When it comes to digital music sales, most artists tend to think first of Apple’s iTunes store, Google Play, Amazon, Wal-mart, and a few other major retailers. Generally the newer service Gumroad is not one of the services thought of in regards to digital music sales. This is unfortunate since Gumroad does something the major retailers don’t do: let the artists sell directly to the fans. Since it is a fairly new service on the block, let’s look at the benefits of using Gumroad as one of your digital music sales platforms.
What Is It That Gumroad Does Differently?
When a fan goes to a service such as iTunes or Amazon to buy a digital copy of your album, you don’t know whom they are. What I mean is, your reports from the seller doesn’t say John Doe bought your album. Instead you just get sales numbers saying how many copies were sold. Gumroad is different because for the fan to buy your music, they have to enter their email address. Furthermore, you can see that email address in the sales records. This really isn’t very different from collecting email addresses for your newsletter.
Secondly, Gumroad isn’t going to tell your fans “hey since you like this artists you may like these suggestions.” They’re not being sold to by the service like with some of the major retailers. Gumroad simply acts more as a strict “seller” role and let’s your fans feel like they are buying straight from you. In a sense, they are doing exactly that. You are doing the promotion still, and Gumroad is simply handling the financial transaction and digital content delivery.
Thirdly, let’s say a fan has come to your website and wants to buy your music. When they click on the link for iTunes, it takes them away from your site for them to buy your music. Gumroad simplifies the process and let’s your fans buy faster and easier without leaving your site. Instead of the link taking your fans to a different site, Gumroad’s links tie into your site directly. If you use WordPress, there are even plugins to simplify it further.
You Want To Make A Living From This
While you may make a larger volume of sales through the major stores, they also tend to take larger percentages of the sales money. iTunes and Google take 30% commission on each sale. Gumroad is a scant 5% commission plus $0.25 per transaction. Just like the major retailers, Gumroad handles all major credit cards so you don’t have to worry about your fans buying abilities being limited. You can also allow your fans to pay what they want rather than have a fixed price. There are some artists who have seen great results using this pricing approach.
Share With Your Fans Anywhere
Gumroad knows that people want to buy your music with as little hassle as possible. iTunes gets a huge boost iPhone sales just as Google Play gets a huge boost from the vast number of Android phones in use. Gumroad knows this works and has taken steps to make mobile purchases easy as well.
Gumroad Is Serious Business
While Gumroad is one of the new kids on the block, that doesn’t mean they are a small fish. Shortly after their initial launch, Gumroad raised $8.1 million from a bunch of A List investors. Add to that the fact that artists such as Wiz Khalifa are making significant use of the service. Music sales are not the only thing you can sell via Gumroad. You can also sells ebooks/PDFs, videos, and other types of digital media. So if you’d rather stick with the major services for your music sales, you can still utilize Gumroad for selling videos and such. At the least, give Gumroad a look and see if you think it’s a good fit for you.