Is anyone making any money from stock music anymore?

[guscave]

I’ve always worked primarily with exclusive libraries dealing with TV sync licensing. About 2 years ago I decided to dip into the royalty free market. I never really made much money from that so I gave it up and put all my focus back on TV sync licensing.

I know that the subscription services have all but killed the RF market for us composers but I was wondering if any of you who were making decent money before are making anything more than a couple of bucks a month now days from RF music.

[StevenOBrien]

I was making between $500-$1000 month from Pond5 in 2018, but it started to taper off in 2019. I tried to expand out to other RF sites, but was always either rejected or given terrible terms, so when I left Pond5 after the change, my revenue from stock music dropped to $0. From what I’ve heard, their sales are so bad now that I haven’t lost much revenue by leaving.

I still sometimes make sales through my SoundCloud, but you’re talking the odd $50 maybe once every month or two.

[guscave]

Thanks Steven, That’s kinda what I’ve been hearing. Someone told me last week that they were making over $2500 a month a few years ago, which was enough for them to live on full time. But had to go back to the 9 to 5 last year due to the drastic drop in revenue.

[MaxPower]

I’m not making any money from the old stock music sites on which I used to make a decent amount. I reckon the subscription sites have killed them.

[LAwriter]

Still doing “OK”. Not great. Raised my prices substantially. For the most part, doing higher ending sounding stuff that most others are not doing. Real instrument based. Buyers seem to be willing to pay more for that as I don’t think they can easily find it in the subscription based libraries.

[Author]

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