How does beat leasing work

You can get a Kaotica Eyeball to record yourself; you can do everything on your laptop. To match that, there are ever more people rapping, and they need access to beats, often for as cheap as they can manage. Even artists with label deals are finding their budgets slashed in recent years.

So the idea of getting a beat inexpensively, even if you run the risk of having someone else use it as well, becoming extremely appealing. So with beats so cheap, does the quality suffer? Not according to Curtiss King. The best way to illustrate that point, he asks? They stand by the quality of whatever that is attached to that name. Not everyone is thrilled with this new state of affairs, of course.

Producer J. Sometimes, leasing beats can backfire. Oliver says that he frequently gets requests to remake beats from people who are unable to renew their temporary ownership because the beat has been sold exclusively to someone else.

Hatch explains that leasing also causes friction within the producer community itself, with some composers feeling like leasing is driving overall prices down, and gives the impression of lower-quality work being prevalent. You gotta think about it like a store, right?

But folks like SuperStar O and Curtiss King are fighting the perception that low price equals low quality. King, for one, has no interest in selling beats to prominent rappers anymore. He says that he made as much money in his first few months leasing beats as he did in 10 years of grinding for placements with major artists and corporations—and he can use the time saved in not attending endless all-night studio sessions just to network to spend with his family.

And you never know—one of your leasing clients might blow up. Batshon points out that marketplaces like his are collapsing music industry boundaries. In addition, Batshon points out that a generation of artists raised on social media find it perfectly natural to use the internet to find beats, even after they become successful.

He looks forward to a future that looks a lot like his own mids past. But the reality is none of these platforms are guaranteed to still be here later down the road. Remember Myspace? The key is building on these platforms but then also routing that traffic to your website and your mailing list so that you can retain your audience. As you're building your audience, keep in mind that your content doesn't always have to be the actual music itself.

Your whole life is content. It's not wise to share everything in your life of course, but find unique ways to showcase your life to your audience. Remember you're not selling your music. You're selling YOU. The more people resonate with you as a person, the more they will resonate with you as an artist. So you're releasing music consistently now and you've set up a solid marketing plan to get your music out to the people.

But how do you make money? Can you make money with leased beats? Absolutely you can! That's the whole point. Using affordable leases to build an audience which leads building your income.

You can profit from leased beats many of the same ways that you profit from exclusive beats. The actual leasing terms will be different from producer to producer, but I personally keep my terms pretty relaxed as my aim is to help independent artists build their audiences. Here are just a few ways:.

As far as Youtube, using leased beats on Youtube can be tricky if not done correctly. When you submit music that contains leased beats to the Content ID system it causes issues for you and any other artists who have used that particular lease. It's best to just choose the monetization options in your Youtube video when uploading. Only submit your songs to Content ID via a distributor if you own the beat in full exclusive rights.

FYI, when using ToneJonez. I have all my instrumentals registered within Content ID via Airbit Distribution so that I can fully administer Youtube claims for my customers!

When used properly, leases can take you a long way down the road before it makes sense to shell out for exclusive rights.

I've seen some artists use leases all the way up to getting a major record deal. A record deal isn't necessary today, but it just shows how far you can utilize leases.

The whole point is to use leases to build an audience of people who authentically enjoy your art. Once you have an audience, the ways to monetize that audience are endless. In addition, one of the major keys of generating income with your music as an artist is so that you can invest that money in investment vehicles outside of music like stocks, real estate, other businesses, etc. Even though we love music, you don't want to have to solely rely on your music making ability to bring you income for the rest of your life.

You must actively save and invest so your wealth can grow to the point where making music isn't "necessary" but you keep doing it because you love it! So many of our legacy artists made amazing music but are struggling financially today because they didn't have a financial plan in place to properly utilize the money they generated from music. Everything that glitters isn't gold and many artists you think are wealthy are not!

Leases can be an effective part of your strategy to help you get there! With all that said, I'd like to end things off with a practical example of how to turn this info into action!

Before I get into the steps, if you haven't created a website or email list yet, you need to do that first. Go to Godaddy. Your artist name would be best but if that's not available, choose something as close to it as possible. Then either get your website built professionally or create your own website with services like Wix, Weebly, Bandzoogle, etc.

Make sure your site is clean, easy to navigate, and loads quickly. For your email list, make sure you sign up with a professional email marketing platform like Aweber, Mailchimp, Get Response, etc. Some website building sites have a mailing list feature built in, but a dedicated professional platform will be much more robust with features and deliver your emails in a more reliable manner. Create a sign up form with the platform of your choice and then embed that sign up form on your website.

There are tons of Youtube videos and articles that explain how to set up these types of things in detail. Please do your due dilligence in making sure you setup everything properly. Don't rush the process. Once these two things are in place, you're ready to move forward!

Let's say you'd like to consistently release 4 songs per month utilizing leased beats. Here's a way to do that:. This is how you start building an audience! Keep making music and repeating these steps over and over again and your audience will grow over time. It's not an overnight process, but with patience it's possible! As your brand gets more exposure, you'll start to see more and more opportunities come your way. It's like a big snowball effect. You start small but as you are consistent things grow larger and larger.

Eventually, you'll get to the point where you have a fan base in place to properly monetize an exclusive beat and that's when exclusive beats may make sense. There's plenty of different ways to invest and plenty of different resources to learn about investing today. From a free resource like Youtube, to purchasing books paper or ebooks , to even purchasing courses, invest in your knowledge about investing TODAY.

If I have one regret it's that I didn't learn how to invest sooner! Credit must be given to the producer as stated in the licence. Credit must be given in all cases where a ghost producer is not involved.

Ghost Producer is the name that the industry gives to a producer who will work for hire and will not claim credit or royalties for a certain creation. This is not the case of most online producers. Leasing Producer is the name that the industry gives to producers who showcase their beat catalog online and sell licences to use their instrumentals for recording purposes.

Established producers who already have a network of contacts and there is demand for their signature sound. Industry placements can be in the form of:. The development of technology over the last few years has given artists and producers a new set of options when it comes to creating music.

Not so long ago everything had to be done with hardware and instruments but with the advent of more powerful computers now everything can be done inside the box. Added to this the internet speed also improved a huge amount over the last two decades. I remember a time where sending stems for a song over the internet was not possible.

The music business is like any ecosystem and the rule about the survival of the fittest applies. It is also easier for producers to get access to the music market and make money from their available catalog. No matter where they are located. With all these advantages and social media being as relevant as it is today there is no excuse, even for up and coming artists, for not dropping records on a regular basis.

Consistency is a main pillar in the foundation of a solid career and it is crucial that we understand that it is almost as important as talent.

One without the other will take you nowhere. Color EQ.