Music sales widgets are the Flash based “mp3 players with built-in music store” we see appearing across the web. SNOCAP is arguably the best known vendor, thanks to high profile deals with EMI and Myspace. But there are at least half a dozen other companies offering similar tools.
Why use one of these widgets to sell music on your site? Consider:
Cost: Unless you’re a web developer, equipping your site with the features in these players will require outside help, and it won’t likely come cheap.
Fan retention: You could outsource media sales to a company like CD Baby, but that means sending fans AWAY from your site to make a sale. Hardly optimal.
Ease of implementation: The media players work just about everywhere, including Myspace and Facebook, so you don’t even need your own web site to start selling tracks! (Though, really, you do need your own web site …)
Features: Thanks to near-universal support for Flash among web browsers, you can add music streaming, and in some cases social networking, to your site without having to worry about cross-browser issues.
The Players
The most popular players come from Amie St., Blast My Music, Hoooka, Musicane, Nimbot OMT, Project Opus, and SNOCAP. The 7 have a few common features:
- They’re Flash-based, and embed in any web page with some simple HTML.
- They support the sale of individual songs, and full albums.
- They let listeners stream your music.
- They don’t require you to give up any rights in your music.
Each player also offers something unique, however, and I’ve laid out the major features below:
Rankings
I’ve ranked the services below in descending order based on the features that are most important to me as an indie artist: How much do I make per sale? And how much control do I have over what’s offered?
With the caveat that I haven’t yet used all of the services personally: The free version of Nimbit OMT is my favorite, even without the CD and merchandise selling available in the premium versions, as the revenue share and pricing flexibility are the most artist-friendly of the group. SNOCAP is my least favorite because, along with their puzzling decision to charge an annual fee, their admin interface makes me feel like I’m essentially a commodity for their exploitation.
The rest fall somewhere in between. I’ve highlighted the main distinguishing features of each so that even if your criteria differ from mine, you can still determine which player best fits your marketing strategy.
1. Nimbit OMT
Website: http://www.nimbit.com
In their own words:
The nimbit OMT is your ultimate, all-in-one sales and marketing tool… use your nimbit OMT to establish or enhance your online presence, create brand awareness, market and sell your music, promote your gigs and other events, connect with your fans, build your mailing lists, engage in creative marketing and promotional activities and/or offer your fans an easy way to work with you!
Differentiators: Collect email addresses for mailing list. And although it’s a premium feature, nimbit OMT is the only tool here that allows for the sale of CDs and merchandise.
Hightlights: Nimbit OMT shares 80% of the sale price with artists (tied for the highest rate with Hoooka.) Artists set their own sale price, although there’s a set minimum price of 49 cents.
2. Hoooka
Website: http://www.hoooka.com/
In their own words:
The hoooka is a unique technology that combines the community and networking aspects of MySpace with the digital sale opportunities and exposure of iTunes. Anyone, from artists to fans, can easily create their own portable digital locker and post it anywhere – blogs, MySpace pages, or Web sites – and instantly become their own mobile media store.
Differentiators: Hoooka’s main differentiator is their affiliate program, which allows anyone to sell tracks on an artist’s behalf and earn 10% of the revenue. The Hoooka is also the only player that offers live chat among users.
Highlights: The 80% revenue share with artists is a plus, but the fixed price of 99 cents per track will hold a lot of indie artists back.
3. Amie Street
Web site: http://amiestreet.com/
In their own words:
We support our artists by giving them 70% of song sales and never taking ownership of their creative work. We want all artists on Amie Street to be successful and we believe that our unique marketplace will accomplish this goal to a degree never achieved before. Amie Street is where bands and fans run the show.
Differentiators: The most unique thing about Amie Street is their business model. They describe it better than I can, though they promise “our pricing model encourages music lovers to discover and buy new music.”
Highlights: The service is free to join, and open to anyone. Artists don’t set the price. Rather, songs are initially free, and slowly rise in price as fans discover and purchase them. Artists get 70% of the revenue from each song, but only after it has made $5.
4. Musicane
Website: http://www.musicane.com/main/home
In their own words:
Musicane is a tool that enables artists to sell their music, video, and ringtones from any site that allows you to embed flash… The best part about musicane is that your fans can actually resell your custom stores and products! They can sign up for musicane for free and become a reseller of your content. Every time they sell a download they receive a commission that you set.
Differentiators: Musicane also caters to video and ringtone sales; And like SNOCAP, they offer Widows Media DRM protection for those who want it.
Highlights: Artists set their own per-track sale price, and Musicane shares 60% of the revenue. However, they also offer a paid service, at $20 a month, which entitles the artist to 80% of the sale price.
5. Blast My Music
Website: http://www.blastmymusic.com/
In their own words:
BlastMyMusic is an online service that lets you buy music directly from the websites of your favorite bands! As an Artist, create an account on BlastMyMusic.com and sell your own, original music directly from your websites!
