Major League Affiliate Music Marketing

A few weeks ago I sparked the conversation on Internet Music Marketing, or how musicians need to start thinking like the Internet Marketing crowd in order to really capture data and sell their music online. What sparked was a really cool conversation on promoting other people’s stuff via affiliate marketing. This is by no means the official guide, but a way to make some money by promoting offers to your fans via your mailing list or your blogs, Twitter accounts, etc.

As with all marketing, this is best used in a transparent mode (read the new FTC stuff by Frank Kern, who was sued for millions by them a few years back), and used in moderation. Just because a few people bought something from an affiliate link, doesn’t mean you need to star over stuffing your emails and blog posts with them.

The Major League Affiliate Networks

This post will feature 2 networks and I aim to continue to work with music companies to get their affiliate info. The overall data will be inside Label 2.0 (sorry, need to give preference to those that put food on my table). We will be looking into iTunes and Amazon and how you can use their expansive network and product catalog to make some extra change.

iTunes Affiliate Program

Sign up to becom an iTunes affilaite here. It is super easy and done through LinkShare (affiliate link), a reputable affiliate marketing company that is known for paying its affiliates on time and tracking your stats pretty aggressively. The notion of the iTunes affiliate program is that you can link to albums, singles, movies, ringtones and really anything else in their marketplace and make 5% on all transaction. This means if you sell an album for $9.99 you will generate about 50 cents. Not exactly retirement money, but get creative and grow your audience, and the residuals can add up. Signing up for the iTunes program may take a few days for approval.

Check out a FAQ here.

Amazon Affiliate Program

Amazon was one of the pioneers in online affiliate marketing and is essentially how they grew to the size they are. With their affiliate program, you can link to digital singles and albums, physical CD’s, books to guitars and musical instruments along with the millions of other products they offer. Amazon pays commissions directly and has a tiered commission structure, meaning the more you sell the higher your commission. You start at 4% and can easily work your way to 6% and higher by gaining a few sales. Again, this may not be the money to retire on, but in the following idea session part of the blog post, you may be able to get gas money for your next road trip.

Sign-up to be an affiliate on Amazon here (disclosure: Affiliate link)

How to Use These Affiliate Programs for Your Music

Now that you are signed up to the top 2 networks you need to start putting the links in your content, in a very usable and trustworthy way. In this tutorial we are going to use Amazon as they offer a wider range of products and the ideas can be structured for all of them.

Campaign Ideas

The first step is to generate an idea of what you want to promote. Some things off the top of the mind include:

Your gear - Talk about the guitars you use, why you use it, the sound it gives you, etc. At the end of the post say something like, if you want to try it out, here’s a link to grab one yourself.

Bands of a bill - This is the easiest and most efficient. When you have an upcoming show, do quick reviews on the bands you are playing with. Maybe a few sentences on why you are excited to play with them, some pics and maybe a YouTube video. Tell your fans that if they want to check out their music and start learning the lyrics before the show, grab a digital download here and thus link to their album on Amazon. This will get your fans excited about the show if the other bands are cool too and helps promote the other acts and they may return the favor.

Bands of a bill on Twitter - Fire out a Tweet or two saying something to the tune of: “Can’t wait to rock with XYZ Band this Friday - Insert Affiliate Link”

Sidebar links - If your band has a blog (Music Marketing 101) use the sidebar as a place to promote stuff you believe in, from music to gear to great books you read on a road trip. Your fans are interested in the stuff you do and these links can get a good amount of attention. The best part is that if they click on a link to buy something and end up buying something else during that visit, you get credit for that sale as well!

Emails - You always want to provide value when sending emails to your fans. One really cool thing we have done with some of our roster of bands is send emails telling fans to check out another really cool band. Something to the tune of,

“Hey guys - On our recent road trip we couldn’t stop listening to XYZ and we just had to share their music with you. Hopefully we can share a bill with them soon and the show will be super bad ass. Affiliate link.”

Getting Links and Banners

Now, let’s grab these links and banners from Amazon. After you login, you want to go to the links and banners page. From there I would click on the Product Links Tab to start searching for specific products to sell.

The next step is to choose a category, maybe music, DVD’s, books, music instruments or whatever else you are looking for. Then pick the keyword, from product name, to band name, album title or a general category. I do suggest having a product in mind before performing the search. Also remember that if the band is indie, they may not have their album within Amazon’s catalog yet.

Once you hit search it will look for the product. From this screen you need to hit “Get Link.” It is here that you get the code that you need to insert on your site, on Twitter or other places.

This next screen will tell you how to get the links, with either a text only, image only or text and image. You can add your own graphics and change things from here as long as you keep the link intact.

And below is a live affiliate product link for Caveman Theory’s album - The Stone Quarter. I do recommend their music for hip-hop heads, so please feel free to pick up the CD from the link below and you will buy me a beer or 3 when Amazon cuts me a check.

Amazon also has Mp3 widgets, that you can get to on the widget tab at the top. From here you can add whole albums, add select songs and make a “mixtape” to share with your fans or have singles that you think will be valuable to your fans. These will link back to Amazon and you will make commission on the sales.

Then you place the widget on your site, in your sidebar or within a post and get something like this:

Again, that is a live affiaite widget, where you can preview the artist’s music and then allow them to click and buy. The tracks are 30 second clips.

Closing Thoughts

This is powerful stuff and creates a new stream of income for your band and music. I do warn of abuse as when you stuff salesy stuff to your fans, they will start to ignore the ads and eventually ignore you. The goal is to provide value around what you are already offering and doing. Sprinkle links in blog posts you would have written anyway. We always advise against writing posts specifically for promoting affiliate links. It doesn’t come out naturally and your fans can call your bullshit.

This is not to say don’t monetize. Monetize the hell out of your music. Just do it in a way that you would want to be presented. You have something precious in your fans. Treat them like royalty and they will reward you.

Let’s talk in the comments!

-Greg Rollett