem at first sight to limit the scope for sales, it has been proved on many occasions that privately-sold albums can be successful and highly profitable for the groups involved.

There are a number of approaches which can help you optimise sales of the album. You may already have some idea which of these options will best suit your situation but if you're in any doubt, try a few different ideas and see which is most successful.

The most obvious and immediate sales opportunity is at concerts, other musical events and special appearances featuring the band - every concert is a good potential sales opportunity! You'll need to be aware that in some venues there may be restrictions on where and how you can sell your CD so it would be a good idea to check with the promoter or venue manager beforehand to check they're happy for you to sell the album.

As well as your regular concert audiences there's likely to be an extended supporter-base who'll be highly receptive to your CD. This might include family, friends and other relatives of band members. Sponsors, benefactors, former band members and their families will also be highly interested in the album and may welcome the opportunity to support the band by buying a copy.

The best way to target these groups might be by a dedicated mailing or perhaps you can get a leaflet added to a general mailing which is already being planned. Try if possible to incorporate a picture of the cover and a good deal of relevant information about the album.

If you can think of good reasons why the potential buyers might want to make a purchase, don't be afraid to point it out to them. As with parts of this booklet, it doesn't hurt to restate the obvious!

Advertising is another tool at your disposal. Consider carefully what your target markets are and how many sales you might expect to generate. This information will help you decide which publications to use and how much you can afford to spend. If the band has a high profile locally, local papers may be an ideal vehicle. On the other hand, if your band has attracted interest from the wider band fraternity it might be a good idea to advertise in a specialist publication such as British Bandsman.

Advertising is potentially very expensive so you'll need to be sure the adverts you place are well targeted and smartly presented to convey the same feeling of high quality which the album presents.

Reviews are another good way to generate publicity and interest ... and a positive review will help to persuade potential buyers that they'll enjoy the album. You can send free copies to a number of publications for review but it's a good idea to phone first to check who to send it to and again afterwards to check they've received it and see if they have any questions.

Alternatively it might be possible for you to approach someone to write a review then submit the completed write-up to the publishers yourself, so they can simply reproduce the text you've supplied (along with a picture of the cover, of course). Try to choose a reviewer who will be known to the editor or publisher and ideally well-known to the audience you're trying to reach, to give the review the maximum level of credibility and impact.

As well as specific reviews, it might be possible for you to arrange for local papers, radio or TV stations to produce a feature on your recording. It would be a good idea to contact them at the very start of the project so they can attend the recording sessions - then follow it up again once the album is released. Press releases announcing the recording, launch and sales success of the album are all likely to receive good local coverage and add to the reputation of the band in general, as well as the album.

Last but by no means least of the marketing tools to mention here is the internet, which allows you to generate world-wide interest in the album, possibly for very little cost. You may be able to set up an online shop to sell the CDs direct, but even if that isn't possible, it's important to try to get some exposure for the album on the web.

Try to make sure the CD is featured on the band's and supporters' web sites - and remember to give details of how people viewing the sites can obtain copies. There are also numerous musical sites, newsgroups and forums where you might be able to mention the album for free and/or link to the band's page. Check out the links page on this site for a good starting point!

If your marketing strategies help you develop a widespread audience beyond the local area you may want to consider setting up your own mail-order operation. In effect, all you need to set up a mail-order business is the ability to receive and pay in cheques - and Jiffy bags or other packaging to post the CDs in.

This also gives you the opportunity to develop a mailing list of potential buyers for future albums - who may also be interested in attending concerts or supporting the band in other ways.

Your promotion can begin even before the album is released. Perhaps you could produce a leaflet which announces the imminent release and includes an order form for people to place advance orders. (It's best however not to bank any cheques you receive until the CDs arrive, especially if you're operating a mail-order service, since this could contravene the laws which regulate the mail-order industry.)

You'll already know that commercial CDs are mainly sold through high street retailers. Distribution on this scale is a highly complex and expensive procedure, which is why most commercially-available albums either originate from one of the major multinational labels or come through a specialist distributor before reaching the shops.

The fees charged (usually in the form of a percentage) by any specialist distributor are likely to be considerable, so your profits on CDs sold this way will be greatly reduced.

For example, if you're selling the album direct you might only need to sell a few hundred copies to cover your costs and any further sales will be pure profit. If you're selling via a distributor you'll probably need to sell several times this number of copies to break even - and even after that stage you'll still be paying the distributor a percentage for each copy sold.

On this basis it's actually likely that the most profitable option will be for you to mainly sell direct to the public, even if this means the number of units sold doesn't run to tens of thousands.

However, it might be worth considering some small scale third-party sales techniques. For example you may be able to approach a local music shop and get them to sell your album as a special item on a sale or return basis. Or there may be a specialist distributor who can help you reach a market which you wouldn't otherwise reach but won't take away any of your direct personal customers.

Marketing and selling your album can be a fun and profitable experience. It's another chance to be creative and you might be surprised by the sort of results you can achieve just by focussing on one or two of the strategies discussed above.

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