Differentiators: None to speak of, which in itself might be a differentiator. BlastMyMusic is a bare-bones no-nonsense mp3 sales widget. If their revenue share was higher, this player would likely be my favorite, as it does what’s needed, and gets out of your way.
Highlights: Artists can’t set their own sale price – all songs sell for 99 cents, although the company claims this will change. BlastMyMusic shares 65% of the sale price with artists.
6. Project Opus Folio
Website: http://www.projectopus.com/
In their own words:
[T]he easiest way to share and discover new music on the web. Each player gives fans the ability to share unlimited music with their friends, which in turn gives artists continuous exposure to new fans and broader audiences.
Differentiators: Offers multiple media formats, including Ogg and AAC.
Highlights: All songs sell for $1.00, of which the artist gets 50 cents.
7. SNOCAP
Website: http://www.SNOCAP.com/
In their own words:
Sell your music on MySpace and beyond – Easily upload your music – Set your own prices – Monitor your sales on a daily basis – you keep all the rights – Only $30 per year (the first year is FREE)
Differentiators: SNOCAP integrates directly with Myspace, rather than through template hacks. They also offer Windows Media DRM, and sound recording registration through the SNOCAP Digital Registry.
Highlights: Thanks to their partnership with Myspace (and the cachet of Shawn Fanning’s involvement,) SNOCAP is the biggest name in the group. They have a no-nonsense pricing model: Artists set their own wholesale price for each track, to which SNOCAP adds a flat 39 cent fee. But for most indie artists, the service has 2 big strikes against it: SNOCAP is currently only available to U.S. residents (and only offers payment by direct bank deposit;) and while the first year of service is free, SNOCAP plans to charge $30 a year thereafter. Given the glut of competitors who charge nothing, I doubt this will last.
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A couple corrections about SNOCAP: music is also offered in WMA format, at the discretion of the music rights holder. Paypal and credit card payment options are accepted. Beyond the pricing model and partnership with MySpace, SNOCAP provides sound recording rights registration, which means that sound recordings are acoustically validated against and added to the SNOCAP Digital Registry, protecting ownership rights.
Thanks Dave. The “payment method” rows referred to the method by which artists receive payment, rather than pay for services. I updated the chart to make that clearer (and added your other points.)
Cheers.
Thanks for validating our commitment to serving the artist!
There are even MORE feature to the Online Merch Table:
-You can set any track to FREE and get an e-mail in return for the download
-You can split payment on ANY product to as many payees as you want
-eTickets will be available in two weeks
Sell direct-own your customer-own your career.
Hey Phil,
You guys look like the best bet to me. Aye aye!
Ha! Funny, I was going to write a similar post this weekend, including some non-widget options such as ejunkie and payloadz; there’s even a little chart, though yours is nicer. :) Nimbit is my #1 pick as well. I’ve been debating for a month whether to use a widget or build some kind of store… Not being a developer, part of me leans towards a widget, but then you can’t link to song-specific pages from the store… Hm… An interesting issue. Thanks!
nimbit rocks!
Hey, here’s a live Online Merch Table for you all to click around in if you want to see what it can really do.
Oops, looks like html is blocked on this comment page! Navigate to http://www.nimbitmusic.com/davecoffin to check it out.
That’s odd Dave, HTML should work … Anyway, thanks for the demo link. Looks great.
I have used the embeddable “labels playlist” widget from last.fm, which links to my website , where I have my online store linked to paypal – with this I retain 100% of sales income – has this widget been overlooked as the best value for artists, or am I missing something here?
Great roundup. I have a super large listing of Artist 2.0 services and widgets at the Music 2.0 Directory:
http://rocketsurgeon.squarespace.com/music-20-directory/
Fiona,
> has this widget been overlooked as the best value for artists, or am I missing something here?
Not at all. I only reviewed widgets with built-in purchasing features. But you’re right, the last.fm widget tied to Paypal is a great value for artists. (Though it also requires some technical know-how, which is a turn off for many.)
Cheers.
Don’t forget about http://www.soundloud.com…. way better than snocap or any other service on the market.
Hello from Project Opus!
That’s a great comparison you put together. Looks like there’s a lot of tough competition out there.
When it comes to these widgets, do you think that communication and branding features are important too? For example, the Opus Player lets you displays a picture of your choice when your mouse isn’t over it.
I’d love to hear your thoughts on what could make us better – be it revenue share or little things that can help independent artists promote themselves better.
As a musician, I wouldn’t mind getting my name out there a little bit more prominently!
Cheers,
Jeremy, from the Opus Team
http://www.projectopus.com
Thanks Jeremy,
> do you think that communication and branding features are important too?
In the short term, definitely. Though not for any of the reasons I hinted at above. (I have another article planned to expand on what I’m about to say.)
