Tunecore All-in-One Distribution

[Deeprig9]

I've been a big fan of them so far, still haven't finished the album but so far the plan is to use Tunecore for distribution in Itunes et al, use the ministore to sell physical discs, and they used to have pricing up for the actual duplication that we would use, it was very competitive. But they've taken the price list down. Now, you have to finish your album artwork and send it in to them to get a price quote. I think this is backwards.

 

Many bands will design the artwork and arrangment of the inserts based on what's affordable. The time sitting down and everyone finally agreeing on what it's going to be, then getting a price quote too high, sending us back to the drawing board. Or even worse, whittle it down to what we think is affordable, all agree on it, only to have the price come back lower than we expected, and have to go back to the drawing board to include other things we thought we couldn't afford.

 

It's a big mess. Tunecore, is there a reason you decided to hide your pricing for duplication?

[Helecho Macho]

Great question!

 

Transparency is the key to good commerce.

[Deeprig9]

There may be a good reason. Perhaps the whole idea to get into the duplication business was to simply offer an at-cost ancillary service to encourage tunecore sign-ups for their digital distribution, and too many people were taking advantage of the dup service without signing up for digital distribution. I'm not assuming there's a sinister reason behind the decision, but they should still put the pricing up there and just flat out state it's for tunecore clients exclusively, if that's the reason.

[PeterTuneCore]

I'm so rarely here these days any more, just too busy to keep up. But I'm glad I checked in for this one!

 

I honestly don't know the reasons offhand, I'm not part of manufacturing, but I know the guys who run it, and I'll ask them.

 

Stay tuned!

 

--Peter

peter@tunecore.com

 

 

 

I've been a big fan of them so far, still haven't finished the album but so far the plan is to use Tunecore for distribution in Itunes et al, use the ministore to sell physical discs, and they used to have pricing up for the actual duplication that we would use, it was very competitive. But they've taken the price list down. Now, you have to finish your album artwork and send it in to them to get a price quote. I think this is backwards. Many bands will design the artwork and arrangment of the inserts based on what's affordable. The time sitting down and everyone finally agreeing on what it's going to be, then getting a price quote too high, sending us back to the drawing board. Or even worse, whittle it down to what we think is affordable, all agree on it, only to have the price come back lower than we expected, and have to go back to the drawing board to include other things we thought we couldn't afford. It's a big mess. Tunecore, is there a reason you decided to hide your pricing for duplication?

 

[PeterTuneCore]

Okay gang, I have an answer, and as I suspected, it's just a question of display and time.

 

Our pricing on-line is not up to date, it's actually DROPPED, so what was online kept falling further and further out of date. We haven't automated the pricing page, but there's SO MUCH going on, we simply haven't the tech time to change it all and we just dont have the resources. So as a stop gap, we have people send in what they want so we can get them a custom quote.

 

You can still get any kind of quote! We'll have a more dynamic page up soon. Thanks!

 

--Peter

peter@tunecore.com

[Deeprig9]

Thanks Peter!!

 

BTW, that story about you was put off by the editors for the Fall when all the students come back to town.

[PeterTuneCore]

Okay, no problem. Also, we DO update the pricing for CDs as often as we can. Check out what's there now:

 

http://www.tunecore.com/manufacturing/lowrun

 

and

 

http://www.tunecore.com/manufacturing/highrun

 

Enjoy!

 

--Peter

 

 

 

Thanks Peter!! BTW, that story about you was put off by the editors for the Fall when all the students come back to town.

 

[BlueStrat]

I signed up in January ( I think) and finally got my stuff up on the sites in late May. I still haven't seen a dime from PayPal, though I know at least two people have bought my CD. I guess I'll reserve judgment for a couple of months, but so far I'm underwhelmed. Which sucks, because I heard such great things about it.

[rlindsey0]

 

Okay, no problem. Also, we DO update the pricing for CDs as often as we can. Check out what's there now: http://www.tunecore.com/manufacturing/lowrun and http://www.tunecore.com/manufacturing/highrun Enjoy! --Peter

 

 

Wait, what happened to the 8-page booklet option for low-run printing? That was exactly what our band was going to need, and now it's gone!

 

Is that still available by special request?

[Deeprig9]

Wait, what happened to the 8-page booklet option for low-run printing? That was exactly what our band was going to need, and now it's gone! Is that still available by special request?

 

Me too.

[Deeprig9]

And wouldn't you know it.... right now I need asap info on my tunecore account and it's the one time the site is down "For reasons beyond our control"

 

What the hell is that? For reasons beyond our control? WTF happened? Should I turn on CNN?

[lowendnyc]

My band just uploaded our tracks last Friday and just days later they've made it to Amazon and Napster. As part of our rollout, we're planning to do a limited run of the disc that we'll be hiring a promotion company to get to bloggers, radio, etc. I'm not even sure what I'd do if someone offered me a record contract, and I'm very interested to see what will come out of this.

[Deeprig9]

I'm excited too, I signed up a while ago and just got the album mastered and am having a blast putting it up. It's a menial task, but exciting because you and your music getting international distribution, for like $8 per member. I also just checked out the high-run prices.... unbelievable how they can do it that cheap.

