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I am pretty happy with where things are going as far as growth of my income doing this. I started uploading a few years ago (April) and writing about 4 years ago. Since my second year, my income is doubling every year, and so far this year is almost double what it was last. If you are consistently contributing, is it reasonable to expect this to continue then eventually level off, i.e. maybe grow more because you are contributing more, but not necessarily double (maybe say, grew 10% because you added 10% more tracks)? For consistent contributors, what has your growth curve, for lack of a better word, been like?
Caveat: Still not near hitting my goals so far, i.e. not quitting my day job just yet.
Yeah, I remember those days…. 🙂 Things will level off. Probably even turn out more like a roller coaster (up and down) than an uphill climb you’re currently on. When you’re starting out, it’s not hard to double your income every year for a few years. I had times where growth was up to 80% a quarter. Unfortunately, when you hit a certain stage, it just CAN’T hold that kind of growth. Wish it could…..
20% annual growth for normal business (of course music is anything BUT normal) would be considered exceptional if you could keep the growth up for years.
Yeah, I remember those days…. ? Things will level off. Probably even turn out more like a roller coaster (up and down) than an uphill climb you’re currently on.
Roller coaster is how I would describe it, from the perspective of having written production music for 3+ decades.
Companies come and go. Tastes change. Tracks, with some exceptions, do not last forever.
My experience was very similar Chuck. I had exponential growth for my 1st 5 years or so. I’m starting to show signs of leveling off now (into my 7th year). However, I am now getting 1-3 large sync fees per year. That combined with a larger library still has me at 10%-20% annual growth. I expect that will end soon though.
Search out my post “5 year report” I did a couple of years ago if you haven’t seen it.For consistent contributors, what has your growth curve, for lack of a better word, been like?
I feel fortunate that I’ve built what seems to be a base of steady, consistent high-earner tracks. Although a couple of these may fallout, a couple more take their place.
And writing and adding new tracks each quarter ends up looking (not surprisingly) like the bell-shaped curve — a couple become high-earners, a couple become no-earners and everything in-between. That’s how it’s been progressing for me.
I’ve been at this for a little over 6 years, mostly on RF sites. Things were pretty steady until this year. My RF sales have dropped off but PRO payments through BMI have increased nicely. I have only 1 RF site that I am getting consistent sales through even though I am with quite a few. Things are changing with much more competition out there.
I started with RF in 2008, and made a killing until some point in 2012. During that time I was pretty convinced that I could stop gigging, so I did and stayed home to write more. From 2013-2014 I watched it all slide downward even though my quality was going upward. In 2015 I decided to try a more balanced approach and put more time into exclusive TV placement libraries. Art always mentioned that a good idea was to have a ‘balanced’ portfolio. Only time will tell if I’ve made the right choices, and all of it was surely a gamble. That said, this year I decided to continue writing for TV placements, but also speed write some tracks for the garbage sites I promised myself I would never submit to. Whatever it takes, at this point. My advice to those of you that have a successful RF library connection (which seems like it is an eternal fountain of money): assume that income will disappear at some point soon or in the future, because this industry changes. Always.
My RF sales have dropped off …Things are changing with much more competition out there.
We may be at critical mass. The flow of composers and music into the library business far exceeds meaningful demand and composers compete against themselves on multiple sites.
The ultimate question may be whether or not the level at which you plateau is enough to sustain you.
Obviously you don’t have to give names but can I ask people in general, how many libraries they are in and how many they consider to be consistent?
Im in my second year doing library music and I’m with 8 RF libraries now with about 300 tracks. For different reasons I don’t have the same tracks in every library and not the same amount of tracks so its not a “fair” comparison.
I’ve had 0 sales with 2 of them. The most consistent library earns me more per month than all the other combined per year.
If the sales continues as they are now (and thats a big if, I know) I will by the end of this year have doubled my income from last year.
I have at same time submitted about 150 tracks to exclusive and non-exlusive broadcast libraries, but its to early to see any results from them I guess.