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Trac — Sign yourself. Be your own label.
We empower independent artists with the tools needed to launch & grow their career.
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Brian Roach
Congrats on the launch! đź‘Źđź‘Ź I think $40/month is a big ask for indie artists who make virtually nothing on their music tho. Anybody else have any thoughts on pricing model?
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@itsbrex Thanks for the note! We also have a free tier where they don't have to pay anything. This will work for those artists who are just starting out and don't yet have a following to monetize beyond streaming on Spotify.
For the paid tiers, we're packaging a lot more than the typical distributor that really only focusses on that - distribution. With Trac, artists get not only unlimited distribution, but they also get a website that they can use to brand themselves, sell their merch, and promote their tours all in one place, among other things. We also share with them all of their fan data & help them with tools to monetize.
The website is automatically maintained for them too, so it's a low maintenance offering compared to Bandzoogle, Wix or SquareSpace for this audience where they're already paying ~$20/month. No longer will they have to pay to release music on one of our competitors and then have to pay and update their website themselves somewhere else, this is all automatically done for them now. In addition, baked into the price, we're taking care of their publishing administration - which is a $100+ annual cost at some of our competitors like TuneCore or CDBaby.
We're packing a lot of necessary value into our paid offerings...simulating the major label experience. All the artist has to do is show up with the music, distribute it and we'll take care of pretty much everything else they'll need.
Hope that clarifies.
@mrdobelina we have a free tier for those artists that are just starting out. So they can distribute for free and step up to the paid tiers when they're ready to start monetizing beyond streams. Like merch, publishing, touring (post COVID), etc.
How does Trac solve the problem of disbursing payments to all contributors a piece? This is still a huge issue with the existing platforms
@king_uchi when you release music on Trac we take into account who are all the collaborators and contributors. We ask for the percentage split of not only the publishing side of the music, but also the master recording side. The master recording is what pays out for streams and downloads. Once we collect who all the collaborators are and what percentage of the songs they own, we save that data and use it to calculate the appropriate payout we issue to each collaborator.
In the future we intend to move this to the blockchain to further decentralize this function and bring even more transparency to earnings and payouts. No more black box accounting for artist earnings.
@musictriage Yes, absolutely!
We're simulating the major label experience for artists. So everything that a major label would provide - we're providing in the cloud without the handcuffs.
So the artist just needs to show up with music and we pretty much take care of the rest, while they retain 100% of their earnings.
Check out the website where we go into more detail about each tool/offering: trac.co. And shoot me a note offline so that I can share more, if needed. :-)
Hey Hunters!
Trac gives independent artists all of the major record label services, but without the handcuffs or headaches. We use automation and machine learning to streamline most of what independent artists need, without trapping them into a contract forever. Our services fall in three main categories: marketing, finance & analytics.
Our marketing services provide:
- Music Distribution: We get your music on Spotify, Apple Music, Tik Tok, Instagram and all of the other music streaming services.
- Artist Profiles: Low maintenance artist websites that are automatically built and maintained for artists, so they can focus on making music.
- Fan Relationship Management: tools that brings artists and fans closer together. .
Our financial services provide:
- Automated Payouts: the ability to split song ownership with collaborators and automate payouts to everyone.
- Timed Agreements: Artists can split ownership for a specific period of time.
Our analytics services provide:
- Performance Insights: A historical view of all streams, money earned, fan demographics, and more.
- Predictive Analytics: Predictions of what future streams & earnings will be and provide optimization recommendations for how to improve.
I started Trac because I want to re-imagine the entire music ecosystem. Trac is the music platform that I needed when I was an independent artist back in high school. I want to make things easier for the next generation of artists who dream of a career in the music industry; just as easy as it was for me to pick up a programming book and become a successful engineer.
Our mission is to create a stable middle class in music. We believe the artist is the new label, hence why our slogan is “Sign Yourself. Be your own label”. This is just the beginning, join us on this movement by spreading the word!
Thank you for your support and we welcome any thoughts or questions!
@cardin_campbell looks cool! how does this differentiate from some of the other tools in this space like DistroKid, TuneCore, CDBaby, etc?
@matt_levin Those competitors that you've listed are all taking care of only one thing, distribution. So we asked, what about the rest of the needs of the artist? What about branding, merch, fan management, touring? Those are all forgotten, but are so needed...so we've built an all-in-one experience to handle all of it in a seamless way. Each service being integrated with the others. No longer a fragmented and disconnected experience.
Artists want to just focus on making music. With Trac, they can do that and know that they have a trusted partner/platform to be there with them every step of their journey. We're simulating that major label experience, without the handcuffs...but now they're the label. We're flipping things right side up.
We have a few other innovative things coming that we'll be announcing in the future. NFT's on the blockchain, predictive AI models to help predict the popularity of a song and share it with the artists (this simulates the A&R). Like I said in my first comment...this is just the beginning!
Digging the idea of not requiring a paid account to pay splits out to collaborators, which is a real pain point with other distributors right now. One less spreadsheet to maintain!
@baze_blackwood this was definitely something we were mindful of when building. Glad you like it!
Hi, can you share with me the payment schedule for royalties from Spotify, Apple Music, 45 days since streaming month or 60 days?
Amazing work @cardin_campbell ! Is there a company behind this or is this more of a solo project?
@cardin_campbell Nice, curious how did you become a music aggregator for distribution? Did you make individual deals with each provider or are you using a white label solution like (https://sonosuite.com/)
Looking to develop some tooling for managers and information around this area is very limited. Would love to shoot you a note offline to continue this discussion if you're open to it.
@siva_siva No, not using that platform (never heard of them). Feel free to reach out to me to discuss offline!
Great idea and progress @cardin_campbell. Trac will be disruptive! Looking forward to catching up soon.
I think its great! Things that should be taking into consideration is that apple music should be a free thing to distribute to.