[aliensporebomb]

I wonder if BlueStrat is experiencing something I've seen with other online

distribution companies in that you have to accrue a certaiin amount before

you see a check or paypal deal.

[rlindsey0]

I had high hopes for TuneCore, but so far, their performance has been poor IMHO. They haven't gotten the music live in any consistent way (after 7 weeks, the album is still "processing"--we don't even get a "sent" message). The music hasn't shown up where it should have.

 

What's worse, the responsiveness of Support has been VERY poor. I've been trying to get some simple questions answered for 2 weeks now. All I got was one e-mail that said basically nothing; no response at all to subsequent queries, and no improvement in the digital distribution situation.

 

I'm sure others have had better experiences, but I'm pretty disappointed. I feel like we should have just gone to CDBaby for a one-stop shopping experience.

[Bobsax]

I got an album up a few months ago and sales are trickling in, the thing is I can't figure out what songs are selling? They have this thing called a Trending Report with an introductory price of $2.98.

I hope this isn't the only way to find out which songs are selling?

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I figured it out and you don't need the Trending Report.

It's pretty cool to see what tunes people are streaming and buying.

[rlindsey0]

 

I had high hopes for TuneCore, but so far, their performance has been poor IMHO. They haven't gotten the music live in any consistent way (after 7 weeks, the album is still "processing"--we don't even get a "sent" message). The music hasn't shown up where it should have. What's worse, the responsiveness of Support has been VERY poor. I've been trying to get some simple questions answered for 2 weeks now. All I got was one e-mail that said basically nothing; no response at all to subsequent queries, and no improvement in the digital distribution situation. I'm sure others have had better experiences, but I'm pretty disappointed. I feel like we should have just gone to CDBaby for a one-stop shopping experience.

 

 

Things are looking much better now. We'll see how it goes.

[Michael Blue]

Watching intently....

[rhmcfarland]

I was very impressed with how fast and accessible Tunecore was for the Pegasus Actual project.

However, I do have a question:

I was looking at i-Tunes (UK-Europe) and noticed that the song order was changed pretty substantially. Is there any way to correct that?

Thanks,

Randy

 

www.myspace.com/PegasusActualMusic

[Bobsax]

Peter from TuneCore said in another post that once your album goes live it's "out of there hands".

I'm curious as what that means? I've got an album that's been live for at least 3 months. In other words I have 3 months of sales reports in my account and I'm still not on eMusic. I think I paid something extra to be on eMusic.

It's hard to tell because I can't figure out how to see what I signed and paid for in my TuneCore account.

[June Moris]

A few questions to those who've had their cd's online for sale for a while.

1.If you are on Tunecore are your cd's also for sale at CD baby?

2.How is your cd doing sell wise?

3.How will people find you through the mass availabliliy of new music?

4. How many of you have read through the terms and conditions of tunecore?

About 4. here is a paste from the terms:The question is how do you translate this. Will you have to pay as the artist license fees when distributed out of the US? and what if you have your own barcode? I won't need one not even a free one.

 

Tunecore T&Cs:

If with respect to any DMSP outside of the United States Company is not able to do so,

Company shall have the right, at its option, to either (i) decline to license such DMSP,

or (ii) assume the responsibility to clear and pay for the music publishing licenses required

in connection with such DMSP's sales, which license fees Company shall have the right to deduct

from royalties payable to you hereunder. To the extent Company is required, or elects

(in its sole discretion), to pay any of the foregoing amounts, such payments will be deducted

from any royalties otherwise due to you in connection with paragraph 3 above.

 

If bar codes or UPCs are transferred or resold, $25.00 per bar code or UPC plus any revenue

made from the transfer or resale.

[Bobsax]

1) I'm just using TuneCore. One album live , two in the works.

2) It's selling as I expected. It's not TuneCore's responsibility to market you.

(see comments below)

3) See #2

4) I don't know.

I do have a few observations that I posted elsewhere.

I just finished another album with TuneCore and I've got a few gripes.

1) I've been working on a Halloween album and I wanted it out a few weeks before Oct.31 so I've been busting my balls to get it out today (Aug.31).

In the TuneCore FAQ's they write"On average it takes about 4-6 weeks to go live on all stores". After I paid I get a message that it will take 8 to 10 weeks to go live. This screws me. Edit 9//20 , I'm up on iTunes USA so YAA! it actually took less then 3 weeks

 

2) It ended up costing me $44 and I don't remember the other album costing that much. It would be nice to be able to go back and deselect some of the stores to bring down the charges a little. So far all my sales have been iTunes and Napster streams.

I was shown the price breakdown and asked to pay. I didn't want the Trending Report but when I deselected it I was taken to another page and couldn't get back to the billing page. All I could do was use the back button and go ahead and pay. I am not thrilled with the heavy and deceptive marketing involved with these Trending Reports.

 

3)I would like to be able to see a breakdown of the charges for this album (and the last one} but I can't seem to find it in my account. Perhaps it's just hard to find? I hope the information is available? I was immediately emailed a spam from TuneCore about a free offer and PayPal sent me a receipt of the total cost but no detailed receipt from TuneCore.