Now that you have built a foundation for your company, you need to develop musical content, and other related content. This section will explain the importance of developing new music, and musical content on a regular basis. I will also discuss how to develop a plan to save costs while developing musical works and other related content.
If you are interested in signing artists to your label, then you must evaluate the talent of the artists before making an educated decision about deciding if you would like to invest your time and money into artists. Some artists seem to be ready for the stage, while other artists can be either just starting out or just not worth your investment. It is possible to run your record label with one artist, and is common with most independent artists. Sometimes an artist will build a label only for themselves, and this label will be easier to manage with a small staff or not additional staff besides the artist. Both methods require creating music and content for the target audience. This point is where either a label will thrive or it will die. Without the periodic creation of new content the record label will slowly become irrelevant. Developing talent will always cost money, but there are two basic strategies that can save your company money. These costs can be anything from equipment, studio fees, registration fees, and other costs to make your artist audience ready.
The biggest cost associated with your record label will be the cost of production. After the content is produced there will be additional costs of post-production processing or mastering.
This strategy is best suited for the type of people that are musicians, engineers, artists, producers, writers, and other musically educated people that are comfortable utilizing computers. If your company doesn’t have any members of those groups working for the record label, then money will have to be invested in contract work with members from those particular groups. The home studio can also pay for itself by acting as studio for other artists to record musical content. It is a good idea to rent out the studio or provide services for non-label related talent as well to make money when your artists aren’t in the studio. The home based studio strategy will require the purchasing of equipment that will allow engineers, producers, and artists to work together to create quality music content. It would be wise to book a couple of hours of studio time to speak with a few audio engineers to figure out what equipment that respected studios are using. Spend some time with that equipment, and also jot down the types of software and out board equipment that they are using. Most importantly figure out the specifications for their studio computers, and decide if it will be powerful enough to support the gear you plan to purchase. This information about the computer is very important because you will build your home studio around the computer. Review your list of equipment and software, then use the internet to acquire estimated costs to build a budget for equipment. The pieces of gear that will be needed for basic production will be listed below, and serve as the best budget gear in my opinion that will yield professional results if used properly. There are alternatives to the gear listed below, but conduct extensive research before you purchase any gear that may or may not contribute to the quality of your productions or recordings. I understand that everyone’s budget is different, so look online, in the newspaper, pawnshops, and all of your neighborhood music stores. Everyone is familiar with Guitar Center, Musician’s Friend, and Sweetwater stores and websites, but there are only a few people who have ever shopped on the American Musical Supply website. The American Musical Supply will allow customers to breakup purchases into monthly payments without a credit check or an account. The only thing required is an initial down payment from your debit card. After this payment the company will charge your card automatically for the agreed number of payments monthly. Visit the website and take a look at the payment options that are posted.
The cost to reserve blocks of studio time can vary from $50 to over $500 an hour. Some studios require minimum blocks of time in order to reserve a session. The bills for most studios have to be paid in full before any music will be released to the record label. There are also smaller less expensive studios that have rates starting at $20 an hour up to $200 for an 8 hour block. The prices for reserving studio time will vary depending on the location, reputation, engineers, equipment, clientele, and the various recording spaces at that particular studio. If you choose produce your artists’ material in a studio that your company doesn’t own, then the costs can add up quickly. It is wise to work out a deal with a smaller studio that has capable equipment, and a great track record. Try to structure a deal that will allow you to pay a monthly, daily, or weekly fee for studio time. Sometimes studios will have these rates advertised as packages for a certain number of songs, and even included services with these rates at discounted prices. Some studios will also create custom packages for projects as well with lower rates. You may need to negotiate your savings. Keep in mind the average cost while putting together a budget for production. For example, a typical song costs around $260 to record in 4 hrs. Therefore the block of time is usually $65 hr. If you required the same amount of time to produce 10 recorded songs for your artist then your budget for production would have to be at minimum $2,600.00. If the studio offered a day rate or your company negotiated a day rate of $400 consisting of 8 hour blocks, then you would require only a recording budget of $2000.00 to record the same amount of songs. If the deal works out, then there could be a possibility of better pricing in the future with the studio that your company struck the initial deal with in the first place. There will be additional fees that may or may not become part of your production cost. These additional sources of spending may include musicians, other artists, producers, choreographers, and other items that may become part of the project that is in production.