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What are some of you guys thoughts on playing from bigger sites like BP as opposed to direct from an artist's own site or a site devoted to a smaller, more focused group of artists?
There are some troubles recently with artists getting sales due to the fact that at least with BP, you've got so many tracks out a week (sometimes in the region of 1500) that many good tracks fall through the cracks.
Obviously the bigger names and top 10 chart people are getting sold but a lot of good stuff is getting unnoticed. There is a case to be made that theres too many labels/tracks out that the moment as well and not enough filters in place.
Any thoughts?
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I think that will probably be the future driven by social networkings applications and the like.
Beatport has become a cash cow it would seem. 1500 releases per week... It's not obvious that BP is working off a percentage basis, is it?
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Two Advantages for BP
1. Market exposure.
2. .wav downloading
1. if the consumer doesnt know where to look they won't find the artist/labels website for direct downloading. BP not only gives you a unified place to search but a place to discover, during your search.
2. why are we still dealing with mp3s has our hearing really deteriorated that much? we have the resources to be able to offer .wav downloads at the same price of mp3 downloads. Let the user compress the file into mp3 when they need to, e.g. when using with abelton. We must bring the .wav back.
On a side note im starting a revolution to "Free the .wav"
The disadvantage of BP is sifting through 1500 releases a week (ok I dont sift through all 1500 and i dont do it on a weekly basis, but you get my point) and its a pain in the ass, plus as Jes said good music slips through the cracks.
So two thumbs up for direct downlaoding from the artist but .wav has to be offered, and the whole search/discovery/market exposure can be worked around given some creative marketing techniques. Maybe you could have a website just for the search/discovery/market exposure, but when you came to buy the song it would direct you to the artist's website directly.
The reason i stress search/discover/market exposure is cause when you live in a redneck town as I do, outlets like BP are very helpful in staying in touch with the scene/genre you are invloved in.
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Well said, Rambunkcious. And .wav downloading is a must, no argument there.
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Beatport is deffinately great for finding tracks easy, it's just too bad it has that downside of all the clutter. It's somewhat a damned if you do and damned if you don't situation. I have found soem stuff on beatport I might nto have ever heard about if they didnt have so much selection. I agree with Sven though that a community driven site would be a good idea. Less choice but more info on whats out there as contributed by user response, similar to going into your record store and asking around what's hot. Right now the biggest factor for sales is the charts on BP, but these don't always reflect some of the more unknown music as well as a community could.
I think with proper search engine technique one could find a track on an artists site. For instance if I sold Medway tracks here, anyone looking for them could simple enter my name and track into google and it should come up as relevant.
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I agree it is a damned if you do and damned if you don't thing. As an artist I don't want to be lost in the shuffle, however as a DJ I love being able to have such a large selection all in one place. Even though BP has a huge selection I still shop other stores like 3beat and Resonant Vibes. I did the same thing when I shopped regular record stores (remember the real world?). I would shop as many as I could, becuase I know every other DJ in town is shopping them too. As far as wav downloads go, I would buy them if they were the same price as mp3 but currently the added cost keeps me from doing it.
As far as an alternative goes would we rather buy direct from a label? or an artist? For me it would be extremely time consuming to have to chase down every artist or even every label I am into. Its hard enough keeping up as it is. Beatports favorite artist and favorite label functions are great for this. I also think that beatports chart function is another good way for people to find music they wouldn't normally find.
As an artist who is trying to sell his tracks I find that newsletters and any type of direct communication with my fans is the best way to get more sales, along with having your tracks on as many sites like beatport as possible.
Just my thoughts on the subject...Great thread Jesse.
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Definitely a supporter of the .wavs at beatport! $1 well spent IMO.
One way I have found around the clutter is the My Artist feature. Although I still browse new releases I now know when some of my fav artists/labels have a new track out. This has resulted in many great finds, that I probably would have otherwise missed.
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I have the my artist page setup as well, need to use it a bit more often though ;-)
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Medway Wrote:I have the my artist page setup as well, need to use it a bit more often though ;-)
It took me a while to get going, but now I swear by it. Soooo many tunes on beatport, and I find anything from prog house, to tech house, to techno and even minimal can be fair came for banging tracks that are right up my alley. And browsing through every new release from all those section I reckon is near impossible.
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Beatport has made me more lazy about shopping for music because I now find myself just sifting through the top 100...even that takes a few hours. When I would browse through the recent releases to try and find original stuff or try to find quality stuff from new-unknown artists it would take me a whole day to just get through like 2 weeks!
So from an artist stand point if you aren't making their charts within just a few weeks or so, your tracks are pretty much lost in the shuffle that quick. Which makes it harder for the up-and-coming artists...like myself.