I think ultimately, a discussion of the artist-facing features in your widget is moot, because it’s a safe bet that the feature sets of all these widgets will converge. Project Opus currently lacks flexible pricing and merch sales, but you’ve got plans to add both those features. As do, I’m sure, all your competitors. Basically, you’ll have to add those features to stay relevant.
So long term, it won’t be the features in your widget, per se, that differentiate you. Rather, it’ll be the value you add behind the scenes…
Most indie artists don’t have a clue how to market themselves. This is partly because of the bull we’ve been fed all our lives by the industry (i.e. “write good songs, get a record deal, and you’ll succeed,”) and partly because the industry now finds itself in such flux (i.e. no one has a clue how to market any more.)
Yet half the widgets I reviewed, most notably SNOCAP, exist because of the perception that indie artists are leaving money on the table. That is, we can draw people to our web sites just fine, but we fail to convert them into customers because we lack a store front. In essence, SNOCAP seems to believe not only that indie artists can take care of their own marketing, but that people can be enticed to buy music simply by making it easy for them to do so.
Well, we already know that’s not true. People buy music, and indeed any product, only when they feel it has value. And then, they’ll buy it whether it’s easy or not. Artists will only succeed, then, by convincing listeners of their music’s value, which in essence means getting their music heard. So contrary to the SNOCAP approach: The best widget is one that offers me a chance to get my music heard by people who AREN’T on my site.
Consequently, as trite as it sounds, the successful sales widget of the future will simply be the one with the most listeners. The features, from the artists’ perspective at least, will be irrelevant.
OK, so to address your point directly:
> I’d love to hear your thoughts on what could make us better – be it revenue
> share or little things that can help independent artists promote themselves better.
Focus on the fans, not the artists.
When all the widgets offer the same basic features to the artists but yours is the one that FANS want to use, you’ve got a winner.
I can expand on this if you want. But in brief, I think fans want three things: Suggestions about music they might enjoy, a community to share their discoveries with, and incentive for participating in the first place. Call it the 3 R’s of the perfect sales widget: recommendations, recognition, and rewards.
Pandora meets Fark meet Matthew Lesko.
As far as I can tell Project Opus is in good shape here: A lot of your users are passionate about the service, and the possibilities they see for it. And you guys do community REALLY well. I love how your site feels like a destination, and I immediately get the sense that you care about the artists rather than the sales. Basically, you’re the opposite of SNOCAP.
Hi Des,
Thanks so much for the response! It’s being passed around the office as we speak, and we really appreciate your thoughts on the topic.
Online music is and interesting one. Have you ever heard of the saying, “You’re not buying a drill, you’re buying a hole?” I think you’re right on target about having a widget that fans want to use.
You’re so, so right!
Maybe we shouldn’t be pushing for artists with higher payout rates, or more features to move products. Yes, we’ll probably have to make that move to help adoption, but the end goal is to help people promote and sell their music.
This is a whole new can of worms to tackle. It should be obvious, but it quite profound. You’re a much better marketer than I, sir.
In terms of recommendations, recognition, and rewards, we actually have something in play. But, it won’t be on Project Opus – not right away, anyways!
Looking forward to the follow up article,
Jeremy, from the Opus Team
http://www.projectopus.com
Hi Des,
I saw something similar to Hooka, and I thought you might be interested.
http://www.fandoodle.com
Cheers,
Jeremy, from the Opus Team
http://www.projectopus.com
This is a fantastic list, but I was wondering if you had any resources or links for creating your own widget of this type? Most of these have limited customization and finding much info about how-to is proving quite difficult.
This is brilliant articles and thanks for the comments too. I am wondering if anyone knows of a widget that DOESN’T require the user to become a member of the site? I feel that must put off a LOT of potential buyers. Why can’t we just buy something and be gone?
As an artist (influences include Radiohead, Dylan, Queen, Tool, Nina Simone) I have tried Musicane and 7digital so far and am seeking advice.
Musicane: seems to only accept US credit cards – I thought they claimed to be international widgets. Any idea how to do this? Plus the forementioned paypal doesn’t come up as an option at all on my widget.
7Digital: Anyone know how (on the free subscription) we can set MUCH lower prices.
On the plus side these two widgets are easy to embed seem pretty intuitive to use, and update themselves quickly. Musicane’s one incorporates the idea of automatically allowing re-selling of an artist’s music by anyone. Brilliant.
Please let me know when you write an updated article, or revisit this subject! I’d love to read what you have to say. Thanks.
Sincerely,
Michael M.
Thanks for the mention, Jeremy! Let me point out the unique thing FanDoodle offers – Fans become partners with Artists and receive 20% of sales they generate. Artists get 60% with the balance going to FanDoodle. We launched FanDoodle Digital today, a service that allows Artists to upload music and banners, manage text content and images, and set their own price – and begin selling through Fans and friends immediately. Payments are handled through Paypal.
We figure that the Fan is doing the bulk of the marketing and should be rewarded.
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