What to expect from PROs

[MaLmusic]

Hey, I’m new here, I’ve been checking this site quite intensely since yesterday, a lot of great info in here!

I was wondering… I haven’t had the chance to receive money from my PRO yet, for placements in TV or movies and whatnot. I recently had a placement in a small indy movie, so hopefully it will air on TV sometimes, so I can get some royalites lol… But I was wondering. How much money can I expect from TV placements? If anyone wants to share some of their experiences, it would be great. Like for example:  I got an instrumental placed in a reality TV show on MTV, they used 27 seconds, and I received about X money for it… You know, specific examples like that, to give me a better idea.

Or if anyone wants to point me to a thread where people discussed that subject, that would be nice.

Thanks!

[soundslikejoe]

Here are two examples…. both are bad ones to give you an idea of the worst case scenario. 🙂

I landed a commercial last year that was 30sec.  It played 2000+ times in a Local-TV market all hours of the day.  I made about $15 from that one last quarter.

In 2011 I composed the theme for a TV show on the Outdoor Channel. The show aired 3x per week for 52 weeks. My music was used for the intro and was about 1:45 of background music. I made ZERO from ASCAP b/c they didn’t “survey” that show that year.  Despite my efforts of collecting and submitting cue sheets, and emailing several people….

Bottom line, it’s a quantity gig for most. Get hundreds of placements if you can.  Charge enough when doing the production work and the royalties are a nice bonus. Don’t expect to do well giving your music away and hoping the PROs will send a fatty check.

[Art Munson]

Welcome aboard Mlmusic.

FWIW here is my experience. I’ve been doing this about 7 years and I watched my PRO income slowly build to the point that my most recent BMI quarterly check was low five figures. There are plenty of other composers that do much better than that. I get anywhere from 10 to 20 uses a day (some of those are repeats), generally cable with a few major networks. I’m guessing there are a few hundred tracks out there earning those dollars.

BTW that does not include any license fees, not many but an additional $2k last year.

[MichaelL]

In 2011 I composed the theme for a TV show on the Outdoor Channel. The show aired 3x per week for 52 weeks. My music was used for the intro and was about 1:45 of background music. I made ZERO from ASCAP b/c they didn’t “survey” that show that year.  Despite my efforts of collecting and submitting cue sheets, and emailing several people….

 

….why I switched from ASCAP to BMI.

[Author]

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